Reply #139: that is jolly well, if...

[kineneb]

you have lots of time and energy. I am the caretaker for Hubby who is disabled (diabetes, dialysis, heart problems). I am exhausted. I have been handling his case with all the federal, state and local agencies. I was driving him to dialysis 3 days a week, 50 miles round trip. He now has medical transportation, which is saving my sanity and our gas budget. But he still has lots of medical appointments and tests which take up a lot of time. We must eat two different diets, due to his medical problems.

I am simply too tired to deal with cooking. As to rice and beans- nice if your digestive tract likes them, but much too starchy for me and Hubby can't touch beans at all. Lentils won't work either. I get canned fruit and vegetables from the cheap grocery outlet, and when they are on sale at the regular grocery. Eating lots of canned tuna is a wonderful way to get mercury poisoning; I stick with the free peanut butter from the Gleaners. And I have been told to limit intake of high cholesterol foods, so there went eggs.

Part of the problem is hopelessness; if you know nothing will change your situation, you give up. Our income level is fixed by Hubby's disability and medical needs. We are stuck here. So many others are in a similar situation. There is no way out, and sometimes the only fun thing left is "comfort" food.

So in our case, it is poverty, exhaustion, and hopelessness. Oh, and toss in depression, while we are at it. And do not attempt to give me the "bootstraps" lecture; those, along with the boots, were jerked away by a system that forces people into poverty to get medical care.