Nicole has a spreadsheet. She has debit card “envelopes.” She has calendar reminders set three to four days before every bill is due. What she didn’t have, until she spent a week tracking her spending for the HerMoney podcast, was a clear picture of what was left over after all of it.
“I was really shocked,” she told Jean Chatzky, “I had a month or two where I wasn’t really buying a lot of extra nonsense or traveling anywhere. And when I saw the number last month, I was like, ‘Wow, I could really be doing something with this money, and I’m just not doing anything.'”
Nicole is 56, lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she works as a senior executive assistant earning about $100k a year. She’s been divorced for nearly 20 years. She’s navigating menopause, a breast cancer diagnosis that was caught early, and the ongoing work of rebuilding a financial life entirely on her own terms. She spent $1,718.93 in the seven days she tracked, and a significant portion of that wasn’t discretionary spending at all.
“It feels really good to be able to say it’s easy to turn around and pay off an eight-hundred-dollar expense knowing that I have the money in the bank to do so,” she said.
Here’s how the week unfolded.
Day 1: Routine Bills To Start The Week
💸 Total Spent: $155.24
Nicole kicked off the week on Monday with two entries: a $62.61 doctor’s bill and a $92.63 cell phone payment, automatically drafted from her checking account.
Both were expected. And both went into the spreadsheet.
Day 2: A $7 Smoothie
💸 Total Spent: $7.09
Tuesday’s entire journal was one line: a $7.09 smoothie for lunch.
Day 3: Frustration with Healthcare
💸 Total Spent: $30.38
Wednesday brought a grocery run ($15.76 for a few fridge items) and a final payment on a doctor’s bill: $14.62.
That second one stung; not because of the amount, but because of what it represented. Nicole had already prepaid for the procedure. And then another bill arrived anyway.
“When you go for certain procedures, you have to prepay. And so I had prepaid, and it’s just frustrating that after the procedure’s over, I still get another bill. Even though it’s under twenty dollars, it’s still a little aggravating,” she said.
According to a report from the Kaiser Family Foundation, nearly half of all American adults find healthcare costs difficult to afford, and people 55 and older account for more than half of all health spending in the country, despite being just 31% of the population.
Nicole’s situation has an added layer of frustration: her employer offers a third-party program that sets aside money to help cover deductibles and co-pays, but only at the time of service. If she pays out of pocket at the doctor’s office, she can’t get reimbursed later. If the provider bills insurance first, the third-party program can step in. The problem is, most providers don’t know how the system works.
“I end up spending a lot of money out of pocket paying it because the provider says, ‘No, no, you have to pay now.’ And then I find out from the third-party company, ‘No, they should’ve billed us,'” she said.
Jean’s advice: call your doctor’s office and ask to have the charges broken down and explained. You may be surprised by what gets removed because it shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
Day 4: Gyoza and Being Part of The Group
💸 Total Spent: $9.00
Thursday was technically a splurge, but a very small one.
The women in Nicole’s office decided to order Thai food together. Nicole joined in. She ordered gyoza — pork dumplings — and paired them with a salad she’d already packed from home.
“I felt like I was part of the group today because normally we don’t get to do anything together for lunch,” she said.
When Jean asked how often social connection factors into her spending, Nicole was candid: most of her friendships are maintained over a meal or a drink. She budgets for it. And she’s not a big drinker; she’s a devoted sweet tea fan, with the occasional hard cider. “Those tend to be like in the six to nine dollar range,” she said. “So nothing in my mind that’s going to break the bank.”
Day 5: Payday, Bill Day, and a Personal Pizza
💸 Total Spent: $578.50
Friday was Nicole’s biggest spending day of the week, and her most satisfying.
It started with a $3.88 Dunkin’ run. “It has been a long week,” she said, “and I felt like it was a nice treat for breakfast.”
Then she got to work on her bills. One by one, she knocked them out:
- Water bill: $47.21
- BJ’s credit card (used for gas; saves her 10 cents per gallon): $97.69, paid in full
- Ann Taylor card (work pants): $135.10, paid in full
- Student loan payment: $200, with a little extra, as always
- Belk card (shoes and accessories): $75.42, paid in full
“It feels really good to have paid these cards off because I don’t like carrying balances,” she said.
The student loan is an interesting case. Nicole took what she calls “the scenic route to college.” She graduated from high school in 1987, went for two years, joined the military, and returned to finish her degree later. She could pay the loan off today if she wanted to. She doesn’t, because the interest rate is 2.8% and she’s found better uses for the money.
Jean agreed: “I think there are a lot of borrowers out there who probably feel the same way. At that point, it seems to make more sense to put money into your 401k, your other investments, and just pay the student debt over time.” That said, Jean added a note of caution — she’s seen more people carry student debt into retirement than ever before, and rolling that expense off the books before income drops is worth prioritizing if at all possible.
Day 6: From Divorce Debt to Financial Peace
💸 Total Spent: $795.67
Saturday’s single transaction was her largest of the week: $795.67, paying off her Apple credit card in full, and she was clear about why she paid it off immediately.
Nearly 20 years ago, Nicole went through a divorce. During the marriage, she’d shared debt; all of it in her name, because her ex-husband’s credit wasn’t good. When the marriage ended, the debt was on her.
“There was no way I could pay any of that stuff off on my own,” she said.
The experience reshaped everything about how she thinks about credit. Today, she carries no balances if she can help it. And she uses a system inspired by Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University — which she went through about 15 years ago — but adapted to her own life.
Instead of cash envelopes, she uses three separate debit cards: one for household bills, one for entertainment (she puts $200 per pay period into it), and one for groceries ($100 per pay period).
“I’m trying really hard these days when I have money left over in those accounts to move them over to savings so that I’m creating additional savings on top of what I’m already saving,” she said.
Day 7: The Hemp Boutique
💸 Total Spent: $143.25
Sunday started with brunch ($25) and ended at the Hemp Boutique ($118.25).
Nicole is navigating menopause, but her experience is more complicated than most. Three years ago, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was caught very early, but the type she has means she’s not a candidate for hormone replacement therapy. So when the joint pain started — pain bad enough that she’s had to stop exercising and playing sports — she started looking for alternatives.
“I feel like my body is 85 years old. I’m hurting so bad all the time. It, it feels kind of like I’ve worked out really, really hard, but I’m not working out. I’m just going through my normal day,” she said.
Someone suggested CBD, so she went to the hemp store, explained her situation, and came away with a tincture and gummies. “Believe it or not, that helps me get through my workday with little to no pain,” she said.
A Week In Her Wallet: Final Reflections
💸 Total Weekly Spend: $1,718.93
Nicole’s $1,718.93 week looks bigger than it is. Strip out the credit card payoffs and routine bills, and the discretionary spending was modest. What this week really gave her was a clearer view of her own finances than she’d had before.
More importantly, she discovered that she has more money left over each month than she realized. Jean’s strong recommendation: open a Roth IRA.
“It is, I think, a gift from the government, if not from the gods. You’ll never owe taxes on it again,” Chatzky said.
When Jean asked Nicole what her “rich enough old lady future” looks like, she didn’t hesitate. “I really don’t wanna work at all. I would love to volunteer, but I don’t want to have a part-time gig for any reason,” Nicold said, “The desire to work in 10 years is going to be gone, so I’m hoping that I can prepare myself for a future where I don’t actually have to do any kind of work.”
With the systems she’s built, the balances she’s zeroed out, and a savings surplus just waiting to be put to work, she’s closer to that future than she thinks.
