Did you grow up poor?

[Simplemind]

Did you grow up poor and if so, how did it affect how you spend money now? I am borrowing this topic from Mr. Money Mustache. It is a subject that I never thought of much until the last year or two. I have noticed some financial patterns in myself that I am not happy with and I am realizing that it came from childhood.
I didn't know a thing about money growing up. I knew that we lived in a certain way but I never connected it to money. I thought we did what we did out of preference. I can now see that in the beginning we didn't have much but through the years that changed and we didn't. Even when there was money there was an attitude of poverty. In the past few years my dad has opened the door to their finances and it is rather shocking to me. My mom passed away a little over a year ago and my dad is beginning to fail. He could more than afford to do some things to make his life easier but he won't do it. There is a bit of a money hoarder mentality. He could have made my mom's last year so much easier and it saddens me. What is the point of saving if you can't use it to make your life a bit easier? I have to ask myself the same on occasion. It is very hard for me to spend money on myself outside of necessities. On the other hand I have never really pined for too much beyond that.

Have you followed in your parents footsteps or have you adopted something different? What do you consider poor?

[Lainey]

I grew up working class/borderline poor. There was one paycheck to support 8 of us, and until the oldest 3 kids grew up and moved out it was years of counting every penny. Surprisingly, my dad who had to drop out of high school during the Depression, was kind of cavalier about money as in he just didn't worry about it much. At least he had the good sense to let my mom handle the finances. I remember years and years where my Dad got an "allowance" of $20 a week, and that was supposed to include paying for gas for the family car (always a beater) and any incidentals for himself.
In elementary school we brought lunch (no cafeteria) and bought a carton of milk for 5 cents. Lunch for many years was peanut butter and margarine on white bread. When we went to high school and were able to buy a subsidized hot lunch for 65 cents we thought we were living the good life at last.
The good things they did financially were 1) my dad stayed in his union job and retired with a pension, along with some stock they managed to buy 2) neither smoked and my dad was just a very moderate beer drinker 3) neither were materialistic and both shopped almost always at thrift stores or sometimes a discount dept. store their entire lives.

My life has been different in that I've had a more middle-class adult life: college grad, some travel with some very nice vacations, new compact cars, only had one child.
But since you posed the question, it does seem I've absorbed a lot of my Mom's money consciousness. I don't obsess about it, but neither do I obsess about new shiny material things.

People I consider poor are those who can't afford the basics. To me that means shelter in a decent neighborhood, some kind of transportation (public or otherwise), food, clothes and shoes, basic health care including dental and eye care, and enough of a financial cushion so that you can manage reasonable unexpected expenses (replacing a set of tires) without having to forego food or other drastic measures.

[Tussiemussies]

I don't think we were really, really poor but after the age of thirteen I had to work and supply all my own clothing and entertainment money. Christmas gifts were clothes that we needed. No one else in my neighborhood lived this way. My mother was a big spender and I think some of it is genetics, I turned into a big spender saving nothing. I had to learn my lessons the hard way.

[Florence]

I was born in 1947. My father was a merchant seaman and my mother had a beauty shop built onto the back of our 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom house. That house was tiny but it was paid for. My parents drove a paid for Chevy. We always had plenty to eat but it was always cooked at home. My mother was an excellent seamstress and it never bothered me to wear homemade clothes. Vacations were trips to visit relatives. I received an excellent education in the public schools and then the state university. Money was scarce but we had enough. Although I knew other people had bigger houses or cars, I never felt poor. I learned to be creative in frugality from my parents.

[Zoebird]

My dad grew up poor; my mom grew up middle class (blue collar); and we grew up poor to middle class (transitioned over time, of course).

[sweetana3]

My dad grew up rich in the Depression because his father was an army officer. Mom was poor and moved from Missouri to CA/AZ during the dust bowl.

I consider we grew up poor/lower middle class in Alaska but my dad was a self employed civil engineer and everyone lived that way or so it seemed. We could have lived a little better but he never saw the need since all he wanted was provided for. They did give us all college educations free and clear wherever we wanted to go. We were safe, free, not hungry, educated. But I still remember unmet wants and needs from those times.

[goldensmom]

I did not grow up poor but my parents grew up during the depression. Dad was one 13 children and even though his father was gainfully employed during that time he grew up poor. Mom was an only child. My maternal grandfather was a doctor and my maternal grandmother was a teacher but times were tough even for them during the depression. Base on mom and dad’s upbringing I was raised to be frugal as were they but we were far from poor. Their example is ingrained in me to be conservative/frugal in all areas of my life.

[SteveinMN]

Lyndon Johnson once said, "When I was young, poverty was so common that we didn't know it had a name."
I know we didn't grow up rich. :) Dad was a schoolteacher; Mom was an office manager, so we were never swimming in money. Plus my dad was paying child support for two kids from his earlier marriage. We did OK. Mom worked more out of a need to be out of the house and among adults than for the $$, though I know it paid for extras. Aside from one house, my parents always rented. Cars came from the back row of trusted used-car dealers. We rarely went on vacations (though we were into "staycations" before that became a word). We never had a color TV until after I moved out of the house. My mom still has the bedroom set they bought from Sears maybe 40 years ago now. We ate well, we dressed from the racks at Sears and Penney's, and there was enough money to indulge us kids our true interests (not the will o' the wisp interests that get put away after a few weeks).

