Living on the Edge: How Christians Against Poverty Pulled One Man Back from the Brink

"I just couldn't see any way out of it," says Clayton Pring, staring at the murky water swirling below him.

|PIC1|"If nobody could help me, what else could I do?" he asks, thinking back to the day he nearly drove his car off Loughour Bridge, just outside his home town of Llanelli, South Wales.

"I thought it would be better for my family if I wasn't there. There'd be no arguments. They wouldn't have all the worries anymore."

Like many people facing mounting debts, Clayton, 31, was desperate. For him, the only escape was suicide.

Give him some credit

The slide into debt had started gently enough. "I was working in Walkers Crisps' factory in Swansea," says Clayton. "I was on the minimum wage: £4.25 an hour. But because I was working through an agency, the work wasn't very regular. Sometimes I'd only bring home £70 a week, which wasn't really enough to make ends meet for the family."

Help was at hand with instant credit. "I had cards from my bank and my wife Sally's bank and they offered quite a lot of money," he remembers. "I was desperate to pay our bills, but on my wages I just couldn't do it."

In the end, he stacked everything on credit - rent, gas, electricity, clothes from catalogues for his two daughters, Lydia, 6, and Lucy, 2.

Spiralling down

There was a brief ray of hope when Clayton got a new job with a mobile phone company.

"I was earning twice or three times as much as I was with Walkers, and I started to pay a bit off my debts." He smiles ruefully: "I thought I could handle it, you know."

But suddenly the business went bankrupt. "I found myself without any money for two or three weeks and it all just went back to square one."

A dark cloud of depression descended.

"I felt angry, frustrated, annoyed with myself. I'd failed my family," explains Clayton. "I was still working hard, trying to get out of the situation. But because of the interest rates and charges - and because I was using one credit card to pay another - I couldn't see any way out at all."

Family tensions

He started dreading the post and the calls from companies he owed money to.

"The phone rang all day," says Clayton. "And to have it ringing all evening as well - when we were trying to relax or put the kids to bed - caused arguments between Sally and me."

"We were shouting at the kids, shouting at each other," agrees Sally. "We were just getting at each other all the time. We couldn't find a way out.

"Then an argument would start," he continues. "And when you start arguing, you can't stop. Things get out of hand and you feel that the marriage isn't working. To be honest, it's hard to love someone when you're in that much debt. It affects everything."

"When you're using all your money to pay off your debts and you haven't got any food on the table, or the fridge is always empty...," Clayton looks away, takes a deep breath: "Because you want the best for your children and you see that they're not getting the best, it does affect you. It hurts."

"Being in debt is like being buried in concrete. Everything is on top of you. You can't climb out."




On the edge

And so he found himself on Loughour Bridge.

"I suddenly thought, 'How am I going to pay this? How am I going to pay that?'" remembers Clayton. "You just think how easy it would be to end it all. You wouldn't have all the worries.

"The only thing that stopped me was the fact that I had children to think about and a family. It was love that was holding me back."

Helping hand

Clayton's face lights up when he talks about bumping into an old friend, Byron, soon afterwards. Byron mentioned he was working for his local church as a Christians Against Poverty debt counsellor.

|PIC2|"He said that CAP helped people for free and it didn't matter how much debt they're in," Clayton grins. "I remember saying, 'Perhaps you could help us - I've got one or two debts.'

"Byron didn't know the extent of our problem until he came to our house to go through things. That's when I told him the full story and the effect it was having on us as a family."

Byron sat down with Clayton and Sally and together they went through everything that the couple owed.

"When you've got a lot of problems and you actually talk to someone about it, it's a huge weight off your shoulders," Clayton smiles. "You get it all out. You cry a lot.

"Byron was really helpful," he adds. "He was sympathetic, and very, very knowledgeable. He knew what he was talking about.

"I'd tried to get help from debt management companies, but you can't go to them and cry on their shoulder. You just tell them how much debt you're in. And they couldn't help us with that either.

"That's why I like CAP. They're there for emotional help as well as financial help. They counsel you through the bad times."

Rescue plan

A week later, Byron came back with a financial statement, giving the couple a reasonable monthly budget and an affordable repayment plan.

"He'd taken all of our bills, rent, council tax, gas, electricity, everything into consideration," explains Clayton. "We would pay one monthly payment to CAP, including the money that would pay off our debts, and they'd send it to the right people.

"With our financial plan, everything is laid out in sections," says Clayton. "You get a section for your debts and one for family and living. You get an allowance for clothing, food and emergencies - even a little bit for leisure.

"You can see how much you've got to spend every week. We've even started saving a little bit as well.

"It is tight," Clayton says. "But if you stick to the budget, you haven't got anything to worry about. And if you're finding things hard, you can speak to your debt counsellor. They're always looking out for you."




Transforming love

Beginning the journey to being debt-free has had a profound effect on family life, says Clayton.

|PIC3|"After being under so much pressure with our marriage, after putting all our cards on the table and saying, 'Yes, we're going to get through this,' we could concentrate more on our relationship," he explains.

"We can concentrate on loving the children, loving each other. I spend more time thinking about my wife's needs rather than the needs of the people I owe money to. Home has become a much happier place.

"We didn't have to worry about the phone calls any more," he adds. "If creditors did ring, I knew I could say, 'You have to deal with my debt counsellor, speak to him.' And the calls slowly stopped coming."

Sally comes in from the kitchen, where Lucy has been enjoying her lunch of pasta and sausages.

"I was relieved that finally help was here," she smiles. "Now we've got food in the cupboard and we can eat a bit more healthily. Before CAP, we were just living on sandwiches."

Discovering God

But there was one big change still to come for the Pring family.

"I've always believed there was a God," says Clayton. "I've kept my little red Gideon Bible from school, never thrown it away. God has been at the back of my mind but I've chosen to ignore Him I think.

"Me and my wife wanted to know more about being a Christian," he continues. "When we had a chat with Byron, it sort of hit home.

"I could focus on it because I didn't have all those debt worries to worry about. I was trying to reach God and Byron was the catalyst that made everything happen."

Hope for the future

Clayton grins when he remembers the day he became a Christian: "It felt like when you're a child, when you come down Christmas morning and you see all the presents.

"Now I look forward to going to church every Sunday because I know it will have a profound effect on my week.

"We haven't got the best of everything, but being a Christian makes me feel that I don't care really. We've got clothes, a roof over our head, the children have got a few toys - that's the main thing."

Sally smiles at Clayton. "We gave God our life," she says, "because we thought there was no way out, then God showed us one - through CAP and the church.

"Once we get out of debt, we won't get into it again, because we've got God to show us the way."




Article and images kindly supplied by Christians Against Poverty, a UK debt counselling charity. For more information on the work of Christians Against Poverty please visit www.capuk.org or phone 01274 760 720.