To have frugality fatigue. (Cost of living.)

Agreed, if I knew you I'd be very happy to bring around cake and tea and chat to you all day OP.

That's harsh. I get it. I like perfume myself and I like spontaneous buys when fed up.

It is true though, none of us on MN are homeless and living in a cardboard box.
You need to think of what you've got not what you haven't.

I wouldn't buy books anyway, what a waste, I'd still get them from the library. Don't want them cluttering up everywhere.

You've got a brilliant writing style quite cheered me up!

Yes, poverty reduces choices. No argument there.

Incidentally, for anyone wanting help in budgeting Shirley Goode wrote a few books about it and also tells you how to work out how much things cost. Obvs the pricing will be out of date and I wonder how many items were cheap as chips back then but now expensive??!!

I think Delia also wrote a frugal cooking book.

DS1 loves dhal. It's his favourite food. But when he worked out in Nepal as a volunteer for six weeks and ate only dhal twice a day he grew sick of it. The OP's point is that poverty reduces choice. You can't tart up dhal with some fried slivers of garlic and toasted cumin seeds and fresh chopped chilli and coriander if all you can afford is the lentils. And you don't want to eat boiled lentils several times a week when you are surrounded by adverts and shoppers and co workers eating a wide variety of foods you love and can't afford.

It is exhausting counting every penny, I was in that position when bringing up three small kids alone.
What is your housing situation OP? are your savings for a deposit? could you allow yourself any for a bit more food shopping?

What a tone-deaf post. No "good perfume"? Perhaps keep that travesty for your own thread, not one where people are struggling to feed themselves and their children.

All credit to you for studying to hopefully get a better job. What a wonderful message to send your son about wanting to get better and working hard toward it. It sounds really tough right now but you are doing all the right things. You are building a better future so look on this as a really tough moment in time. Your kid won’t remember anything except his mum loved him when he was growing up. Well done.

I am with you OP.

I think what annoys me the most is that useless government after useless government have allowed utility and transports companies to make huge profits while driving the cost of living up for most of us.

Basically a lot of our current issues are to do with corporate greed...

Anyone who has a job should not be struggling with basic things like food and heating.

I have cut down as much as I could on my expenses. Now I have nothing left to cut.

It's so hard. I earned less but had a better quality of life in my early 30s than I do now in my early 40s. I don't have kids and currently no partner so no additional expenditure there. My rent and bills are at least double what they were 10 years ago but my pay has obviously not doubled, nowhere close. I don't know what the answer is.

I just googled “smug retiree on YouTube”. Took me straight to her 😂.

However lovely dhal can be (and I like dhal ) it's fine to not want to eat it every day and it's besides the point. Having to count every penny, worry every time something goes up by 5p a jar/loaf/packet, worry about any little thing wearing out/breaking/going wrong because it'll push you into debt is exhausting. Life on that sort of financial knife edge is something that can only be sustained for relatively short periods before it starts to seriously affect your health.

im poor and im physically disabled with severe mental illness. i dont have much family and they have their own lives, families and jobs, so despite them helping out with stuff like doing shopping and house stuff where they can, you know, they dont have time or energy to do stuff all the time, so yeah, a lot of stuff just i cant do so it doesnt get done for a while....my legs hurt too much for me to get out for milk? no one available to nip down to get me some? then i dont get any and thats just how it is because i cant afford the uber eats fees to pay to have it dropped off for me. i dont have the space to store loads of powdered or uht milk or the funds to buy it upfront so yeah, its just how it is sometimes. im not starving or anything like that but yeah, between budgeting for the bills, shopping and actual needs like mobility stuff or other stuff for my health needs, theres not much left, if anything, for 'fun' and really.....my health doesnt allow for much fun to be had in person. It can be tough for a lot of us, so i get it i totally get it.

I remember years ago when I was out of work. I couldn't even cook dhal as I could not afford the spices! For me it was cheap spaghetti without any flavourings. That's all I ate every day. Bloody miserable.

What I am really trying to say is things can change you just need a plan

I just wanted to say I understand. I was a poor single mum many years ago and remember the constant grind of saving money and not having anything I wanted. I turned my low mood into something positive. I wasted my time at school and was interested in my social life but as an adult I studied in the evening to get myself into a well paid job. Often poverty can be a motivator to study for a career that is financially rewarding and now I have an amazing life and am building up a solid pension as I never want to be poor again.

re pets, we'd love a dog ,a rescue, but that's an expense.

Thank you. I know, it was an odd, really unpleasant response. It’s not as if I was suggesting buying unbranded champagne or something. Some people are strange though.

I was thinking this -I love dhal.
But I guess it’s different if you’re forced to eat it (and don’t actually like it).

Indeed they should! The relevant rule is, in essence: you have a monthly assessment period (MAP) which is exactly a calendar month and the amount of UC you get is calculated according to your total net earned income in that calendar month.

This means that UC goes up when income goes down and down when income goes up. In the month where you get paid twice, your earned income is doubled and UC entitlement falls accordingly.

Unfortunately, a lot of work coaches and job centre managers still have the mindset of just getting people into work, and don't really understand the complexity of a means-tested benefit, let alone one which is constantly readjusting itself. But they're not wrong, in this instance.

Is that how you see it?

I think it offers opportunity, freedom and security.

...then they can get good jobs and pay for other people.