October 2015 Moms

Food Stamps (SNAP)

Are any of you going to be financially strapped enough to go on food stamps before/after delivery to supplement food and alleviate other expenses? No judgement, just curious. My husband thinks we may have to do this to make ends meet. Just wondering where other manas are!
image


Re: Food Stamps (SNAP)

  • DH is self employed and a full time engineering student and I have been looking for work but have so far been unsuccessful. So yes, we have applied for SNAP and WIC. Waiting to hear about it.
  • I'm not entirely sure what your question is, but my family and I receive SNAP currently, as well as WIC. If you do think you qualify, I would definitely apply, because, even if it's only for a few months, that extra money helps.

    At least in my state, the income limit for WIC is higher than for SNAP, so if you qualify for food stamps, you almost automatically qualify for WIC. Every little bit helps.

    This is certainly not our long-term plan, but having money coming in for groceries is a huge relief when other expenses come up. For example, in July, we had to spend over $1,000 on repairs to our car, wiping out our savings. At the same time, my husband had a couple weeks at work where he barely got any hours. Without SNAP, I'd be wondering how to buy groceries in August. We usually try to keep our grocery budget close to what we receive from WIC and SNAP, so any extra we have leftover can go towards emergency savings and other expenses. This means buying our meat when it's marked down, clipping coupons, and eating a lot of peanut butter sandwiches.

    a href="http://www.thebump.com/?utm_source=ticker&utm_medium=HTML&utm_campaign=tickers" title="Parenting Tips"><img src="http://global.thebump.com/tickers/tt1c2dc3.aspx" alt=" Pregnancy Ticker" border="0"  /></a>
  • Loading the player...
  • I have thought about it but unfortunately my husband and i combined make too much to qualify for SNAP or WIC. We make just above the cut off for our area which sucks. We previously used snap when we first got married as my husband was still looking for full time work. For now, I'm making us cut back on our eating expenses, which my hubby hates!! He misses running to the store for a snack ;)
  • Thanks for the feedback, Ladies. Our families tend to look down on this type of support for people and I was feeling a little crappy about considering it. It definitely wouldn't be our long term plan but we will be without the majority of our income (I'm the main breadwinner) while I'm out on maternity leave and DH's work contract is up in November. Thanks for letting me know I'm not alone in this ladies!
    image


  • My husband & I will be on WIC and SNAP, until we are making more money when I am able to go back to work. I was at a job that was physically exhausting being pregnant and with my hypertension I could have been a high risk pregnancy so I had to quit. I will also have to watch the baby while my hubby works for the first few months because we definitely can not afford child care. This is obviously not our full term plan by any means, but granted I'm only 20 I feel like we will eventually be okay financially and make it all work out. Government assistance is there for a reason and there's absolutely nothing wrong with taking help when you really need it.
  • My husband and I received WIC 6 years ago while pregnant with DD. I was finishing up my last semester of undergrad and he had just started a PT teaching position. He was offered a full time teaching position 4 months later. I can tell you that I was not shameful of receiving help, because I knew we were bettering ourselves. The FT job put us over the income threshold, so we no longer qualified. It was very helpful in the interim. There is nothing wrong with using assistance when you need it. That is what it is there for. If your family frowns on that, then they don't need to know. Don't tell them, it's none of their business how you provide healthy foods to your family. Especially WIC, it was all super healthy food and I greatly appreciated the fresh foods/veggies while I was pregnant.
  • @ashleylowry. don't bother talking to your judgmental family members about it. It's none of their business! It doesn't hurt to apply, the worst they can tell you is you don't qualify. In my county, you can actually apply online, so look into that too. Then they contact you for an appointment and tell you what you need to bring, or send in. 
    Baby Birthday Ticker Ticker

  • In regards to your judgmental family, there is no shame in needing help. I agree with @FrozenMommy they won't know if you don't tell them. A dear friend of mine used WIC and a food assistance, it helped her greatly. You have to do what's right for your family.
  • We've been on and off it. No shame here. If I qualify for a govt program I use it. Florida has a good program. And it's not like the old days where you literally had to bust out stamps. You get a little credit card thing and swipe it.
  • I'll take judgement over my kids starving. Food is expensive and I've had to learn to stretch a dollar and we manage to get good mileage out of our stamps. Some of the fresh markets are taking them locally and it helps to get cheaper produce that's better quality than store bought stuff.
  • We are currently on WIC and we're looking at me not working after the baby is born. We are at a rough spot now with some emergencies coming up and we had to use our savings and are trying to bounce back before he makes his arrival. We had things all planned out when we started trying and then the moment we found out we were pregnant we had back to back crap come up :-/. We intend to apply for SNAP after I've been out of work for 30 days because we know we will qualify without my income. It's not our future goal and when we get things situated I will be returning to work (finding a new sitter we can afford is a major thing) but for now we will be doing what we have to. I don't intend to tell my family because I know I'll hear all the judge mental stuff from them and quite frankly our finances are none of their business.
  • I think we are going to have to apply for WIC. I have a great job but don't have benefits so I won't make any money while I take time off. My husband started his own business but isn't making very much money yet. Having part of our groceries taken care of will be a huge help because paying the bills is hard!
  • If you don't end up being able to qualify for WIC or SNAP, there are other resources, like church pantries or co-op programs. I volunteered with one in high school that was very very affordable- if I remember right, around $25 per family. It's not free, but it helped a lot of people get what they needed to get by.

    We don't qualify for any state programs (they look at tax filings first and we were far over the limit, since I worked all of last year) but are looking for other ways to save.

Sign In or Register to comment.
Choose Another Board
Search Boards
"
"