DW grew up almost working-poor. Her dad passed on when she was in her teens, and mom worked at a couple of pink-collar jobs. But they made it. Then DW was a single mom for years, making almost no money in her field. She and her chosen extended family all were just starting out, so there were lots of potlucks, picnics, and FFF with the kids. DW was happy to let her daughter go up and down the escalator at the mall until she didn't want to anymore -- free fun and the kid loved it!

I guess I learned from my parents to live comfortably within one's means. As kids, we groused about not going on "fun" vacations (to Disney World, etc.), but we did have fun on our staycations. We noticed our house and cars were not as fancy as our friends' families on the block. But it's not like we were embarrassed by poverty. So I've never had this bug to wear the right designer label. And my interest in living in a fancy ZIP code has everything to do with the financial benefits of location-location-location, not having a swell of pride when I give my address to a store clerk. I don't even need to buy knockoff name-brand goods to look like I have the money. And DW is pretty much the same way. We see friends of ours who will be working till they die to keep up the payments for the Acura and the too-big-for-empty-nesters house and the Ann Taylor clothes and Levis -- and are happy to just sit by each other at home and enjoy the occasional splurge.

[Float On]

My parents grew up poor. Mom was one of 10 kids and grandpa G lost the farm and ended up commuting to Kansas City to work construction downtown only taking the train home on weekends to see the family. How grandma did it with 10 kids and 4 nieces/nephews shes raised I'm not sure. Dad was one of 6. Grandpa J was a ranch forman on cattle ranches. Dad says they moved 22 times by the time he graduated high school. Mom and Dad put everything into buying the farm. They say they were very poor when I was little but I wouldn't of known that. Dad worked the farm but also always worked in town and jobs improved until he was doing very well. They are well set and enjoying retirement they are also very glad of the sacrifices they made over the years to keep the farm. I remember talk several times about selling out but we're all glad they didn't.
They did not talk money in front of me or my brother very often - so when we asked for something and they said 'no' we thought it was because we were being punished. I've done that very different with my own children and they are very aware of our finances (or lack there of).

[catherine]

What is "poor"? As my MIL used to say about her hardscrabble life in Scotland, "we were poor, we just didn't know it."

I will never say I was poor, because I don't know which definition to use. You could say it's chronically not having enough for basic necessities. Going by that definition, I can think of only one time I might have been "poor," right after my mother kicked my alcoholic dad out, and she was faced with raising 4 young kids in early-60s suburbia--before the women's movement, so the best she could do was minimum wage as a bookkeeper. But I only remember an acute, not permanent, effect of the experience on my attitude, pride, and dignity during those times, so I can't say I was poor. The "poor" mindset didn't completely poison my soul, even though we had to sell our car and couldn't have as much as a Saltine cracker between meals for snack, and I was getting second-hand clothes from my cousins.

While looking for a good definition of poverty, I found this beautiful essay (https://www.msu.edu/~jdowell/135/JGParker.html) online:


Poverty is an acid that drips on pride until all pride is worn away. Poverty is a chisel that chips on honor until honor is worn away. Some of you say that you would do something in my situation, and maybe you would, for the first week or the first month, but for year after year after year?

Read the whole thing--that is poverty. I've had a taste of it, but thank God, not for long.

[ApatheticNoMore]

No we grew up middle class. Frugal but that's just because a mortgage was being paid off in 15 years and later because only one parent was working (much of that isn't economicaly possible anymore, at least not here, but that was a different time).

I always thought we were *rich* though. Not a lot of money was spent on me (nor were kids really given priority in general - mostly because parenting overwhelmed them) but I was always told how well off we are (because dad had seen real poverty both in himself and others). So I assumed we were rich. Plus many of my classmates were poorer (mostly because the middle class doesn't really send it's kids to public school in many parts of this state - and I don't blame them). The money spend on me did increase some in my teen years (ok I got music lessons for one thing - not a car or anything). We weren't rich, we were what a lucky section of the middle class once looked like (both college educated, mom was professional track, dad was unionzied).

[iris lilies]

I was raised in the middle class with both parents working for public school systems (my mother was a teacher, my father was a physical therapist.) I thought that we were pretty well off, actually, 'cause we had the biggest house in town. But that's because it was an old Victorian and besides, the town wasn't very big. Looking back a lot of family resources went to the house. One summer we didn't take a vacation, mom and dad painted the house instead, that was our summer activity. My job was to make lunch on painting days. I also had an assignment: painting the wrought iron fence that surrounded that house.

But my dad was very poor as a kid and he had that mentality, so that's were I learned to be frugal. He was the only one of his six brothers to take full advantage of the GI bill and complete college.

