Today, I sign over a LOT of money to a financial consultant.   This is supposedly a way to make more money, but I will admit to having mild panic attacks at the thought of writing the checks. 

I grew up poor.  Not dirt-floor, no-shoes poor, but it was definitely a hand-to-mouth existance without a lot of room for extras.  My parents, through a series of twists and turns that life tends to throw at you, live rather tenuously money-wise even now.  I have deep-seated issues regarding financial security.

Insurance paid for most of the losses from Katrina, including the note on the house.  Thank GOD for the paranoia that made me update that policy every year, despite living “outside” the flood plain.  Best $248 a year I ever spent.  As a bonus, and much to our incredible surprise, we were able to sell the lot and shell of the house (because after the gutting, that’s pretty much all that was left), and we made a modest gain off the house.  Not a huge amount of money – barely over a tenth of the amount that would elicit IRS interest – but more money than I have seen sitting in my savings account EVER.  Some of it, we put toward replacing things we needed, but the bulk is still sitting there.  It gives me this very weird happiness every time I login to my bank account and see the balance.

But, visceral satisfaction aside, I know intellectually that savings account returns are not exactly the brightest way to invest my money.  I am in that strange phase in life where I have to save for BOTH my son’s education and my own retirement – yeah for “older” motherhood.  So, in the end, the fear of the unknown trumped the anxiety of handing my money over to a complete stranger.

The details of the investment, or how much money is involved is one of those things I think I will keep to myself.  My parents always taught me it was crass to talk about how much money you made or how much your house cost.  But for me, this is a huge step into the frightening unknown and a release of control over my future that I have never envisioned making.  But, I also know that as a do-it-yourself investor, I would either become distracted and neglect it horribly, or become obssessed and neglect everything else.  I am painfully aware of my own limitations.

 One small step for a woman, one giant leap for a control freak.