Oh, what the hell...let's just go ahead and engage in a boomer-esque rendition of "We Were So Poor"! Powdered milk...it kept us alive, barely! In our house of 7 kids, we lived on that stuff unless we lived close enough to Grampa's dairy farm. Pro-tip...yes, you can freeze milk; you just need to leave extra headspace. We had a rule that whichever team (we were paired in twos) had dishes that week had to make sure there was a gallon of the powdered milk made and in the fridge for breakfast the next day. Mom would let us use two ice cubes in the rare emergency that the milk had been made late and we had to drink it relatively warm for supper.
We were so poor that when I was 10, we had to live on oatmeal 2x a day for 5 days while we waited for a money order to come from Grandma...the MO was to finance our move back from Phoenix to Michigan. Luckily, school was in session, so we "big kids" got to eat hot lunch at school. I think my little sisters got toast and canned applesauce or peaches for lunch.
I remember big brown boxes with ASDA stamped on the side. The canned beef was the best! There were times when I was making the stew that I had to open another can cos, you know, the cook has to sample her food! Major demerits from Mumsie on those occasions!
You had a refrigerator? highbrow! uppity city type.
Poor ? At least you had parents.
My mom left when I was 4 and my dad was a drunk.
My sister was 6 and I was 8 when we were put into an orphanage.
We stayed there until we graduated H.S.