<prompt> Human: We started dating just when she started going to school and I knew that she was taking out loans to finance her education. I knew they would be a lot, but wasnt nearly as financially aware five years ago as I am now. I thought she had about 120,000 in loans after graduating... I found out today it has ballooned to 166,000. She is only paying the minimum on each loan because she cant afford more. I am fucking terrified. In the past 3 years, my personal finances have changed dramatically. I went from being 10k in debt to having a net worth of just under 50k. I started a job at 50k per year in Sept, 2011 and have gotten three raises. One to 60k about six months in, another to 66k about a year and half ago and 3 weeks ago they bumped 80k. I have worked my ass off to pay off my own student loans, and save money. As it stands here are my finances:AssetsChecking - 1.5kSavings - 15k401k - 23kRoth IRA - 12kCar - 3k DebtStudent Loans - 5.3kOutstanding Credit paid in full every month, never accrue interest - 1.2 k IncomeJoint net income 94,648Joint gross income 140kI know I want to be with my girlfriend and most likely marry her, but this is making me seriously lose my shit right now. Ive been working so hard towards financial independence and it feels like the dream has been ripped away from me. I am really feeling quite overwhelmed. Any ideas, suggestions or words of help would be greatly appreciated? Has anyone been in the same boat?EDIT: formattingAssistant: I cant figure out if shes been hiding this from you or if you just never asked.If its the former, you have bigger issues than your finances.If its the latter, take a deep breath, relax, go out to dinner and enjoy your meal and then dont go out to dinner again for 4 or 5 years. That last part is a joke but the point is that its doable but tough.Human: She has not been hiding this from me. I just dont think she actually knew how much the debt was increasing as a result of the interest. She always told me she had about 120k in debt, which in all honesty at our current income levels I could see us paying off it 2 or so years if we really buckled down. Then I found out it was 50k more this morning after she recalculated when I asked for the total. I think she was pretty surprised to. Ugh. Yeah. Its doable. Just so fucking daunting. I basically need to get to a place of acceptance around the fact that if we are going to stay together, my plans and all the hard work Ive done ultimately are leading towards a new goal. Man... I have the most horrible pit in my stomach.  <response>: So three years instead of two? 