How many kids are too many?

[noamnety]

96. Depends what you count as "afford"

Last edited Sat Dec 31, 2011, 12:21 PM - Edit history (1)

We could technically pay for milk and cereal, but the thing about being poor is that each decision to buy one thing comes at the expense of another. Maybe you've never been in that situation, or had to forage for much of your food. If you haven't, you've had a privileged life. Heck, I lived like that for years, but still consider myself to have a privileged life.

So yeah, we could pay for that without WIC, but then other things most people would consider a necessity we'd be doing without.

The financial situation was the result of trying to support the family for a few years on an E4's pay (just above a private in the army), then returning to the states and trying to use the GI bill - which required Senator Levin's office to interfene! The state university wouldn't give the husband in state tuition rates even though he was born and raised here and ONLY lived out of the state/country because of active duty orders. At that point he was a full time student, I was recalled against my will into the reserves. I couldn't go back to school full time because I lost all my VA benefits - I got out 2 months early to have my daughter, and even though they put me back in afterwards, once I made the decision to get out to avoid two parents on active duty with an infant, the GI bill and what I paid into it was forfeited. I paid more cash into the GI bill than I ever got in WIC coupons.

It's awesome to be told you can get a discharge to raise a child, give up your benefits in the process, and then involuntarily be put right back in with no benefits. It's even more awesome when you are still serving, and then some jackass in line wants to start judging you as a drain on society because you're using a coupon for a freaking box of cereal.