Who grew up poor - AR15.COM

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Posted: 1/17/2021 2:11:56 PM EDT

Who here grew up poor? Were you really poor?

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:13:34 PM EDT

[#1]

I was government cheese poor. My childhood was amazing though.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:16:19 PM EDT

[#2]

Quote History

Quoted:
I was government cheese poor. My childhood was amazing though.

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So was I. I dont recall feeling poor though

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:16:30 PM EDT

[#3]

How about wood burning stove and no running water when I was a child?

Does that count?

I used an outhouse until about 1980 when I was around 3 or 4.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:17:18 PM EDT

[#4]

Yeah, we pretty damn poor. I didn't know it then, though.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:17:57 PM EDT

[#5]

I was. As poor as it comes, ghetto hellholes, hiding from city inspectors. Etc.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:17:57 PM EDT

[#6]

Loved my childhood

One year I got a loaf of bread, and peanut butter and a jar of jelly for my Christmas gift and I was so excited because we didn’t always have peanut butter and jelly needed for the sandwiches.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:18:07 PM EDT

[#7]

Family came to the US in 1989 with 800 bucks to our name. No job, no English, 3 months promised paid rent and groceries.

Does that qualify?

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:18:57 PM EDT

[#8]

Yeah, pretty fucking poor! No running water, hell not even an outhouse. I didn't know what a shower was until I was 12 yrs old. Only heat was a 3 coil stack heater, I slept on the couch because I didn't have a bed, yeah, Id sit on that couch at night and shoot fucking rats with my BB gun off the kitchen counter, Id say I know what poor is. That BB gun was my Christmas present one year btw.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:19:36 PM EDT

[#9]

What is poor ?

What is not poor ?

I always did, do what I want... Buy what I want.... What would that be called ?

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:20:41 PM EDT

[#10]

Jam sandwiches were a thing.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:21:21 PM EDT

[#11]

Quote History

Quoted:
What is poor ?

What is not poor ?

I always did, do what I want... Buy what I want.... What would that be called ?

View Quote

That would be called a "spoiled brat"

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:21:23 PM EDT

[#12]

Quote History

Quoted:
Family came to the US in 1989 with 800 bucks to our name. No job, no English, 3 months promised paid rent and groceries.

Does that qualify?

View Quote

Im not judging. My father was a junker, buying scrap metal and reselling it

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:22:15 PM EDT

[#13]

Quote History

Quoted:
Jam sandwiches were a thing.

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Ive had those, but we were so poor you had to take ONE piece of bread, tear it in half, and then JAM it together.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:22:23 PM EDT

[#14]

“Some people are so poor all they have is money.”

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:23:00 PM EDT

[#15]

We ate sand.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:23:45 PM EDT

[#16]

we used to eat chicken, bone and everything

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:24:32 PM EDT

[#17]

Today, i have more money then ive ever had. But im still poor

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:24:35 PM EDT

[#18]

Im not proud of it but Im not ashamed of it either. To be ashamed of it would cast guilt upon your parents for raising a kid in conditions like that and my parents were SAINTS. They did the best they could and that's all anybody could ask.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:24:45 PM EDT

[#19]

My family didn't become poor until around 2010. As a kid, we owned a body shop, I went to private school, my cousins also went to private school. My grandparents had a huge fifth wheel rv and brand new dually diesel to tow it. They traveled the country. Then we lost our direct repair programs because insurance companies are evil. Now my 75 year old grandma is broke and still works. We had to sell the shop. Been in a lawsuit since 2013 against like 30 insurance companies. My poor story is backwards

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:25:29 PM EDT

[#20]

Quote History

Quoted:

Ive had those, but we were so poor you had to take ONE piece of bread, tear it in half, and then JAM it together.

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Uh, dad, is that you?

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:25:50 PM EDT

[#21]

My dad was a school teacher and we were not poor. However, my parents grew up during the depression and sometimes acted like we were poor. We lived very modest in a poor blue collar neighborhood. We kids had everything we needed but not near what we wanted. My dad would recycle nails. When he need some guess who got the chore of straightening them? My mother washed and save used aluminum foil, bread sacks and other plastic bags. How she fed a family of six on one skinny fryer I'll never know. I guess potatoes, vegetables along with gravy on biscuits made the meal filling

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:26:32 PM EDT

[#22]

No, white privilege kept my single 2-job working mother in millions.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:27:02 PM EDT

[#23]

Started life dirt poor and by the time I was 14-15 dad was a multi millionaire.

I lived both ends of the spectrum and wound up as a middle class welder/mechanic.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:27:03 PM EDT

[#24]

I grew up in San Antonio,TX, on the East side in the 70s.When we could no longer afford to live in the trailer park, we moved to a housing project. Ate lots of 5 pack for $1 hot dogs, eggs,cabbage, and ketchup sandwiches.

My dad got out of the Army while in SA, called home in WV, was told to stay there, because there were no jobs back home.He went into the Army. He had a scholarship to WVU, but was so poor, he still couldn't go.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:27:21 PM EDT

[#25]

Quote History

Quoted:
Yeah, we pretty damn poor. I didn't know it then, though.

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Same here.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:28:06 PM EDT

[#26]

Had to duct tape my shoes together poor. Yup.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:28:54 PM EDT

[#27]

We were farmers, and owned some land that was so bad you couldn't raise a ruckus on it.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:30:04 PM EDT

[#28]

Quote History

Quoted:
Had to duct tape my shoes together poor. Yup.

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We stuffed towels around the windows to keep the wind from blowing in

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:31:49 PM EDT

[#29]

Nope.

