I'm not doing this again!

I don't really try to get sympathy or pity, and when I do discuss my financial issues, I point out straight away that I know they're mostly my fault. We go out to eat a lot. Yes we have a lot of food at home, but when we take our kids out for an afternoon at the park, we are too tired and too hungry to come home and cook and wait for the food to be ready, so instead we go eat at a restaurant with all our kids. We'd save a ton of money if we just ate at home more often, and we do get ourselves into bad situations when we spend money on fast food when we shouldn't, so I know it's our fault. Whenever I say we're having trouble, I usually say "Well, it's our own fault for eating at Red Lobster 2 weeks ago, but we're having trouble paying off the power bill this week"

I used to volunteer personal information to whoever, whenever, but when they'd use it to eventually stab me in the back with, I started keeping things to myself. It's so much better when people aren't privy to certain things.