Thank you for writing this. I hope it opens some eyes. I've been in tough straits before, though nowhere near as tough as yours. (I only had two children to care for, which for me made all the difference.) I was just telling my son today that many years ago, when I was a church-goer, I would only go if I could scrounge up a dollar to put into the plate. I didn't go some weeks because I was ashamed to not have a dollar. I was that level of poor. I had some middle-class-ish years, but am more of a working poor now. But I have always said there was a real difference in my mothering when I was married to a teacher vs when he left and it was me trying to make it on a meager newspaper salary. I was too exhausted, for example, to attend parent-teacher conferences as a single mom. If you'd ever told me that I'd skip such a thing, I'd have argued. But there's a limit to how much a person can do. I'm glad you're doing better these days. Thanks again for writing this.