[In this post I’m following my own advice to open up and be vulnerable talking about money (more specifically, money mistakes). Besides Mr. FL, no one else knew about the following personal story I’m about to share.]

I’ve made some pretty big money mistakes during my early and mid 20s. In this post, I’m sharing with you one of the biggest money mistakes I’ve made. For years, I’ve struggled to understand my money behaviors. Despite having an academic background in psychology, somehow I failed to associate my relationship with money to my upbringing. I probably saw part of the equation, but definitely missed the full picture. That is until very recently. My parents’ frugal ways of living definitely positively affected my frugal nature. However, knowing what I know now, having lived in years of scarcity most likely affected my consumption behaviors. There was this constant fear of scarcity in the household I grew up. Even to this date, my mother still overstuffs the refrigerator, freezer and pantry. She still buys into the fear that this item or that is not going to be available for sale the next day, month, or year. To help herself cope with the fear, she buys more than she needs on a regular basis. So, like my mother, for years, I was in a constant battle with myself between the desire to be frugal and the desire to hoard material things.

This past weekend while rotating out my warm weather clothes to make room for cold weather items, seeing tall piles of clothes sitting all over the bedroom floor once again had me walking down the hall of guilt and mental/physical distress that I once brought upon myself. In the past eight years, the total amount of money I’ve spent on my wardrobe summed up to over $20,000, where between year 2009 and 2012, I was spending $3000 to $4000 per year. This over-consumption behavior was something I struggled to understand over the years. And after having read books like “The Millionaire Next Door” and “Money, A Love Story“, I’ve finally got to a point where I can say those behaviors are understood. And now, I need to work on forgiving myself.

Here, I’m walking down memory lane sharing when I started spending large sums of money on clothes, how I let myself got deeper and deeper into the rabbit hole, what happened when I hit my lowest point, where I am at today and the lessons I’ve learned from this experience. If you’re just interested in reading about the lessons learned, you can scroll down near the end of the post to read that section. 

How It All Started

When I moved to Austin to begin my graduate studies, I probably owned 15 pieces of clothing that were presentable. And most of the pieces were purchased by family members while visiting China. At the age of 22, I didn’t know how to shop for age appropriate clothes. While my middle and high school friends were hanging out in the mall, I was working at my part-time job. I didn’t want to spend money anyway. And my mom liked purchasing her clothes at stores in San Francisco’s Chinatown. She had much better luck finding sizes that fit her as most of the clothing items were imported from China, marketed to the Chinese.

Shortly after I started my graduate program I felt the need to buy new clothes. I needed professional clothes to attend conferences. And I also started having this desire to dress better as I was meeting new people. For months, I didn’t know where or how to shop. I asked my new friends for help, and they took me inside stores where they shopped. Time after time, my frustration grew and grew as I couldn’t find clothes that fit me well off the rack (I’m standing barely 5’4″ tall). My non-Asian friends didn’t share the same problem.

After months of shopping with very little success, I was about to accept my destiny—that I would have to wear poor fitting clothes. I wasn’t aware of petite sizes at the time. And it never occurred to me to bring my new clothes to a tailor. Then, one day in early 2009, my world turned around. While browsing the Internet searching for clothes for small women, I learned about the “petite” word! As I continued to browse, I came across small-sized women documenting on their blogs their adventures finding professional clothes that fit. And that did not include shopping at the children’s or teens department. For months I was doing exactly that! Imagine my joy when I learned about retailers like J. Crew, Banana Republic, Ann Taylor and Ann Taylor Loft that offered petite sizes! Yes, petite sizes are for women 5’4″ and under. I was obsessed reading through those blogs. I also spent hours browsing through the websites of those aforementioned retailers. I felt like I conquered something great. I was jumping up and down with joy and a sense of victory. At the same time, little did I know, I was also on my way to spending several thousand dollars at those retailers within the next few months.

Getting Deeper into the Rabbit Hole

You see, I was at the edge of defeat when for months I had such a hard time finding clothes that would fit me properly. I became desperate. I was psychologically deprived. Once I caught a taste of tangible hope, I threw my whole self in and devoured. Before the year 2009 ended, my walk-in closet was overflowed with clothes on racks and shelves. There were also clothes laying all over the floor. I just kept buying and buying without knowing what I was trying to accomplish. I purchased the same dress in three colors because I thought I could wear one color each week. I purchased two of the same sweater because I wanted to have a backup. I was totally front-loading my wardrobe. As I continued reading fashion and personal style blogs, I kept buying new clothes to experiment.