[early morning]

Both of my parents grew up during the depression. Mom was from a large, poor family in a tiny, poor town. Dad's folks farmed, and thanks in part to FDR his immediate family was pretty much unaffected by the hard times - in fact they took in "help" during season, providing room/board and a tiny wage. In fact several of mom's sisters were summer help. Dad had bought an acre from Grandad to build on, and he and mom bought a large building in town for next to nothing, took it apart, and used it to build our home, by hand. He paid to have the basement dug and they did the rest. He was a factory worker by the time I was born (DB and Dsis are 15/13 yrs older than I am), and Mom did some cleaning and took in laundry. All extra money went to Dad's hobbies, with Mom's blessing - he built a greenhouse and raised orchids in the late 50s-early 60s, when orchids were not household flowers. Vacations were fishing trips, or scouting out places to hunt for whatever - bear, moose, deer. He bought a plane, both of them learned to fly, and he kept it, for a while, at Grandad's house and used the pasture as a landing strip. When we moved, I bought a horse, and horses and horse shows were added to the greenhouse and airplanes. All this on a factory worker's pay. He never made more than $5 an hour - but we only spent money on things that were important to us. We never had extras in other ways. We had a large garden and put up enough food for the year ahead. Dad hunted and fished, and we ate a lot of venison. When Grandad and Grandma were still on the farm, they butchered and a side of beef or pork was always a Christmas gift to the family. Mom made a lot of our clothes and most of my show clothes. We bought a lot of things used. Mom has the same furniture I grew up with, and I'm 57 - and it still looks good. Dad did all our home maintenance, built the stalls for the horses, built greenhouses every place we lived. The last one was all glass panes from 15x15 sheets of glass that he got as salvage when the semi hauling it wrecked in front of a co-worker's house. We picked through LOTS of broken glass - it's a wonder none of us were hurt! I never felt I wanted for anything - my life was so much more interesting than my friends whose families had new houses, new cars, new clothes, lots of games and toys and such...so actually, I guess I was right as a child - we were blue collar rich, lol. (And sorry for writing a book - but I was just thinking about this topic and had it all in my head, lol)

[herbgeek]

I /thought/ we were poor, based on hearing my mother frequently say things like she didn't know how she was going to pay for groceries next week. I was not allowed to do anything that cost money, no instruments or lessons. I did do Scouts for a year, but that was because I did extra chores for the 50 cent dues. Turns out Mom had closets full of clothes, thousands of dollars worth of figurines and new furniture every few years. So, yeah I'm a bit scarred. I was always on the outskirts with my dorky, several-years-old clothes on top of being a huge introvert and nerd. I couldn't even find my "tribe", since I wasn't allowed to do anything like clubs that might cost money. No school trips. I worked as soon as I was able. In college, I lived on $10 a week for food and even back in the dark ages it was tough to do that. No spring break, I worked.

I'm still relative frugal compared to my income, ironically. I have really nice clothes now, but they come from a consignment shop. And I have a whole bunch of swiss army knives/multitools because I couldn't have them as a kid and I really really wanted one. And I really splurge on good ingredients because I can. :)

[Simplemind]

Both of my parents grew up poor but my dad was dirt poor. Grandpa worked in the timber industry and was a womanizer who took jobs out of town (up and down the coast) drinking and gambling the family money away. He was quite well known for his largess with anybody other than his own family. My dad grew up with that " as God is my witness I will never go hungry again" mentality. They were actually left without food many times and my dad was farmed off to live with other relatives here and there. He coveted what he saw as luxury in other peoples lives. He once went to the house of a distant relative and was so impressed with the great room with a moose head and swore he would have the same one day. He now has the house and the moose.
When I was born we lived one step above shanty town. My mom came from out of state and none of her family ever visited us there. My dad started taking out of town jobs because they paid more. There was never extra anything. Food was tightly controlled. My mom bought for the meals and you were not allowed freedom in the kitchen. Snacks were apples because my dad's relatives were growers and we got them by the box full. To this day I still have a hard time warming up to an apple. We never ate out. My mom canned. She sewed our clothes. For a short time I went to Catholic school which my mom loved because I wore the same uniform for four years and she only had to buy underwear and socks for me.
They scrimped and saved and finally found enough scratch to buy five acres out in the country. We then started to build Mr. Blanding's dream house one piece at a time. Every weekend at first was spent clearing the property, then building the home. When the home was finally built there was not a penny to put finishing touches in it (to this day there are still no curtains or blinds) or furnish it. If things were tight before they began to get really tight. Only later did I really appreciate the area we moved to. In the beginning I hated it because there was not sidewalk to ride our bikes. The store (any store) was eight miles away. We were in boonieville. My dad started working more and more and was never home. My mom clamped down even tighter. When dad came home we ate different kinds of food. When he left it was back down to three kids splitting a can of fruit cocktail and fighting over the cherry.
More acreage became available and my dad bought that too. Next came horses and cows, chickens and rabbits. We were involved in 4H, raising our beef and growing our food. I think back very fondly on those times. My mom..... not so much because she (a city girl) was left to take care of all of this while dad was working. They really became two different people who shared children and nothing more.
My mom always acted as if she never knew how things were going to get paid. She became a money hoarder and only in her last days did we discover how deep it went and some horrible financial land mines. I think she feared my dad was going to leave her holding the bag.
What I see now and didn't then was that my dad was very concerned with the illusion of status. He would buy status items in order to show them off but when it came down to clothing or food we had little. I think he suffered from deep envy and wanted to be the envy of the people he worked with. He finds validation in his things which I find really sad. I think they are cold comfort now as he sits in his house alone.
He is very upset that none of us kids want the house and property. He feels like it is a slap in his face that we aren't fighting each other to have it. It is filled with stuff that none of us are interested in. He needs to tell us each time what such and such is worth. We shrug and he gets mad.

