'Splurging' a bit occasionally with purchases is wonderful and can actually be accounted for in your budget (to celebrate an accomplishment, spend time with a friend, etc). This is not Compulsive Buying. Do you find yourself going to Amazon or another online store to relieve stress? Do you at times purchase items and are surprised when they arrive at your doorstep (because you don't remember buying or needing the item)? Is shopping a compulsion that you sometimes find hard to control? Does how much you spend bother you (or your partner)? These might be signs of Compulsive Buying, an unhealthy way of coping with life's stress.

There are various terms you might see with this phenomena:

1. Compulsive Buying - “…excessive or poorly controlled preoccupations, urges or behaviours regarding shopping and spending, which lead to adverse consequences” (Black, 2001)

2. Shopping Addiction - “the compulsive shopper is addicted to the process of shopping itself” (Rose & Dahndayudham, 2014)

3. Oniomania - an obsessive or uncontrollable urge to buy things (Hauge, Hall, & Kellett, 2016)

There are even proposals to include Online Shopping Addiction to the next version of the DSM. Researchers are already developing scales to assess one’s severity of this addiction (The Development of Online Shopping Addiction Scale, 2016).

There are ways to balance spending so that you are doing so in a way that is more aligned with your values and how you want to be spending your money. It doesn't mean depriving yourself of things you want or need ... it is adjusting your spending to where you buy the things you ACTUALLY want and need (and not a bunch of random things that have no meaning because they were purchased due to stress).

Treatment is about a re-prioritization from what is distracting us from our lives to what is important and meaningful. Compulsive Buying can be a part of that distraction (especially with all the ways that we have to shop today).

If you or someone you know might need help with this, have them give me a call! If I am not a good fit, I will help them find someone who is.

DrZepeda@FinancialTherapyTexas.com

Phone: 713-291-9553