Someone hold my hand!!

Okay, I have done a lot of reading on "do it yourself" and some research on the web, but as I have never been in this situation before, I am still confused and need some guidance to help point me in the right direction.

For those who still aren't familiar with my situation, I have:

$64,000 in private student loans ( I've paid it down to $32,000 ),

2 car loans through Wachovia ( 1 at about $15,000, the other at about $14,000, the latter of which I finally paid off just last month, so effectively, only 1 current auto loan now )

$4800 Cashcall

$1200 QuickclickLoans ( was originally $3500. Almost have this monkey paid off my back )

$1300 ThinkCash

$2500 Beneficial revolving line of credit

$2320 BofA Visa Card

$890 Chase Visa Card

$730 Bill me Later Credit Account

$340 Capital One Visa

$550 Capital One Mastercard

$267 Paypal Credit Account

All the account above I just mentioned are all current and are being paid on time with at the very least, their minimum amounts due. With the amount of debt I am carrying, I have looked into bankruptcy and I qualify. However, I am looking to that only as a desperate, last resort and am slowly, painstakingly paying these accounts down through sheer frugalness and by taking a second job that gives me a work week of 70 hours + per week. Now, the ONLY account I have delinquent is an HSBC Visa credit card. I had it paid down to about $7200 when HSBC raised the card's APR to an unpayable rate the very same month I was in a bad car accident that left me injured in a trauma center, causing me to lose my vehicle and miss plenty of time from work and lose income while racking up medical bills. I tried to work something out with HSBC prior to defaulting, warning them there was absolutely no way I could keep up with their new rate and minimums, but I basically only got "oh well, too bad, so sad" out of them. I stopped paying on the account mid-September, 2008. HSBC made a few feeble attempts to contact me, but never did anything much more than leave a few voicemails on the answering machine at my parent's home ( HSBC doesn't have my current phone number ).

A few days ago, I received a letter from the law offices of James A. West, P.C., saying that his law firm has been retained to collect on my account with HSBC, and saying that their client ( HSBC ) has aked them to negotiate with me in order to resolve this matter.

I tried looking up this law firm online, and couldn't find much. Their homepage called "Wild West Law" claimed they are BBB accredited, but when I checked the BBB, it claimed they were NOT accredited with the BBB, and it didn't have a report on them nor any complaints on file. I found an entry for the firm at RipOffReport claiming these were not actually lawyers, but a collection agency, and then I found a "Watch Blog" for this firm claiming that it's just a collector who gives up after only a few months time and then resells the accounts. Basically, the letter sent stated that my current amount owed is $8527.38

My question is- where do I go from here? I want to get this monkey off my back- all I want is to work something out on this debt like settle it and pay it back in a timeframe I can afford, but I'm not sure who I should be dealing with. Should I try contacting HSBC first? Or this law firm? Depending on which one I contact first, should I be doing it by mail or by phone? If the "law firm" isn't really working for HSBC and is just a collection agency who bought the debt, should I just wait it out a bit longer to see if they resell, and I might be able to get an even better deal? And no matter who I deal with, would threats of filing bankruptcy even work? I have a huge debt to income ratio and the amount of debt I have is bankruptcy-worthy, but all they would have to do is look at my credit report and see that all my other accounts are in good standing- it's just this one and this one alone I have stopped making payments on.