I could fill a whole other thread with what I can now see as an adult that I didn't have the maturity to understand as a child. I always considered myself great with money in the way that I could make it and save it. I'm not great in having balance with it and need to lighten up and enjoy a treat here or there. I have few clothes. I wouldn't know what to do with more. That is OK with me but Lordy does it drive my friends nuts that I hate shopping. I don't want anything and I don't want to waste my time looking at cheap junk I don't want. On the other hand, the few things that I do own are very nice.
When my husband met me it drove him nuts that I didn't have anything in my cupboards or fridge other than spices and condiments. He would come over with a bag of groceries every visit. He felt we must be starving but I was in the habit of walking to the store every couple of days and buying what I needed. I didn't want to invest in extra food in case for some reason I needed the money - weird I know. It didn't bother me a bit to have that nice walk to the store every couple of days. I don't like duplicate items. I don't like too many items. I think that comes from the Spartan lifestyle we lived.
So now with my husband's stroke and being out of work we find ourselves looking at savings. I am telling myself that it is OK. We have this one life and this is what we save for. My dad didn't take care of my mom at the end as he should have and now he is not caring for himself. He says he is too cheap. He would rather pour over his bank balances and sit in the dark and eat expired food. Oh how I struggle with this.....................

[catherine]

Thanks for sharing your story, Simplemind. Very interesting and heart-rending. It's true: some people go one of two ways if they've experienced lack: The status-seeker, like your dad, and the security-seeker, like your mom.

I am obsessed with stories about people who have nothing.. and I think it's because on the one hand, I feel like we shouldn't need too much to live. Animals live without money--why can't we? There are people like Daniel Suelo who have figured out how to just "be"--moneyless. On the other hand, perhaps I'm afraid of not having money. I feel I've been lucky to have found a career in my mid-forties that pays well, and I feel resentful and angry with myself for making stupid choices along the way--"Brewster's Millions" (the movie) choices--the choices of people who come into money who have never had it before. In my case it was just spreading it out to family without thought about the implications for my own future.

Very interesting stories here.

[Blackdog Lin]

That was powerful. Thank you for sharing it.

(sorry: referring to Catherine's poverty essay link)

[JaneV2.0]

My grandparents were upper middle class and survived the Depression without deprivation. My parents were middle class--my father a small business owner, and later the manager of someone else's small business. My mother was a homemaker. Each was frugal in their own way, so I inherited some skinflint skills.

Herbgeek's post resonated with me. There didn't seem to be extra money in our household to support a child's talents or interests, let alone whims or dreams (college least of all*), so I have a whole lot of gazingus pins related to what I didn't get as a kid, and I will always support others in their passions.

*My parents, and all their siblings, were fully supported in extracurricular lessons and college, including post-graduate work, so I don't know where the benign neglect approach came from. By setting my sights low on a local university, I managed to work my way through. I would do things differently today.

[happystuff]

It wasn't until I was grown that I realized that, yes, I think I grew up poorer than most people, but not as poor as others. As a child, I had everything I needed and/or thought I wanted. I was fed, clothed and happy for the most part. Rich/poor only seemed to come into question with regards to material goods, so I think it is relative.

If you were to ask my children this question, I think they would say "yes", our family is poor. But... again, only with regards to the "material goods" side of the discussion. Many of the families in my children's peer groups are deeply in debt, yet have those material goods which often signify "wealth/success". We have no debt, but also none of those material goods.

[artist]

My mother grew up poor. My mom told us that they only had two outfits as a child, one to wear while the other was being laundered. Everything was hand-me-downs. Birthdays you got a nickle but had to share it with your siblings. Of course in the 1930s a nickle actually ment something, but didn't go far when divided by four. My mom recalls my grandfather arguing with the dentist about fixing a tooth. Fixing cost $1. Pulling was 50cents. His reasoning was that in his mind, by the time she was 16 she'd have lost all her teeth anyway. Needless to say, the tooth was pulled.

My dad grew up well off. His father was a business man. Owned a movie theater, a pharmacy and three tenament buildings that housed mill workers.

I grew up upper-middle class.

Dh grew up lower middle class as the parents of school teachers.

Our married lives we have climbed out of living well below poverty level... Couldn't afford health care of any kind, dh worked two part time minimum wage jobs, while I stayed home caring for our special needs son. We lived in a third floor tenament in the one of the worst parts of town. Our grocery budget was $25 a week for our family of three back in the 1990s and that included cleaning and paper goods. We couldn't afford to keep a car, dh rode a bicycle to work year round for the longest time. Doing laundry was a task I dreaded due to the cost. I washed what I could in the bathtub before going to laundromat. I never dried my clothes there, we brought them home wet and put them out on drying racks.

Today we live in a home that we have a mortgage on. It is not in the best part of town, but better than were we were. Having a home with a mortgage is stressful. We have health insurance now, but to afford our copayments on our medications we have limit things.. ie.. I can't afford to run our gas clothes dryer so I line dry year round in the basement. Our grocery budget is $50 a week for two adults. $70 a week when our son is home from college. We still buy second hand clothes for all of us. Dh and I saved up and had a "big" date the other night. We spend $22 each to go see a cinecast of "Wait Wait don't tell me". We never spend that much money for something that is just for enjoyment.

