<prompt> Human: Sorry, using a throwaway since Ill be giving out so much personal information.The story starts about 6 months ago when my motorcycle broke down. I needed about 200 for parts, and my wife told me we didnt really have the budget for it right then, and told me to just keep it garaged and shell buy the stuff when it comes up. Didnt really think anything of it at the time. Last month I was on the phone with my wife, and said I was going to get some gas to fill up the tank, and she told me to hold on while she put some money on my card. This rose a bit of a red flag with me.Ive been married for nearly 4 years now, and since before we even got married my wife has been doing all of our finances. Shes the one that budgets for everything, pays all the bills, everything. Im just the guy that brings home the paycheck. Before December I hadnt even logged into my bank account in probably close to a year, my wife just handled everything.So, in December I sat down with my wife and went over all of our finances. Heres where were at: CC- 6500 at 16.99 CC- 4400 at 11.00 CC- 3500 at 20.99 CC- 3400 at 16.24 CC- 2700 at 15.99 CC- 2700 at 9.90 Several store specific cards Target, Victoria Secret, Gap, etc.. not even sure... Monthly minimums are around 700. Car loan - 450 per month Mortgage - 1500 per month Student loans - 40k or so, deferred until my wife stops taking classes 5 in our savings accountBasically every credit card my wife has is maxed, and our joint card is really close to maxed. Seeing all those big debt numbers was really shocking to me because I make really good money, and I consider myself very frugal. I take my lunch to work everyday, I havent bought any work clothes except for a couple button down shirts in the past 3 years and a new pair of dress shoes, I never eat out, I had been driving the same car for the past 11 years until we traded it in in June for a new SUV for my wife and now I drive her old car thats new to me.For January I decided we would track all of our spending. I really couldnt see where our money was going other than to minimum payments to all the credit cards. I spent 30- ate out twice, bought a couple sodas from vending machines and bought a new bicycle pump Wife spent 430- new shoes, haircut, eating out and other minor stuff 100 on entertainment- went out on a date and saw a movie 230 on gas 480 on food not counting the individual eating out or the date together 160 on stuff for the house 44 on misc stuff from Walmart and Target 400 on Utilities 1500 on the Mortgage 700 towards the miscellaneous cards 200 on Insurance 200 towards the wifes businessThat total comes out to about 5k, which is about 75 of my take-home paycheck. The other 25 1600 ish went to paying towards the big credit cards. No savings other than whats going towards my 401k at work. My wife didnt earn much last month, so Im not entirely sure where that money went since she has her own business accounts and stuff.Using a spreadsheet I found that if I keep putting 1600 towards the big credit card debt I can reduce it from 23k down to about 8k by making minimum payments on everything except the highest interest cards and working my way down. Is that what I should be focusing on?The biggest problem I have here is that my wife knows that we were supposed to be saving last month, I specifically told her that we need to focus on paying down this debt because the interest on the creditcards alone is killing us. Despite that she still spent over 600 on stuff for herself and her business just from our joint account, no idea whats going on in her business account. She brings in less than a few thousand each month, but she justifies all of her spending as necessary in order to keep her clients and her business. She needs fancy clothes, new shoes, and expensive haircuts etc.Any advice? What should I do in this situation?BTW: The motorcycle is still in the garage, and still needs the 200 worth of stuff. I think I could cut our gas bill nearly in half if I took my motorcycle to work instead of the SUV. Would that be a good investment? The motorcycle itself is worth maybe a thousand bucks, its nearly 20 years old, but is still very reliable. I just need a new air filter, chain, and battery pretty much.Assistant: 1. Cut up the cards. ALL of the cards, even the ones she is hiding.2. Sell the SUV, purchase a used beater for your wife to drive.3. She needs to stop mixing her business finances with your personal finances. Im assuming her business finances are a mess too, which is why she is using the personal money to pay for business expenses.4. Anything outside of her business stuff, you need to be on a strict budget.I would say try to do some balance transfers to a 0 APR card for at least 12 months, but your credit is probably shot.Human: 1. But what if something comes up and we need money? We dont really have any savings, credit is all that we have.2. The SUV is very under water. Its less than a year old and has close to 20k miles on it. I dont think we could afford to sell it right now even if we had to. Wife uses it for hauling all of her stuff around.3. I agree there. I was pretty upset when I found out she was writing checks to her contractors using our joint checking account.4. What do you mean about a strict budget? Nearly all of our money is going to fixed cost stuff...Well, Ive never missed a payment on anything and Ive had credit for nearly 30 years, when I checked last year my credit score was around 800.  <response>: Well, Ive never missed a payment on anything and Ive had credit for nearly 30 years, when I checked last year my credit score was around 800.The difference now could be your credit utilization ratio. Youve got a credit line of over 23K and youre using all of it. You look like a bad credit risk for that reason and your credit score will take a hit for it.Your plan to pay down your credit card bills is solid. Youll probably want to pay off those store specific cards and pay them off first -- store cards are notorious for having poor rates. You should also have a sit down of sorts to talk and look over her business stuff too. If its costing your family a thousand a month to earn a couple hundred dollars, youd make more shuttering from a business standpoint. Personal finances must be kept separate from legitimate business finances for long term success. Financial issues can be a major source of strife in relationships. Youve got work on both or theyll drag each other down. 