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My dad worked 2 jobs for a long time, and my mom worked, and I didn't realize how fortunate I was to grow up in a 70's middle class household.
Then they divorced, and I was still pretty clueless about how things worked.
Then I got pregnant and married and homeless and I was brought into the wide world of "holy shit this sucks".
8 months pregnant, living in the park in southern california (there are worse places, I know), eating *cold* ramen and coconuts and drinking water out of the water fountain at the library where I would spend many days reading quietly.
My sister was in training to be a correctional officer near my mom's house, so between 12 and 1pm three times a week I would go over there and take a shower while she ate lunch. I'd bring a pack of ramen and have *hot* ramen for lunch. That was a treat! My mom never knew.
A guy my husband met let us stay there a couple weeks until he found out I was 17 then he kicked us out. The state wouldn't give me aid because my mom wouldn't let me give her address, because if I did, they wanted her social security number, and she didn't want to give it. So I couldn't get on medicaid or foodstamps or afdc or anything.
To this day, I can't eat Ramen without gagging.
The best part was giving birth on my aunt-in-law's couch tho. Go me! After that I could get a job and we moved into a 33 foot travel trailer, so things improved, but that was the "dirt Poor" period of my life. The first and last one.
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