[ToomuchStuff]

My parents made it to middle class, but I wouldn't know where we fell. Knew a few who were poor (one gal comes to mind, who received three t shirts, a pair of coveralls, and a pair of shoes for school every year, and were barely able to make rent), and a lot who were just getting by (or what I saw as average).
But my parents, didn't exactly teach money lessons (more do as I say, not as I do). As a kid, we had an "allowance" for a while, but never saw any of it. (they kept borrowing it), and by the time they might have been able to provide one, we weren't buying it. You did get presents for Christmas and birthdays, clothes for school, but the rest of the time, your option was to save up your lunch money (food or stuff), or find work. And with the amount of kids that were around, there were not a lot of jobs, or you didn't have the tools (dad always said if you want to mow lawns, you need to buy a mower, couldn't use his to get started). They tried to drive us more towards activities they approved of, but a lot of that I hated (stuck in orchestra, and they figured out why I hated it, when the allergy bills, came from me and rosin).
Learned more from a poorer relative. When I earned money there, I tended to use it on tools or stuff for her house and obtained new skills. I learned a lot more about how to be (semi) self sufficient, and when to shop around to get something done.
So by the time I moved out, my thought process was I will be poor, if I am lucky, and dead if I am not. (safety matter was a different issue)

[befree]

I grew up in the solid lower middle class and, although we seldom ate out, didn't have a lot of luxuries, didn't buy designer clothes etc., we NEVER worried about food on the table, roof over our heads,doctors or dentists visits or a little extra for occasional ballet lessons or field trips. I grew up without an attitude of scarcity or poverty, but with (what I consider) a sensible, frugal attitude. But I have had 3 close friends over the course of my life who grew up poor -as in homeless, going hungry poor. All of them became lavish spenders in adulthood, and pretty much deny themselves nothing, even if they have to go into debt to do it, and even if this year's model isn't substantially different from last year's model. They simply think they deserve it, and the ability to have these things is evidence of success. ....the "status-seeker" creation somebody suggested earlier. I have also met what I would consider fairly poor people, working class at low-paying jobs like fast-food restaurants, who frequently make what I think are obviously bad, short-sighted decisions about money, like renting a bouncy castle for a kid's birthday rather than spending that money on a needed dental visit.

[SteveinMN]

But I have had 3 close friends over the course of my life who grew up poor -as in homeless, going hungry poor. All of them became lavish spenders in adulthood, and pretty much deny themselves nothing, even if they have to go into debt to do it, and even if this year's model isn't substantially different from last year's model. They simply think they deserve it, and the ability to have these things is evidence of success. ....the "status-seeker" creation somebody suggested earlier. I have also met what I would consider fairly poor people, working class at low-paying jobs like fast-food restaurants, who frequently make what I think are obviously bad, short-sighted decisions about money, like renting a bouncy castle for a kid's birthday rather than spending that money on a needed dental visit.
My DW, who is a social worker and was, for a while, living on the edge of working poor, has observed that many people in that economic class have a different mentality about money than us SLFers do. If you have it, you spend it, because you never know when it's going to be gone and you may never get another chance to buy that <object> again. Rent the bouncy castle this year because next year you may be out of work and your kid won't get anything for his or her birthday. Get that pedicure and the nail jewelry; you've wanted it a long time and you have the money now so use it before something breaks on the car (again) and the money goes to that.

I agree that it would be better in the long run to take care of needs like insurance, medical/dental care. But that's a 20th century invention, I think. Back in caveperson days, when they landed a water buffalo or whatever, people gorged well beyond their dietary needs, because they could have been subsisting on leaves and berries for many weeks after that. Same thing with money, I think -- just a more primal reaction based on not having the security of the expectation of a steady income.

[Simplemind]

That is so interesting Steve. If I have extra I always bank it in case I can't meet basic needs. I wouldn't/couldn't get a manicure over paying the electric bill.

[jennipurrr]

My parents were middle class but very frugal. They drive cars for 10+ years, use as few utilities as possible, etc. The standard issue line was that "we can't afford that. You'll have to work and save your money." As a kid I really did believe it as I am naturally a worrier. They told me I was going to have to pay for college myself so I worked hard to get scholarships, but it turns out they had saved college money for both myself and my sister. When I was 16 I was truly suprised and astounded to get a (used) car for my birthday! I thought it was completely out of their financial realm. That's when I started to figure out they had more than they were letting on. They are in their mid-50s and on paper have been FI for some time, but haven't gotten to the point where they will retire yet.

I inherited some of their mentality and fret about money even when there aren't money issues. My mom and I are often the voice of reason for each other, encouraging the other to let go of the purse strings when necessary, but it is hard to do it ourselves! My family has always talked about money management and things like that, so budgets, retirement accounts, etc weren't foreign concepts to me.

DH grew up poor. As a kid he lived through utilities being cut off, evictions, not having food, etc. They moved around a lot and never owned a house. When his parents were married I think that things may have been financially ok, but once they got divorced neither really made enough to live, plus they both had various substance issues over the years. He didn't have any money skills when I met him, only the desire to NOT live that way. He is the only one in his family that has any desire/ability for delaying gratification and saving up for things. I think a lot of it has to do with what Steve was saying above. DHs family looked at us crossed eyed when we kept our old furniture, or bought things on craigslist instead of just financing or doing rent to own or something. His family thinks we are misersly and doesn't understand why we don't come to their rescue with their self inflicted money problems.

