re: I'm 39 years old and apparently still don't fully understand credit cards

quote:

---

But shouldn't I be paying at most the interest on the small chunk of principal left from the first statement, not all of it accumulated? The spending was nearly identical. What the hell am I not understanding here?

---

Likely you no longer have the grace period so interest on every purchase starts as soon as you charge the purchase to the card. To stop this you will need to pay off the entire balance now, as in tonight. You have to bring the balance to zero.