You might ask, where did I get the money to make all those purchases? I didn’t get into debt. At the time I moved in with Mr. FL his condo was already paid off, and he didn’t want me to pay rent when I offered — in hindsight he should have said yes [as Mr. FL inserted] . So instead of saving that money, I spent that on clothes, shoes and bags. I also got into buying custom jewelries, too. Pretty soon, the situation got so out of hand that I found myself buying extra clothing racks from Target to hang my clothes in the spare room. It was like I was having my own clothing boutique. I got into the whole thing of wanting every color and style in my wardrobe so that I could do every imaginable color and style combinations. I was obsessed with my wardrobe.

Then, there came a saturation point. I could no longer find room in the condo to store more clothes, shoes or bags. Suddenly, I started having buyer’s remorse. What should I do? I asked myself. I didn’t want to get rid of my items because I spent money on them. Yet, without doing so I’d have no room for new items. The problem at the time, as I realized nowadays, was that I front-loaded my wardrobe very early on in the process of pursuing personal style. I just kept buying and buying without having taken a break. And as I continued to fine tune my personal style, I realized that some items worked better for me than others, or that I liked certain pieces of clothing more than others. If I had taken shopping breaks here and there and allowed myself time getting to know what was it that I like, I would’ve wasted less money. Instead, I was in distress and felt depressed. I wished I could just close my eyes and when I open them again, all my clothes would disappear. And I would be able to start all over again. Unfortunately, there was no such magic (again, I felt guilty donating perfectly fine clothes; also, Mr. FL strongly dislikes being wasteful). And the pieces of clothing I front-loaded just became sights for sore eyes. Meanwhile, I was struggling with a strong urge to buy new clothes, clothes that I thought I’d like more at the time. And when I did let loose and donated some items, I quickly replaced them with new clothes, and the processed repeated itself.

Hitting My Lowest Point

Little by little, I let my wardrobe consume my whole being. The acts of shopping, tracking my purchases, trying on new clothes, doing returns, tracking my credit card transactions, coordinating outfits and organizing my super-sized wardrobe, was very time consuming. I was burned, both physically and mentally. I ended up neglecting my relationships with Mr. FL, other family members and friends. I couldn’t focus on school or exercising. I was feeling unsatisfied and didn’t know why. At one point I broke down and cried so hard in the very same room where I hosted my “boutique”. I cried to myself and was depressed for weeks.

When I finally opened up to Mr. FL about my internal struggles, he was very kind. He didn’t understand why I did what I did, but he was quick to his feet and wanted to remove me from my distress. One day in 2012, while preparing for the move to San Francisco, I donated about 80% of my wardrobe. Mr. FL and I counted the number of bags of clothes; it was 9 bags in the 13 gallon size! But oh, for the first time in four years I felt so free. I felt like a 300 lb. gorilla got removed from my back!

Once we moved to San Francisco, I spent about $2,000 in year 2013 rebuilding my wardrobe. Unlike the previous years, my shopping behavior was much more intentional this time around.  Then in year 2014, I had to buy pregnancy clothes. I wore the same eight pieces of clothing week after week throughout my pregnancy, until I delivered my daughter. In year 2015, I spent about $1,000 and purchased 20 pieces of clothing and shoes. That was a huge improvement compared to the years when I was living in Austin.

Where I Am Today

So far this year I’ve spent $270 on clothing. I’ve been pretty proud of the current status, however, I was showing some concerns prior to this weekend’s activity (wardrobe rotation). You see, fall is my favorite season to shop for clothes and shoes. This was true when I was living in Austin, and it’s true now that I’m living in San Francisco. I cannot resist the feel of soft cashmere sweaters against my skin or the beautiful and colorful patterns of fall florals and plaids. Then there’re the cozy flannel PJs, knit hats and blanket scarves. Don’t forget about the stylish leather gloves, OTK boots, gem color suede heels and ladylike coats! Truly, I thought these upcoming months would be a real trial for me.

Then, as I was unpacking my cold weather clothes, filling up my closet once again, I had a real defining moment. Instead of thinking about what additional colors of sweaters I would like to add to my closet or trying to determine if I would need more turtleneck sweaters, v-neck sweaters, or round-neck sweaters, I had some refreshing thoughts. My stream of thoughts went something like this: “Wow, I probably have enough sweaters that will last me through at least 5 more autumns and winters!” and “I probably have enough clothes in my closet to share with three other women of the same size!”.  As similar thoughts continued flowing through my head this past weekend, even after I was removed from the closet, I was surprised by my new way of thinking. For me to be having those thoughts, instead of being busy mentally making a list of items I would’ve liked to purchase this fall (as I had done in past years), was a drastic change in mindset toward material things. I felt like I truly got indoctrinated by the FIRE community’s way of thinking and living. And it has only been four months since I became acquainted with the community!

