Giving Compass' Take:

· The number of graduates in the U.S. owing over $100,000 in student loan debt has quadrupled over the last 10 years. Here, Jennifer Billock talks about her current student debt situation and explains why it causes her to have anxiety and fears for the future.

· What options are available for individuals with student debt? 

· Learn how canceling student loan debt could save the economy.

At the beginning of May, I checked my total student loan balance and saw something incredibly frustrating. I’d been making payments for about seven years, and instead of the total going down, it had risen by $6,000. What started at about $85,000 in loans for both undergrad and graduate school has now ballooned into something completely unmanageable: $119,300. That’s more than I owe on my mortgage.

I’m worried. I think about money all the time and obsessively check my bank account. I’m just waiting for one emergency to happen that will force me to declare bankruptcy. It’s like a constant shroud of anxiety hanging over me, leading to frequent panic attacks and unavoidable depression. And I’m not alone. In the last 10 years alone, the number of people owing at least $100,000 in student loans has quadrupled.

There are more than 42 million federal student loan borrowers carrying about $1.4 trillion in student loan debt, according to the U.S. Department of Education. NerdWallet has estimated 45 percent of graduates in the class of 2018 will leave school in debt.

Read the full article about student debt anxiety by Jennifer Billock at YES! Magazine