<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"I&amp;#039;m currently working on completing the budget worksheet that the mediator sent over, and I&amp;#039;m having a serious battle with myself, here. Some of the information is cut-and-dried, like utility bills, mortgage payment, insurance payments, etc. That&amp;#039;s easy enough to fill in and document.  What&amp;#039;s throwing me for a loop are the things like monthly food costs, monthly home repairs, vacations, entertainment...things that can fluctuate, and more importantly, things that I can cut back on or have cut back on or maybe I should feel guilty for not cutting back on enough. The problem is, I know that Peter will be seeing all of this, and even though I&amp;#039;m not extravagant by anyone&amp;#039;s estimate on this stuff, I still feel like he&amp;#039;s going to look at this somehow and think I need to be more frugal. And that&amp;#039;s completely mental because we are really, really frugal. I can just picture him shaking his head while he looks at the breakdown. Adding to that is the fact that his expense breakdown is going to be far smaller than mine because (a) he only has the kids 1/4 of the month and (b) he has another adult sharing the bills in his house. It&amp;#039;s like I feel that I should be even with him, and that&amp;#039;s really ridiculous because we don&amp;#039;t have a joint custody situation. Mental. I am completely mental. So I&amp;#039;m working against myself as I build this thing, going through old bank statements to get an accurate picture of how much we really do spend on groceries and the occasional movie and our once a year vacation. Shorting myself here is not helping me or the kids in any way, even if it feeds some stupid psychological need of mine to seem like the one who&amp;#039;s trying harder to be fiscally conservative. Did you find yourself chronically underestimating your expenses when you had to detail them out for the divorce?  [Follow Ellie on Twitter and Facebook] "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.womansday.com/relationships/dating-marriage/a47985/get-myself-in-trouble/>