It is weird because I think I have more "bag lady" issues than DH even though I have never been poor. He is still sometimes astounded he lives this comfortably. We've put an offer in on a new (to us) house and he has said several times he can't believe he is spending THAT MUCH on a house. His worldview growing up was that anyone who owned a house was rich. Now he is trying to wrap his mind around himself potentially spending a chunk on a house. I don't have those thoughts...it is a lovely house, within our budget, in a great location in town and is a very reasonable price considering it has a rental suite. It has the potential nicer than my parent's house (fixer upper) but not that much nicer, while it is completely different than anything he ever lived in.

[chrissieq]

Like many of you, I grew up with "enough" - we always had a house (never more than 1 bathroom, lots of shared bedrooms), one car (always bought used), plenty of food (all prepared at home). Any vacation was a week rental at a state park cabin. My mom managed the money using the "envelope" system - once the money ran out, she was done spending. My dad was a truck driver gone most days of the work week and home most weekends. Our only regular "splurge" was donuts bought after church on Sunday.

We did attend parochial school - I think there was a volume discount for families. Any new dresses were ordered from the Sears catalog and - I swear I am not making this up - they came 3 for $10 with no choice of color or style only size was guaranteed. We got some crazy dresses - my favorite (and maybe cause I got to wear it first) was a brocade-like sleeveless dress with a matching 3/4 length sleeve coat which we called the "cocktail" dress!

[Azure]

The first 5 - 6 years of my life, although I don't remember much , we were pretty poor. My father had Hemophilia and a lot of the time he couldn't work. When he did he worked in a gas station pumping gas & working on cars. He also drank too much probably because of the pain. He died when I was 5. We were living in a house out in the country that his parents owned. My mom started working as a nurses aid. I remember growing potatoes. Bathing in a wash tub. I remember hanging clothes on the line. I remember an outhouse being built. Going to a 1 room school house. I don't remember ever being hungry. We got milk from the grand parents farm. Probably chicken & beef too but I don't know for sure. We picked corn from their fields. I found out later that it wasn't sweet corn but the corn they grew for the cows. We just picked it early, I think. I know my mother made lots of our clothes.

When I was 6 my mother remarried to a man she went to high school with. His wife had died and left him with 3 girls. We were all pretty much the same age. We lived in a little 2 bedroom house for 6 years. All 6 of us girls in 1 bedroom. One bathroom. Dad (my step-dad) worked at Oldsmobile. He worked midnights for the extra money.

For a long time we continued to get milk & corn from my bio dads family farm. But what also helped was that my mom was getting social security for the 3 of us. So we had a nice lower middle class upbringing I think. After 6 years of saving we moved to a bigger house with 2 bathrooms & 4 bedrooms. Actually the upstairs had been converted to an apt. so 3 of us slept in what used to be the living room area. 2 of us in the kitchen dining room area. And 1 of us in the tiny little single bed sized bedroom. lol

We went camping every summer. We had a couple of canoes. Dad had hobbies, including woodworking, which he did use around the house. In the little 2 bedroom house he built this wall of cupboards so each of us had a place for our clothes & things. When we moved into the bigger house he built us each a headboard with a shelf & cupboard. He had model planes. Did some shooting & hunting. Photography.

I only remember ever eating at a McDonalds or a nearby truck stop a couple of times. We didn't have a vegetable garden. I remember mom still had a wringer washer in the basement but after a while she just used it for the bigger heavier items. Usually the only things line dried were those big items.

In our little town we were pretty much like everyone else. I do remember some kids that you knew were poor. And a very few who had money. We had pretty much everything we needed and some of our wants.

[Blackdog Lin]

I grew up in the solid lower middle class and, although we seldom ate out, didn't have a lot of luxuries, didn't buy designer clothes etc., we NEVER worried about food on the table, roof over our heads,doctors or dentists visits or a little extra for occasional ballet lessons or field trips. I grew up without an attitude of scarcity or poverty, but with (what I consider) a sensible, frugal attitude.


I couldn't figure out how to articulate my young circumstances. This quote does it. Thanks befree.

Lower middle class, but no poverty. I think that sums it up for my upbringing.

[catherine]

We lived in a little 2 bedroom house for 6 years. All 6 of us girls in 1 bedroom. One bathroom.

Thanks for the story, Azure. Love the "one bathroom." We have one (and a half) baths, and I had 4 kids (not 6) but even so, people in my neighborhood would never put up with only having one bathroom anymore. The houses in my neighborhood were built in the 70s and all had 1.5 baths, but now people are adding in another full bath.

I do remember my best friend actually had 8 siblings, and THEY had one bathroom. Now, you see people on HGTV refusing to buy a home because the master bath doesn't have his-and-her sinks. They act like it's impossible to live with one sink. I can't remember a time when it was a real problem getting everyone showered and out the door in the morning--you just waited your turn.

Interesting also how you remember some kids that were poor--what made THEM poor? Was it their clothes? The way their homes were kept? Back then before there was so much of everything and people lived much more simply, what separated the regular people from the poor ones?

[Tammy]

Poor hygiene?

