Well I do know the electricity bill is coming sometime in March. I'll get DF to get the receipts/emails from the last bills, so I can add it to the calendar on the fridge where I work out the finances. I guess I got a bit slack in the last couple of weeks, probably since I went to the doctor and went on antidepressants. I'll get back into keeping track of things, but DF really needs to save or give me money and I can save.

WRT prepaying on a CC, it would be when I don't quite have enough money before the bill is due, and the owing part would be on the CC. Say the electricity is $300, and I have $170, we put $170 on the CC and pay the bill with the CC, of a $1000 limit we'd only be owing $130 plus interest.

I think I'll leave the credit card until later, and just preplan all the finances. DF thinks I stress about money too much. For good reason! He doesn't worry at all! And I keep telling him and trying to get him to know what is happening with our money.
As Dach said above, almost ALL companies will enter a re-payment or pre-payment agreement with those who are living on restricted means. It would be better to pay the electricity $170 and then agree with them the schedule on paying the further $130 because they WON'T charge you interest for that. You could even arrange to pay the set repayment amount EVERY week as Dach suggested, so that when the bill next comes it is already half or mainly paid.

As a general rule you NEVER accumulate debt to pay debts unless you are forced to. And when i say forced to i mean you will be homeless unless you pay a whack of rent right NOW. Utility companies only charge penalties when you don't tell them what you're doing (i.e. when you neither pay the bill nor tell them when and how you plan to). Overall it will be far cheaper to pay the electricity company what you owe than risk oweing it longer and accumulating more debt on a CC.

I'm sorry about the depression. I had depression for several years about a decade ago and i found that the 2 problems of 1) feeling so overwhelmed by simple or not-so-simple tasks that i ended up avoiding or ignoring them, and 2) feeling utterly out of control with everything, fed into one another so the more overwhelmed i felt the less i did and the less i did the more overwhelmed i felt. I think that whatever your DF thinks you are both wise and mature to be really thinking about your money situation. The difference between struggling and managing is just what you DO with your money. I have friends who don't manage their money and no matter how much they have it's not enough - they just manage it badly and never QUITE get on top of the things they need to pay.

Bx