Life lesson - what memory from your

Life lesson - what memory from your childhood makes you think "wow we were poor"?

we ask this question in a forum and this is the answer

-realizing that we were living in my aunts backyard, in a tent, and not camping for three months. then getting kicked out

-My dad breaking down and crying after realizing he didn't have enough money to buy all the school supplies we needed.

-My dad always put everything for school on layaway. He nearly cried when he couldn't get everything out before school started when I was in second grade. He put on a brave face and told me that I'd just have to make do.

-hot dogs and macaroni every night. having "camp outs" at the fireplace because we couldn't afford the electric bill. church people leaving boxes of food on our porch.
my mom is the strongest person i've met. raising a young child as a widow and making the poverty seem fun or invisible. no words for how much i admire that woman.

-Sitting next to the window in my room so I could read by streetlights when our power was shut off.

- I remember my mother once taking us to Burger King and just watching us play. She didn't buy anything for herself. Never has. This isn't the worst, but to me it now makes me sad remembering my mother in a beige trench coat, watching us play. Both my parents are incredibly humble, it makes me want to cry how people can be so selfless.
And yes, ramen soup and food stamps.

-Once my dad, mom, sister and me started a spring cleaning in our house and we didnt have dinner that day. At that time I thought it was because we just had forgotten about it but now I realize we didnt have money for food and my parents were just trying to distract us so we wouldnt be hungry.

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-I remember going dumpster diving with my dad when I was a young child. He would hold me up so I could describe what I saw inside the dumpster. If there were soda cans or glass bottles, he would lower me into the dumpster and I would throw the cans and bottles out onto the ground, where he would collect them. Then he would get me out. I received one of those "grabber" tools as a Christmas present, and we used it to grab cans easier. I suspect the only reason I was given the grabber is so we could collect cans more efficiently. I thought it was great fun at the time, but now I realize we were poor. My dad died when I was 14 and these are some of my most treasured memories of him. + I'm so sorry you lost your dad so young and that your memories aren't about better times. Reading this just breaks my heart.

Wow that really hit me.. I hope you're doing better now! I was almost homeless once but it's really interesting how our young minds can't grasp the gravity of the situation.+

Thanks for your comment. You're exactly right about kids just seeing their circumstances as the way things are -- very resilient. Though I didn't have my dad long, I learned a lot from him. He was very patient, hard working, and non-judgemental and he instilled those traits in me. They have served me well and I am a doctor now. I wonder what my patients would think if they knew I grew up scavenging from others' trash.
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-We often ate at soup kitchens with homeless people. When you're six food is food, but looking back we were destitute.
I also recall going stretches without food, lying in front of a space heater too weak to move.

-I volunteer at a homeless shelter soup kitchen and it always crushed me seeing small, young children there. This is their childhood and they have no control over their situation. We would give them extra cupcakes and dessert to feel special and hopefully make it seem like a fun thing to come here.
The worst thing was when a 4 year old boy knocked on our door during 100F+ weather asking for a cup of water. As simple as that, just a cup of water. That's all. Dinner serving wasn't even for another 3 hours, he and his dad had nowhere to go. A lot of volu