When Heidi Casino, a Registered Financial Planner, hit the lowest financial point of her life, it wasn’t due to a lack of knowledge. It was something deeper—an emotional, spiritual, and personal reckoning that no certification could fully prepare her for.
“There came a time that I ventured into business… that really depleted my savings,” Heidi shared in an interview with Financial Adviser PH. “It was the first time I felt so stressed about money. I would wake up at 3 a.m., thinking about it. It felt like a nightmare.”
The turning point came when she was forced to transfer her children from a private school to one with lower tuition. “That was when I really felt so defeated. Ang tagal mong walang problema sa pera, nag-RFP ka pa… tapos ‘yung sarili mo hindi mo matulungan,” she admitted.
Despite her qualifications and years of experience helping others manage money, Heidi found herself drowning. “I’ve been talking about financial literacy, how to save, how to get out of debt—and here I was in the same situation I warned people about.”
One night, trying to calm herself, she stumbled upon a sermon series about money on YouTube. “They were talking about the exact same problems I was going through—debts, failed business, hopelessness,” she said. “I fell to my knees and said, ‘Lord, surrender ko na ‘to.’ That was the moment everything shifted.”
With a clear head, Heidi turned back to what she knew. “After that, I did a financial needs analysis for our family. I detached my emotions and focused on the numbers.”
She also sat down with her children and opened up about their situation. “I told them, and I cried. I felt like a hypocrite,” Heidi recalled. “But my daughter told me, ‘Don’t feel like you’re a hypocrite, Mommy. All the more that you have to talk about financial literacy so no one will ever feel what we’re feeling right now.’”
That conversation became a turning point. With renewed faith, family support, and the very principles she taught others, Heidi rebuilt. “It was no longer just head knowledge. I lived it,” she said. “And that made all the difference.”
Today, Heidi shares her journey with deeper purpose—proof that even financial experts stumble, but with faith, humility, and action, recovery is always possible.
