MMI?

If you are overextended and can't afford a dmp with a credit counseling company than your only option might be debt settlement. Whether You Choose to settle the debt on your own or choose a reputable debt settlement company to assist you is up to you. Either way their will be a risk of lawsuit. However based on my experience , it is a very small percentage of cases on which lawsuits are actually filed. When this does happen , usually the purpose of a lawsuit is to force a settlement. I suggest you do the most aggressive debt settlement program you can afford within your budget so you can minimize the risks as much as possible. The longer a program the more of a risk of lawsuit.

By the way , what state do you live in ?

If you can afford more than the minimum payments or even about minimum, then a DMP will be perfect for you, if you can't afford the minimums by any means, then check out debt settlement. If DS is unaffordable, I would look into BK.

I live in MA. The program she set up leaves $15 extra/month. That does not account much for fluctuating things like gas/electric.

$15 dollars is all that would be left over !!! MMI should not be trying to enroll you in a DMP with that tight of a budget. Murphy's law states "if anything can go wrong, it will." That leaves you with no money left over for emergencies. When that happens you won`t be able to afford to stick with the DMP and will have wasted all those fees when they kick you out for missing payments. I strongly suggest considering the Debt settlement route. If you can't afford settlement than consider talking to a bankruptcy attorney like Jack-black suggested.

Yes, that's what would be leftover. It's on the financial map she did up for me. I emailed her and told her I didn't feel comfortable cutting it so close and her reply was to let her know. She could only keep it open for 60 days. I am shocked at how unhelpful she is actually being, and this was one of the recomemmded sites from the NFCC. I am so frustrated nd I feel like she is setting me up for failure. How can the NFCC recommend them when they do things like this?

I can afford settlement, but lawsuits scare me, and I want the phone calls to stop. I want to get caught up but feel like a fish out of water right now.

I can understand your concern. Nobody likes getting collection calls and lawsuits.

How delinquent are your bills ? Also could you name the creditors you owe and the balances ?

Here are the totals (most of which are quite a bit higher than originally) because of the jacked up rates @ around 30% and fees)

TNB - TARGET $450.00
GEMBPPBYCR $900.00
CAP ONE $1,820.00
CHASE/CC $1,930.00
CHASE $8,150.00
CITIBANK-CHOICE-MASTERCARD $9,860.00

Because I had initially consulted with GCS, they consulted me to stop paying. I am around 5-6 mos late at this point.

These creditors aren't too bad to deal with. Do you think you can save at least 400 a month to use to settle? That would leave you with around $200 a month to put aside for possible emergencies. If so you should be debt free in just under 2 years assuming you settle these debts for around 40 % which is very achievable.