Lessons Learned

Understand the value of a dollar saved and invested: As I wrote in an earlier post, for what I knew, our retirement horizon was very far away. We were already saving and have saved so much already. Spending an extra few thousand dollars this year or next wouldn’t at all delay our projected retirement. However, knowing what I know now, my thinking should had been this, “Saving an extra $3,000 this year and next can possibly allow us to leave our day jobs even earlier than what we’ve planned.” Unfortunately, that kind of thinking was not part of my mindset then. Nowadays, if I allow myself to, I can get pretty upset just thinking about all the growth and dividends I’ve missed over the years, and will be missing in the all the future years! Want to read what other people have to say on this topic? See here, here and here.

Understand one’s money behaviors and attachment to material things: In the midst of my struggles throughout those years, it never occurred to me that reading books on money might be able to help me gain some insights into the money problems I was struggling with. I used to think that money books were about creating a budget, investing, getting out of debt and/or planning for retirement. I wasn’t aware of the psychological components of money behaviors. This was such an irony as I spent years in school studying human behaviors. 

Speak up about money struggles and ask for support:I wish I had the courage very early on to speak to Mr. FL about my struggles. For many months, I kept my feelings and emotions inside. Mr. FL could see that I was going through distress, frustration and depression, but I didn’t let him into this part of my emotional world. I was too deep into my own unhappiness that it didn’t occur to me that help might be just beside me. 

Front-loading a wardrobe is very costly: Front-loading one’s wardrobe is like walking inside a buffet restaurant, going immediately to one food bar area, filling up two full plates of food, then sitting down and eating (because you’re very hungry). This is without having taken the time to walk around the various food bars, think about what you would like to eat, sampling some of eat, then going back for seconds on the items you like. The problem with this scenario is that you’re most likely full after ingesting the two full plates of food (front-loaded) and have no room for others interesting items that you might see later on. And if you really want to create room in your stomach for other items, you would have to do something very unpleasant. In the end, you walk out of the restaurant thinking about the items you didn’t get to try, and you feel frustrated with yourself because your stomach couldn’t take in more.  

Avoid buying duplicates: Over the years I’ve notice that clothing items made of good quality materials (think cotton) in general last through many washes. I have a pair of blue jeans that I’ve been wearing for over 5 years, and it still looks new after each wash. The other pair of the exact style and color has been in my suitcase for exactly as long. I purchased the second pair because I like the first pair a lot, and I wanted to have a backup pair, just in case. For several years now I regretted the purchase. Then, there was the case of my wool pencil skirts that I purchased back in 2010 and 2011. I owned six of them, of the same style and size, but in various colors. I ended up donating them all away when my body changed shape after having given birth to my daughter. At the time I made the purchases, I knew I would be able to maintain a pretty consistent body weight throughout the years. However, I didn’t anticipate that my hips would get bigger after pregnancy. Unfortunately, I had to replace about 50% of my pre-pregnancy wardrobe. I literally cried when I had to let go of many of my favorite items. 

Know oneself: This one is very important for me to remember. Knowing myself, I know I cannot practice what some do—going on a shopping ban. If I “force” myself to do that, I can see myself coming out of the other end and doing a shopping binge. I like pretty things (and here I’m talking about pretty clothes, shoes and bags). And at this point in my life I know I can practice moderation. I’m actually pretty good at following through with the goals I set for myself. Early this year I set out to buy a maxi dress, a navy skirt, a pair of brown sandals and two light scarves. I did exactly that. So, at least for now, I’m not going to say that I won’t be shopping for a month, half a year or a year. I will set a goal for myself, run it through with Mr. FL, and follow through. For instance, this fall I know I want to buy two vests (one light and one heavy). Now, I know I will get distracted looking at other things while shopping, but I won’t buy. This is about discipline. This is about knowing myself.

Readers, how do you plan to limit your wardrobe purchase this fall and winter?

Have you ever let your spending go overboard when shopping for your wardrobe? Each time, were you conscious of what you were doing immediately afterward?

If not, how long did it take you to come to the realization? How did you feel? What did you tell yourself at the time? How’re you doing nowadays?

What has been the hardest part? What strategies have been helpful?

Have you ever let fear of scarcity took over your spending behaviors (e.g., buying more than you need)? What was going through your ahead at the time?