People Who Grew Up Poor Are Sharing Things That The Rich Kids Will Never Understand

Things we experience as kids have a way of sticking with us, and they can pop up later in life in the most unexpected ways. Recently, people who grew up poor gathered on Reddit to talk about how it affected them, and there are so many things that people who grew up with plenty of money will never understand. Here’s what they had to say:

1. “You can end up doing very well money-wise, but being poor as a kid never leaves you.”

—Substantial-Bag5141

“Especially true if you were ridiculed for being poor. It stays with you.

You either spend the rest of your life anxious about appearing poor (which may lead to overconsumption of luxury items and garbage trends), or you become a very understanding but out-of-the-loop adult who promotes humility everywhere you go.

You either become very anxious to stay fashionable or you become unabashedly frugal and individual.”

—Upset-Elderberry3723

2. “Spending money to save money isn’t an option, because often times you don’t have the money in the first place. Yeah, a $100 pair of shoes is going to outlast the $10 Walmart special, but if you don’t have the $100, you can’t buy them. Yeah, it’s better to buy in bulk, but if your grocery budget is only $20, you can’t spend it all on the 25lb bag of rice.”

“Yeah, it’s better to take care of minor car issues before they become major car issues, but you can’t do that if you don’t have the money for the parts, much less labor.

Yeah, it’s better to buy brand new tires, but the $20 used tires will have to do, because you don’t have money for the $100 new tires. And you ain’t replacing all four at once; you’re doing it on an as-needed basis.

Yeah, per unit it’s cheaper to make your own burgers at home, but you can’t buy per unit at the grocery store, so McD’s it is.

I could list dozens of other examples.”

—Phonic-Frog

3. “I would say I experienced poverty more as an adult, and my answer is how expensive it is to be poor. There is a ton of nickel and diming that goes on. Things like laundry mats, overdraft fees, and heaven forbid you get credit card debt or payday loans.”

—joemammmmaaaaaa

“That $33 overdraft fee is devastating.”

—Vikingaling

4. “No matter how many times you open the cabinets or the fridge when you’re hungry, food never appears.”

—Ok-Psychology-5702

“Damn, I felt this one and remember it too. I’m never going to let my kids feel this. Ever!!!”

—BDH818

5. “Not having the security to take risks and pursue your passions, and having to worry about playing it safe by finding a job that pays well. I understood our financial situation, and every test felt like game seven with two seconds on the clock. If I failed, I couldn’t escape.”

—sickstrings8

“This is how I felt growing up lower-middle-class. If I didn’t get scholarships, I couldn’t go to college. It gave me a lot of anxiety.”

—Coomstress

6. “It’s not that I don’t want to hang out, but I can’t afford to. Every activity you do costs money somehow.”

—ShaChoMouf

7. “Choosing between having power or having water because my mom couldn’t always afford to pay for both.”

—infinitekittles

“Yeah, it’s a whole new level of decision-making. I said to a friend once that poverty is all about choices, and she was confused, because she imagined poverty as having few choices. I had to explain the difference between options and choices. When you’re poor, you have fewer options, but you have to make lots of hard choices, because you can only spend a dollar once.”

—NiceNBoring

8. “The daily shame of going to school in ‘poor’ clothing. Clothing that’s cheap or ugly or doesn’t fit right. Holes in the seams. Only two outfits. It eats away at you over the course of years. It’s especially difficult at the beginning of each school year, when other kids show up in a brand new wardrobe that their parents bought them in prep for the new school year.”

—Salty-Ambition9733

9. “Going out to eat was a treat. I don’t mean a nice restaurant, I’m talking fast food. Stopping at a Burger King or McDonald’s instead of going straight home for leftovers was a big deal. And those kids’ meal toys were cherished for a long time, not just tossed after a week.”

—Rule-of-Two-1899

10. “The constant dread of a financial situation hanging over your head. A flat tire, a toothache, or any unexpected expense can ruin you.”

—mydevilkitty

11. “Having to convince yourself that you’re fine so much that you don’t know how you really feel. So many times, I’ve said that I didn’t want to go on this school field trip, or I didn’t like to follow a trend, and I didn’t want what everyone had because I wanted to be different. But as a child, you want to fit in with your friends. You want the cool light-up shoes. You want the iPod. You want the lunch box to match your book bag instead of taking a paper bag.”

“I’ve said I was fine so many times when I wasn’t that now it’s hard to express myself and I push my true feelings down so it seems like I’m happy and put together.”

—AggravatingShow2028

12. “The idea of not getting rid of anything. For example, I wear white undershirts. When they get too dingy to wear, I cut them into rags for dusting and light cleaning, then when they get dirtier, I use them for painting, and after that I save them for if I have to clean up grease or oil (like wiping down the weed eater).”

