The worst/naughtiest thing you've done to survive whilst at rock bottom

Hovel_lady

carpedieme wrote: »

when I was a single parent of three children I could have written a best seller entitled " How Many Ways With A jacket Potatoe ! "

Write it now - I'd buy it

flippin36

vixx wrote: »

In a similar vein...

When I lived in a shared student house, my nan gave me about £50 of M&S vouchers for Xmas so I could buy some new clothes. I spent it all on M&S food. I ate very, very well that month!
I had to make up an outfit and describe it to her when she asked what I'd bought!

I've done something similar, but I think your nan would have been happy that you ate well.

I only get money for birthdays and christmas and it always goes on buffering the cost of it all. ie other peoples pressies. My whole family invited themselves round for christmas last year when we were really trying for a frugal one. My mum gave me thirty quid to treat myself but I went straight to morrisons to buy all the food we were going to need to feed them. She kept asking me what I had bought with the money and I just made something up.

My birthday money always goes into the holiday spending money fund for the kids. But I enjoy treating them and it takes the stress out of the holiday when I don't have to be mean all the time.

flippin36

Oh I've just thought of one that makes me feel a bit bad. A lovely lady on freecycle gave me something that turned out to be of 'vintage' value on ebay. At the time we had a huge overdraft that was costing us money every month, so me and OH decided to sell everything we didn't use. I felt bad but I sold the item I was given by this old lady (£50). I know its against the rules and i felt bad everytime I saw her, but we did manage to clear our overdraft, the person who bought it was over the moon and I have made people happy with some things I have given.

Asiacat

Post deleted.

PinkKiwi

Don't know how I forgot this. Me and my partner where out of work a few years ago and things were an extreme struggle. We had 2 young children so obviously food and things for them came first. Some days we couldn't afford food for ourselves so we used to go to Morrisons for dinner......not in the cafe.......we used to take one of each of the tasters on cocktail sticks that they have on the deli counter then later that day we would go back again hoping it was a different person serving.

We've also pretended to do a big shop, putting food in the trolley on the way round, but eating sandwiches and giving crisps and snacks to the kids while they were in the trolley, then we left the trolley and walked out that sounds so bad.

jaffacakegal

I_Should_Be_So_Lucky wrote: »

However, when people/stores are chucking out perfectly edible food that has just gone past the sell by date, I don't think there's anything wrong with raiding the bins. If you work in a store/restaurant there's nothing wrong with taking left overs home rather than chucking them in the bin. When I go out for a meal I collect all the uneaten bits of meat etc for the dog.

P.S. I don' t have a dog.

I ALWAYS take all the leftovers home when my (large) family go out for a chinese banquet! Have chinese ever meal for 3 days but it saves me money!

I watched a program on BBC3 the other night re Freeganism (rummaging in bins for food). It shocks me how much perfectly good food is gone to waste when so many people are going hungry.

Also walking round Sainos the other night saw them throwing all the fresh bakery produce in bins - makes me sick thinking about wasting food!

Possibly the reason why I have a weight issue :rotfl:

regret70

jaffacakegal wrote: »

Possibly the reason why I have a weight issue :rotfl:

You should join my diet club, guaranteed weight loss in 1 week haha :-)

Amatheya81

When I was living in a bedsit that was only just big enough to get a bed in and struggling to buy food I would take left over sandwiches from work. I worked in a meetingroom venue and whenever we had clients having lunch (nearly every day) I would run in and remove the plates as quickly as possible so that I could wrap up the leftovers and take them home for dinner.
We also had the key for the chocolate machine, just in case something got stuck... It's amazing how much you can remove from those without the vendor noticing.

geoffky

I was unemployed in the early 80s and got a interview down in dover working on the cross channel ferries.I hitch-hiked down there and was over the moon to have passed the interview and asked could i start in 3 days time...
well it was winter and there was no way i could hitch-hike back up and down and then go to work.So i spent three winter nights sleeping rougth in Dover and will never forget it..i asked the police for a bed for the night at one stage..got told where to go.

I remember asking a takeaway for any scraps they had and getting refused..i have never been so low in my life as that time and i was once stranded at a airport with no money whatsoever for four days until the company i worked for worked out they had flew me to the wrong country..i was meant to be flown to costa-rica instead i was flown to Puerto rico..It was a living nightmare..

lottieholder

I love this thread . I too have liberated loo rolls, also paper napkins and paper handtowels to use as loo paper.

Didn't think I'd ever go back to those days but I'm rapidly approaching them at the mo and back on here to work out how to prevent it.

I've picked sweetcorn, kale and spuds out of fields, legal stuff out of hedgerows (blackberries, elderberries etc). Can't remember ever doing anything worse.

Been living off Nectar points for the last 2 weeks. Payday on Friday thank goodness :j.