₱700k across installments: I had started shrinking some loans, but the cycle wasn’t over

My debt started growing in 2022, when my income was not enough for what I was spending. By the time I wrote about it, I was earning around ₱55,000, but the total had reached roughly ₱700,000. It was not one loan. I listed bank debt, credit lines, buy-now-pay-later balances, cash loans, and about ₱55,000 owed to friends. There were around twenty separate entries on my list. Some were only a few thousand pesos; others were close to ₱90,000. GLoan and GGives were already overdue. The total surprised me because many of the balances had looked smaller when I viewed them one installment at a time. I had also used the tapal system: borrowing again to cover an earlier due amount. As long as I could still move money from one account to another, it felt as if I was keeping up. In reality, the total was growing each month. When another borrower suggested writing down what I could pay every month, I said I was prioritizing the short installment periods first. That did not mean the cycle had stopped. In a later reply, I described the small change I was trying to make. I was focusing first on online loans. I would pay them monthly, then reborrow a smaller amount instead of the previous amount. My estimate was that it could take another three months to clear that group before I could turn to the overdue credit cards. Even that plan depended on keeping expenses very tight. I was reducing grocery and electricity spending. After payments, there was often little left. There was one short piece of relief. I contacted BillEase customer service and received another 30 days under a promise-to-pay arrangement. That extension changed one due date; it did not resolve the many other accounts. The most honest description of my situation was not recovered or debt-free. I had finally seen the total, identified the tapal pattern, and started trying to make each new borrowing amount smaller. The credit-card balances were still waiting, several loans remained active, and my three-month estimate was only an estimate. Where the story stood One lender granted a 30-day extension and the borrower was trying to reduce reborrowing while paying online loans first. The approximately ₱700,000 multi-account debt remained unresolved, and no later public record confirms that the projected three-month payoff happened.