The summer holidays is nearly over. It’s been a tough one on entertaining 3 children. Wish I could have done more for them but hopefully next year I’ll be able to, even if that means planning a few months in advance.

But I feel optimistic about the future, surely it can only get better.

Wondering if I should try and go back to university ... for a third try at getting a degree ... this seems like a possibly good time (seeing as how I appear to be unemployable!!) ... but ... I'm just so time poor!! I can hardly even get to swim more than twice a week, even though I love to, and it's good for me ... so I don't know how to make space to study, when I'm always feeling guilty about how much I can't do for the kids, and when we really can't afford to lose any of my side hustles!

Hi Ella, thank you for your question.

My Son is in Year 10 now, so it will be things like GCSE material, books, finding extra support, for me that will be the concern. This is an important time for him. Finances are so stretched it's difficult to squeeze a little bit of money for extra support for him. I do feel helpless and guilty for not being able to help him the same I did for my older two boys.

Honestly, I’m down because I can’t afford to do a lot. My son explained the other day that he feels terribly resentful that other kids get to have holidays and days out and lots of things that I just can’t afford.

It will be really lovely to spend some time relaxing though and not having to rush in the morning!

Grateful to be a mum, but so so sad that I cannot provide a more dynamic life for my son, and I feel I have not given him the best childhood because we have been really poorly off financially for a lot of his life.. most of it really.

We have been struggling during the last few weeks, trying to keep an 11 year old entertained has been hard without the money to do anything deemed ‘fun’.

How do you tell your child no when the rest of her friends are able to do things so freely, there is only so many excuses a mum can come up with

Summer holidays always means spending more money we don't have. We are at an awkward age where my kids do not yet qualify for any school summer camps as they aren't in school yet - so I have to fill our day with as many cheap or free things as I can. Even a trip to the coffee shop costs in excess of £25, so I have to think twice about simple outings. I feel guilty keeping the kids home so much, but we can't afford to do much, so what choice do we have?

Really upset today, Sunday and what does my son get for tea the majority of a tin of beans, while most others get to have a Sunday dinner, feeling like a failure and worry about what to do rest of week as there’s no food not even any bread not that I could toast it for him anyway the toaster broke a few week ago and I can’t afford to replace it when I can’t even afford to buy food. One last toilet roll to last until Friday, this is the life of a single mum who works full time, it’s beyond a joke and to top it off I got a email from gas and elec to say it’s going down but as I’ve got a budget plan (where I pay the same amount each month to build credit for winter) my price won’t change until the annual review which I’ve just had so another year of paying £210 per month, do I stop paying but can we live if it gets cut off, I work from home a lot too so I need it, but I’m also not earning enough to live anyway

I rely heavily on support from the school, and extra funded clubs.

It’s been difficult this year more than others due to my daughter finishing primary and entering secondary school after the summer: the added expense for prom, leavers disco etc has had me awake at night crying wondering how to make ends meet without her feeling like the odd one out and left out of doing x, y & z with the rest of her classmates & friends.

Today I felt the pull of parental guilt again.

My 11 year old has SEND and as such struggles to form and keep peer relationships. Today he's asked for his friend from school to come over for tea tomorrow night.

Obviously I want to promote this for him so said yes but now I'm sat here wondering if I'll have enough food to go around, whether they will actually like the food as I can't afford processed goodies ATM. I'm wondering how I'll afford the fuel for the extra journey to drop them home.

He has little concept of money right now and thinks it grows on trees as at his dad's house its never an issue so when he asked if I could treat them to a chippy and I said no I saw the disappointment in his face.

The thing is he doesn't ever ask for much, probably because I always have to say no. But now I'm sat here thinking about what other corners I can cut or belts I can tighten to give them a simple treat.

Sometimes poor parenting is just hard.

It's 2023 and right now I'm happy each week if I managed to feed and clothe my children without running out of electricity or fuel. There is no expendable income and survival is what this is, not living.

My older two children are fortunate enough to live in a separated parent family so at their dad's they live a completely different life. My youngest son who is 2 only has me and most days I feel so guilty.

My older two have been away this week, my eldest spent a week abroad with her dad and my middle son is currently in abroad where his dad is to be remarried. I am eternally happy for both my older children that they get these incredible experiences but I also feel guilty. Guilty that my youngest son lives in second hand clothes and shoes. Guilty that we have to rely on the community grocery for food. Guilty that during cold snaps he has to get in bed with me to keep warm as I can't afford the heating.



I know that for now on UC there will be no holidays, no trips away, no clubs to attend and some days it just makes me feel like I'm failing him as a parent.

To remain transparent he got money from family and friends for his birthday recently and I took him to the zoo and beach but that won't be happening again for such a long time.

Deep down I know that I spend every single day taking him to parks and playing in the garden with him and children need time and love not money and things but sometimes I just wish I could give him something special. I wish I could buy the sweets he wanted so badly from the shop, I wish I could take him to the mini movers group all of his friends go to.

But here we are in 2023 surviving.

It’s been a tough few months here, financially, I’ve been so lucky, I am blessed with a great friend who supported me to be able to move house.

I have a tiny budget to do a lot of work and am trying to find support with some things, which isn’t easy. People think if you have a mortgage, it’s your own home and so why should you get support.

So you struggle, and it isn’t easy at all.

I do feel more empowered when I’m able to sort out my finance, but, with living on social security payments largely, I worry constantly and I check my journal when it’s close to the time of payment, just in case they’re taking something out or putting something in. It feels a bit sad really!

I feel like some people think they have the right to judge what I buy and how I spend the support money. I feel wasteful and think; ‘you don’t need that’, or ‘that’s a waste of money’. Could be anything from moisturiser to nice bread.

In particular at the moment, my internal dialogue when I’m shopping is really unkind and miserly. It’s so expensive!! So even the things I might previously have been able to justify are no longer an option.

It’s isn’t the worst off I have been, but I’m so afraid of the financial carnage of no support with energy costs and the cost just to live. When that is gone, what then? So I have to be extra careful… and I was already quite careful with what we had…

Not many new clothes, shoes needed but need to afford them, no trips out to anywhere paying, no holidays… there’s only so much imagination you have when you’re exhausted from just surviving…

Sometimes, people say that you can have adventures even with no money… I used to agree, but when that no money time extends so far into the future, there is just not enough imagination to make poverty into a Wes Anderson film anymore…

I was getting housing support and now it stopped from two months.

Paying rent on my own no support any more. Its affecting my health now because I have to do extra hours with working full time already to pay the rent.

Unable to give time to my son on weekends too. As no choice but to work on weekends too.

Support from government is a joke.