I work at a bookstore and I love my work. However, I do not love being paid minimum wage. It’s affected the way I see myself, and worse it’s affected the way I see food.
I already don’t have a great relationship with food, but now I’m seeing the money I spend on food as time I have worked. So I look at a burger and I think ‘that is an hour and a half of work; do I want to spend an hour and a half of work on a burger.’ There are times where if I do not buy that burger, I will not eat enough food.
I am a small person and it takes about eight to twelve weeks of not eating enough for me to lose about 15% of my weight. Being malnourished and underweight sucks and I really want to avoid that. I can’t figure out how to buy the food I need with this voice in the back of my head telling me that it’s too expensive and that not eating enough food isn’t that bad. When I eat less, I feel worse, and then I want to eat less– it’s a nasty cycle. I’m scared
(For clarification, I have a college fund from my grandparents, which I was using to keep myself fed while I didn’t have a job. While I still have access to it, I really want to use it for college, which is why this post is about how I see food and not about not being able to afford food)