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To Sam

About my father

I have a father who loves to use a credit card, even though his salary was enough to pay for our family. until finally, he owes that to this day has not paid off. my mother had advised my father to stop using credit but my dad still does not want to. so what should I do?
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Sam

Hi there

Thanks for your message, I can hear that you are really concerned about your dad using his credit card and you would like him to stop.

It can be really hard for us to see someone we care about doing something that isn’t good for them or the family and it’s natural to want to make it stop. You ask what you can do about it and it sounds like you are starting to take on the responsibility to make your dad stop.

Your dad is an adult and he is responsible for his own decisions and behaviour and it is not your responsibility to make him stop. I know this can be hard to accept when you really want someone to change but usually someone will only change when they feel ready to but I can see you really want to find an answer to this. Sometimes people close to us are not aware of the impact their behaviour is having on us.

I’m aware that you would like to do something so maybe you could let your dad know how you feel about what he is doing. Perhaps you could let him know how much this is worrying you and your concerns for the future if he continues to do this.

You might find it helpful to have a look at the money worries page. In it you will find more information around how money issues can affect families and some ideas around spending less money. You don’t say how you and your dad get along usually but some of these tips can be as useful for adults as well as children and depending on your relationship with him you might consider sharing them with him. This might also be a good way for you to show him how worried you are about his spending at the moment.

It can be hard to cope with our worries sometimes and if you ever want to talk in some more detail about this you can talk to a ChildLine counsellor by calling free on 0800 1111 or by logging in for a 1-2-1 online chat.

Take care

Sam

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