Poverty

As a child in elementary school I was not aware that I lived in poverty and we were poor. I remember people bringing us a box of food and toys at Christmas. I started to realize that we were poor when it was time to buy school clothes and supplies. We were not able to go until the day before school started and only got a pair of shoes and basic school supplies. My mother worked three jobs to support us and it was never enough. We lived in a small trailer and were not allowed to have friends come over. I also remember the trailer being cold because the heat was cut off. Because of my situation as a child, I have learned that its no fun being hungry. Now that I am grown and have children of my own, I am learning still. There have been times that I have gone without food to make sure that my children eat and have enough I buy something for myself maybe once in a couple months because I want my children to have new clothes and school supplies. Children in Russia face the same issues as anywhere else. UNICEF states that

•  "Children growing up in deprived households do less well in terms of life chances, in educational attainment, wages, employment rates and other social outcomes in adulthood. Child poverty is also being shown to be crucially linked to the inter-generational transmission of poverty, and its perpetuation. Any long term efforts to tackle poverty and inequality need effective action to break child poverty"

There are around 90 million living in poverty. When you grow up in poverty, there is more of a chance that you will remain in poverty throughout your life. In Russia, a family living close to poverty may chose not to have any or more children because it can push them into poverty. Therefore, the population will slowly decrease.












 http://www.unicef.org/ceecis/media_3372.html

Price of Food

I was actually unsure about what to post for this post. But, after reading Nadia's post it came to me. I work for and Early Head Start program. Anyone who knows about this program is that we cater to low income families. The majority of these families are also on food stamps. My concern is the fact that so many children are becoming over weight. And I believe this is happening because junk food is so low in cost and so high in fat. I have attempted to go on diets in the past and have gone broke doing it. Why is it that all of the healthy food is so expensive? If junk food would be a higher price, families would be less likely to buy it. My other solution is that Food Stamps will not allow it just like they do not allow beer or toilet paper. I have had a family use their food stamps to buy $40.00 worth of candy for a pinata. And the parents response was " I am not paying for it, so What"s the big deal"

Childbirth In Your Life and Around the World

Having my first child was a day I will never forget. It was an easy pregnancy, but a horrible birth. Before I even got to the hospital, we were stuck in a traffic jam for over an hour. Upon arriving at the hospital, I was given a epidural.  The labor stopped. When I was dilated enough to push, I pushed nonstop for 4 hours. Almost needed a c-section. Lane had to be suctioned out. After he was born, I was one of the few who receive a rear but painful headache from the epidural. I was given a strong pain killer and woke up in ICU. I was told my blood pressure blew up then bottomed out. Because I was young, I was alloud to have many people in my ICU room.
My second child was the opposite. Pregnancy was horrible and the birth was two pushes and she was out with no trouble.