[Azure]

I think it was things like shabby clothing or the same clothing worn over & over. Or getting a free lunch. Not buying books at the bookfair. That kind of thing. Though I am sure there was probably some poor hygiene with some of the kids.

One girl I went to high school with, I felt so sorry for her. Her parents were older when she was born and they were from Germany or somewhere. They would only allow her to take a bath & wash her hair once a week. The poor thing. She always had oily hair.

[Maxamillion]

We were technically lower middle class but my mom was not good at managing money so the last few days of the month before payday, things were rough...for instance, no shampoo or toilet paper. We ate lots of ramen. Lots and lots of ramen. To this day, just thinking about ramen noodles makes me nauseous.

My sister ended up being the type that puts a lot of importance on status symbols and name brands and splurges on stuff like that for herself, even if it means she ends up having to borrow money to pay the electric bill. She's mentioned before she buys this stuff because she could never have it when growing up.

My money-managing skills are pretty good. I don't have much income and am very much under the poverty level but... I have a monthly budget, emergency funds set aside, and am hardly ever late on a bill payment. I shop at thrift stores and salvage grocery stores, keep my meat consumption low, and hardly ever eat out. I very rarely buy new clothes and will use them until they wear out and even then I've been known to try to repair shoes with duct tape lol. My biggest weakness is the toys I collect; I've eaten mainly rice several days in a row just to be able to afford a doll that I want.

[Mighty Frugal]

The first 5 - 6 years of my life, although I don't remember much , we were pretty poor. My father had Hemophilia and a lot of the time he couldn't work. When he did he worked in a gas station pumping gas & working on cars. He also drank too much probably because of the pain. He died when I was 5. We were living in a house out in the country that his parents owned. My mom started working as a nurses aid. I remember growing potatoes. Bathing in a wash tub. I remember hanging clothes on the line. I remember an outhouse being built. Going to a 1 room school house. I don't remember ever being hungry. We got milk from the grand parents farm. Probably chicken & beef too but I don't know for sure. We picked corn from their fields. I found out later that it wasn't sweet corn but the corn they grew for the cows. We just picked it early, I think. I know my mother made lots of our clothes.

When I was 6 my mother remarried to a man she went to high school with. His wife had died and left him with 3 girls. We were all pretty much the same age. We lived in a little 2 bedroom house for 6 years. All 6 of us girls in 1 bedroom. One bathroom. Dad (my step-dad) worked at Oldsmobile. He worked midnights for the extra money.

For a long time we continued to get milk & corn from my bio dads family farm. But what also helped was that my mom was getting social security for the 3 of us. So we had a nice lower middle class upbringing I think. After 6 years of saving we moved to a bigger house with 2 bathrooms & 4 bedrooms. Actually the upstairs had been converted to an apt. so 3 of us slept in what used to be the living room area. 2 of us in the kitchen dining room area. And 1 of us in the tiny little single bed sized bedroom. lol

We went camping every summer. We had a couple of canoes. Dad had hobbies, including woodworking, which he did use around the house. In the little 2 bedroom house he built this wall of cupboards so each of us had a place for our clothes & things. When we moved into the bigger house he built us each a headboard with a shelf & cupboard. He had model planes. Did some shooting & hunting. Photography.

I only remember ever eating at a McDonalds or a nearby truck stop a couple of times. We didn't have a vegetable garden. I remember mom still had a wringer washer in the basement but after a while she just used it for the bigger heavier items. Usually the only things line dried were those big items.

In our little town we were pretty much like everyone else. I do remember some kids that you knew were poor. And a very few who had money. We had pretty much everything we needed and some of our wants.

what a wonderful story. Thanks for sharing!! How sweet-6 girls! Are you all still close?

[Weston]

Grew up solidly in the upper middle class.

[KayLR]

Azure, your story is quite touching. Thank you.

I grew up very middle class in a small town. My Dad did have several side jobs in addition to his graveyard shift at the county jail. As he moved up in the ranks, he worked into day shift deputy patrol, then ended up the undersheriff before he retired. There were 4 kids in the family; my Mom stayed home.

We didn't have a lot of extras, and our birthdays were simple celebrations with maybe one present. School clothes from the catalog. I don't remember feeling "less than" anyone else. We usually went in with another family and bought sides of beef for the freezer, and chickens from a local farm. Saturday night was always meatless casserole (mac n cheese-like) night and Sunday was fried chicken or pot roast.

My SO, however, grew up very poor. I dated him in high school and remember going over to their house where his mom was rearing 6 kids along with her mother (father was absent, alcoholic). SO was an athlete, ran cross-country, and his shoes often had holes in them. The suit he wore in his graduation photo was borrowed from a friend. He had an after-school/weekend job to help his family and he ran to it--too far to just walk. He hates eating pancakes, because he says he remembers eating them weeks at a time. This was the early 70's.

Now, how did that shape him? He is one of the most generous people I have ever known. He never just walks past the Salvation Army kettle, he contributes to humanitarian causes, and works at a food bank. He is also a 23-yr Air Force veteran.

[Mighty Frugal]

Azure, your story is quite touching. Thank you.

I grew up very middle class in a small town. My Dad did have several side jobs in addition to his graveyard shift at the county jail. As he moved up in the ranks, he worked into day shift deputy patrol, then ended up the undersheriff before he retired. There were 4 kids in the family; my Mom stayed home.