—LittleCeasarsFan

13. “Watering down the milk to make it go further.”

—Lea32R

14. “The level of shame/embarrassment that comes with the realization of how poor you were.”

—twoblues702

15. “Delayed gratification is very difficult to practice when life has taught you that gratification is never coming. People love to judge the poor for what they see as bad spending decisions, but that $10 you spent on a rare treat might be the only ‘extra’ $10 you might have for weeks. It’s not as if you have it to spare every week to invest for long-term gain, unless you’re extremely disciplined.”

—soggydepends

16. “That feeling of being the one on a field trip, or a sporting event, or in the cafeteria, or walking home from school who didn’t have money to spend. You never forget it, and never pass up an opportunity to help prevent another child from feeling that way.”

—None

17. “Shopping at thrift stores, yard sales, flea markets, and farm auctions for literally everything you need. It’s not a quaint hobby or eccentric pastime.”

—PyroFemme1

18. “Just call someone to fix it? Yeah, that ain’t happening. You either have to fix it yourself or it stays broken.”

—anythingaustin

19. “I remember being super poor in college, and a non-poor friend kept telling me to just go to the ATM and get money. No concept of ‘there is no money.'”

—matchboxtx

20. “I could write a novel, but I’ll stick to this; People will judge kids for being poor. Didn’t sign for paid extracurriculars? ‘Why didn’t you sign up for xyz program? You shouldn’t be lazy.’ Take two buses solo to the ballet class that you’re attending on scholarship? The bus gets you there between 10 minutes early to exactly on time. ‘We value punctuality here; five minutes early is on time. You clearly are not dedicated.'”

“Parent doesn’t show up for the teacher conference? ‘Well, if you don’t take your education seriously, then neither do I.’

Like, which parts of these things can I control? People were just mad the poor kid was there messing up the illusion of perfection.

Another part of that is you have adult responsibility with kid power. I would have to push like hell to never have a math class in the morning because we never had breakfast, and I cannot count when I’m hungry.”

—sddk1

21. “Watching your parents balance the checkbooks and feeling that stress from a very early age. Also, watching TV and feeling like you are not part of society.”

—the_BoneChurch

22. “Everything was a calculation. I’m comfortably well off as an adult, but I still do the math on everything.”

—Low_Satisfaction_725

23. “I couldn’t afford a sports bra in junior high, so I bounced. I can’t shake feeling self-conscious about that even now.”

—wheelsup77

24. “You grow up quick when you grow up poor.”

—IncognitoAtWork17

25. “Only the eldest child gets new things. The next gets the hand-me-downs.”

—somwname

26. “Unhealed childhood desires. Recently, my son won one of those bead things that you make and then iron together to fuse. I ALWAYS saw other kids play with them as a kid, but never got one. My son asked me to help him, and I told him I had never made one before. He said, ‘Maybe you should have asked for one?’ I try not to talk to them about my childhood struggles because they don’t need to know that. But I told him, it just wasn’t something that was doable at the time.”

“My mother-in-law ironed it and asked me to help her peel everything and all that. My son was happy for like a minute, but moved on.

Afterwards, I went with my husband to run an errand, and I cried in the car. I told him I felt a part of my childhood was healed in that moment when his mom handed me that fused together SpongeBob. I never knew it was something I was missing in my life until I did it. I finally managed to do a normal childhood thing.”

—AnaneSpider

27. “We had to use every last bit of toiletry items, like toothpaste or shampoo. If the shampoo is almost gone, we put water in it to get all of it out.”

—herec0mesthesun_

28. “You don’t have the luxury of being picky about food. I can tell when someone has lived a comfortable life when they have a big-ass list of things they won’t eat due to anything other than allergies.”

—PickScylla4ME

29. “Learning how to take care of the things you own because you never know when or if you’ll get another one.”

—Lizzie_001

30. “Paper towels were such a luxury. To this day, I will tear the smallest amount off of one I need and reuse it as much as possible, even though my own financial situation now is better than it ever was as a kid with either of my parents. If I dry my hands with a torn-off piece, I set it somewhere to dry, and do this as many times as it maintains integrity.”

—VicAintVanquished

31. And finally, “I didn’t know. And that’s a beautiful thing. It’s funny because my little brother knew even less. Only in recent years, he was helping my parents with personal paperwork, and I guess he saw something that showed Dad’s salary when we were kids, and he was shocked. He could not believe that we lived on so little. He probably had to calculate the difference for inflation as well, so the initial numbers must have truly surprised him.”

“I think the internet, for all its good, has to bear responsibility for our kids knowing too many things that they shouldn’t yet. I believe kids need nurturing, food, shelter, and lots of hugs and kisses, and not the state of their family’s economic situation.

That’s old-fashioned, I guess.”

—EyeNpeAceNvrwk

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