Decidedly middle-class. 3BR 1800 sq.ft. ranch home in a quiet neighborhood. Two cars in the garage. No servants. My parents could afford to get me a few fun toys, like a dog, a minibike, a Red Ryder, and a 10-gallon aquarium. I mowed the neighbors' yards for play money.

Went to public schools until I entered 7th grade, then I got a scholarship to a small private school where some VERY wealthy families sent their kids. They were my classmates and my friends, and I was never jealous. I did however spend a lot of time at their homes, enjoying the fruits of their parents' labor.

I never was exposed to the poor side of town.

You know... WHITE PRIVILEGE.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:32:18 PM EDT

[#30]

Well below the poverty line. Earned a scholarship through ROTC to pay for college.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:33:11 PM EDT

[#31]

Quote History

Quoted:
Nope.

Decidedly middle-class. 3BR 1800 sq.ft. ranch home in a quiet neighborhood Two cars in the garage. No servants. My parents could afford to get me a few fun toys, like a dog, a minibike, a Red Ryder, and a 10-gallon aquarium. I mowed the neighbors' yards for play money.

Went to public schools until I entered 7th grade, then I got a scholarship to a small private school where some VERY wealthy families sent their kids. They were my classmates and my friends, and I was never jealous. I did however spend a lot of time at their homes, enjoying the fruits of their parents' labor.

I never was exposed to the poor side of town.

You know... WHITE PRIVILEGE.

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Thank your parents

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:33:35 PM EDT

[#32]

Quote History

Quoted:
Thank your parents

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No doubt.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:33:55 PM EDT

[#33]

Standard of the 60/70's: somewhat lower middle class

Standard of today: working poor

Standard of 87chan: destitute.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:33:59 PM EDT

[#34]

Both my parents came from poor farm families. As a child we didn't have a lot of extra money but I wouldn't say poor. I was taught to work from an early age and that's a good thing.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:34:02 PM EDT

[#35]

I thought we were poor because my parents wouldn't buy me the Combat Wombat I wanted.

Mostly it was because we had four family members in college at the same time, one in Vanderbilt. Money was just tight.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:34:40 PM EDT

[#36]

My first neighborhood, I never realized how dumpy it was until after I came back to see it years later. 20 years after that, it’s now the hipster part of town and nary a crime to be found.

My parents moved to a nicer part of town but were completely house poor. My parents divorced shortly after. My mother went to food lines for most of our groceries. We qualified for free meals at school.

Started working at 14. My mother always had to borrow money for the mortgage. She finally got a degree around then and was finally able to make more money.

Things have changed. She saved every dime she could for years by being as frugal as possible, paid off the house and bought every car she has owned with cash. She has a really nice place that had the same hipster attraction to the neighborhood (house is worth about half a million now because of it’s location), has a nice new car and has no debt. She will retire in the next few years with a modest 401k.

I bought a house six years ago for $87k. It’s worth almost twice that now. I constantly get offers to buy my house.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:34:59 PM EDT

[#37]

I grew up poor even though my family had money...they sure didn't like to spend it lol.

Now im really poor because I sure do like to spend it

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:36:26 PM EDT

[#38]

We weren’t well off by any means but we weren’t dirt poor. There were good times and bad times. My mom worked her ass off to keep a roof over my head and clothes on my back.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:36:36 PM EDT

[#39]

I remember a nearby church dropping off brown grocery bags full of used clothing and broken toys. There was a very used pair of Tony Dorsett cleats in one of the bags and I was elated because they fit me perfectly. I remember LARPing all over the trailer lot that day.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:38:44 PM EDT

[#40]

Quote History

Quoted:
I thought we were poor because my parents wouldn't buy me the Combat Wombat I wanted.

Mostly it was because we had four family members in college at the same time, one in Vanderbilt. Money was just tight.

View Quote

Hodaka Uber Alles!!! I bought a 125 Wombat throwing newspapers for 2 years.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:38:58 PM EDT

[#41]

Most of you folks don't have any idea what poor really is. College? LMAO! wtf is that? Our only water source was my great grandmothers well across the road. It had to be carried back in a bucket and if it sat for more than a day it had "wiggle tails" swimming in it. A coke was a once a MONTH treat. Please, thank your parents and even more than that, thank the good Lord for giving you the means to live a better, more healthy life.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:39:35 PM EDT

[#42]

I grew up in South Texas on the Gulf Coast, there were Vietnamese families living 3 generations in a one room plywood shack, working on shrimp boats saving up money to buy an old wooden shrimp boat of their own.

There were tons of Mexicans living in plywood shacks, they came to school smelling like smoke from burning anything they could get to stay warm, they practically lived in the library during the summers since it had AC. Shoes that were to big with duct tape holding them together since they had been handed down already worn out, stuff like that.

We had a window shaker and a rusty old station wagon and my parents could afford new shoes, clothes, and jackets, and I felt like I was rich in comparison.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:39:55 PM EDT

[#43]

grew up really poor.

took me a while to figure out that not everyone is degenerate white trash.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:40:12 PM EDT

[#44]

Quote History

Quoted:
We ate sand.

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you ate sand?!

we ate sand.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:40:16 PM EDT

[#45]

And I still hate powdered milk to this day.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:40:24 PM EDT

[#46]

Monty Python - Four Yorkshiremen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26ZDB9h7BLY

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:40:27 PM EDT

[#47]

When I was growing up if we wanted a jacuzzi we had to fart in the tub.

Posted: 1/17/2021 2:40:44 PM EDT

[#48]

I grew up poor in a wealthy community.

I learned a lot about human nature. I didn't realize that I was poor until my mid teens. I learned the difference between real human love and snobbery.