We didn't have a lot of extras, and our birthdays were simple celebrations with maybe one present. School clothes from the catalog. I don't remember feeling "less than" anyone else. We usually went in with another family and bought sides of beef for the freezer, and chickens from a local farm. Saturday night was always meatless casserole (mac n cheese-like) night and Sunday was fried chicken or pot roast.

My SO, however, grew up very poor. I dated him in high school and remember going over to their house where his mom was rearing 6 kids along with her mother (father was absent, alcoholic). SO was an athlete, ran cross-country, and his shoes often had holes in them. The suit he wore in his graduation photo was borrowed from a friend. He had an after-school/weekend job to help his family and he ran to it--too far to just walk. He hates eating pancakes, because he says he remembers eating them weeks at a time. This was the early 70's.

Now, how did that shape him? He is one of the most generous people I have ever known. He never just walks past the Salvation Army kettle, he contributes to humanitarian causes, and works at a food bank. He is also a 23-yr Air Force veteran.

Please give your SO a big hug and kiss tonight. Tell him it is from a SLN member who was moved to tears reading about his upbringing

[KayLR]

I will certainly do that, MF...I feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

[Simplemind]

Something that was really missing in my upbringing was learning the art of pure generosity. Not the kind that is ego driven but purely from the heart. We were taught that private business was private business. You didn't talk about an elephant even if it was sitting on your chest. We were so busy being buttoned down that we didn't learn how to reach out.
It has taken me quite some time to loosen up and learn how to let go. Must be part of that money hoarding, mind your own business messages. I have been working on being giving of my time and resources and have learned that it never depletes what I have even though my blueprint would read differently. I so admire those who have naturally generous spirits and believe they are much happier for it. I have so much to make up for.........

[smellincoffee]

My dad worked two jobs to keep the bills paid and food on the table, so while we were never quite poor, they tended to live paycheck to paycheck, and that got worse as my dad grew older and could only do one job. Earlier my parents had problems using credit cards, and after kicking them for a decade got back onto them. I've grown up watching that stress and resolved never to experience it. I'm nearly 30 years old and don't have a credit rating; I've never used a credit card for anything. The only time I've gone into debt is for college, and now I'm shuttling half my income to pay that off early. My parents' struggles are definitely one of the motivators for my avoiding debt, but growing up "lean" also cued me in to the fact that you can't buy the good life. My favorite childhood memories are of romping around in the woods, spending time with my grandparents -- and that doesn't cost too much money at all. That childhood also made me very sensitive to being manipulated into WASTING money -- I despise advertising, bottled war, coffee machines that require you to buy brand-specific little cartridges for them, that sort of thing.

[Stella]

I grew up upper middle class. My mom came from a wealthy family, although it was new money, her parents had grown up poor in the Depression. My dad came from a middle class family, but they had a lot of expenses because my dad was born with a severe birth defect in his legs that took 13 years to mostly correct and his sister had a bone disease that required hospitalization frequently.

There were some ways that my upbringing was pretty privileged. Holidays at our beach home in Mexico, a brand new car for my 15th birthday, and other stuff like that. It didn't seem like much at the time because it was less than some of my cousins had. In other ways, it was a pretty awesome, low key upbringing. My mom was a preschool teacher and her philosophy when we were little was to spend lots of time outside and lots of time in creative play. I think that set the stage for simple living for me.

[razz]

Had some very poor times with clothes from the neighbours in my early teens but loved living in the country with the care of farm animals so no regrets as my life developed very well ever after.

I am still frugal and not into impressing anyone and as long as my clothes are neat, clean and classic in style, I am content.

[Mrs.B]

My mother was born in 1914, my father in 1919, my fathers family immigrated here from Russia in 1917, -0- money, they lived in a hut made of dirt (really dirt) there were 11 children that lived (17 total). My mom's father died in 1924 leaving my grandmother with 6 children. Some how she made it. My father would go on to become an alcoholic and abandon my sister and I when I was 2 years old. My mom was older, and had a heart condition, so we ended up on welfare. But my mom could make a dime scream! She cooked and sewed, we had amazing friends and family that brought us fresh produce and fresh fish. My mom never drove a car a day in her life, so we walked everywhere till my sister turned 16 and my grandmother bought her a car. (1963 Rambler) Being the youngest pretty much everything I had was "hand-me-down" At the beginning of the school year there was a family friend who would take us shopping and buy each one of us 1 new outfit. My grandmother would provide shoes or coats which ever was the most needed that year.
As soon as we were of working age we started to earn money, I babysat all over the neighborhood, my sister worked as a maid at a local hotel. We picked beans and berries. With this income we would combine our funds and go school clothes shopping. I taught myself to sew and started to make my own clothes.
My father died when I was 22 my mom when I was 39. My youth gave me 2 issues, one I called my Scarlett O'Hara complex. "As God as my witness I'll never be hungry again" And so I shopped to stock up. Not always wisely. #2. I struggled for a long time with its "MINE" having to share everything I owned as a child I always wanted something that was just MINE. I also struggled with my relationship with Men but that's a whole issue unto itself :)
Today I'm 58 years old, healthy (not wealthy) but much wiser!!

[Simplemind]

Thank you Mrs B. I totally understand your issues. I don't stock up but freedom to have what I want when I want it is very important to me.