How One Childhood Encounter Made Me Embarrassed to Coupon and How I Got Over It.

I don't know about you, but I love to save money.  It wasn't always that way for me. I was once embarrassed about using coupons. The embarrassment stemmed from one childhood encounter. 

It was first grade. We were standing on line in the gray-colored school stairwell.  I had been the lucky and proud student who was called upon to hold open the door.  We weren't supposed to be talking, but kids were whispering to each other, as we waited for the go-ahead to march back to our class. Every whisper echoed in the chamber-like stairwell. 

Ralph, who even in the first grade, seemed so much more popular than everyone else, was at the head of the line and we were face to face. I had been admiring Ralph's stone-washed baseball style hat.  Who could blame me, right?

I chirped up, "Ralph, I really like your hat!"  It really felt good to pay him a compliment.

"Like you could ever afford it," was his reply.

"Yeah," I murmured. 

I had no idea what he meant, but his tone was condescending; that much I knew. Isn't it amazing, how small kids can pick up on things like that?  

That moment played over and over in my mind the whole day. At some point, either during school or after, I figured it out.  

We must be poor.

The sadness was like a kick to the gut. At the time I wasn't even sure what made me sad. Perhaps it was because I believed him when he said, I couldn't afford to have a cool hat like that. Or maybe the sadness was embarrassing.  

It was the first time, that I can recall learning that my family didn't have the kind of money that other families had. It was also the first time that I learned that the amount of money your family had mattered.  First grade - 6 years old. That's too much reality for such a little person. 

This little insignificant exchange turned out to be pretty significant in how I viewed myself.

I started trying to walk away from my mom at grocery stores as she paid with food stamps. I remember hiding my face while she paid at a corner deli one time. Another classmate had been in the store with his mom. I was certain that he saw me, which meant that he saw the real me. The real, poor me. The girl who walked to town hall to pick up a block of cheese with her mom. The girl who  usually didn't meet the other kids at the ice cream truck. The girl who didn't bring money for souvenir shopping on the school trip to Waterloo Village.

I was embarrassed.  More than embarrassed; I was ashamed. Shame turned into anger and I took it out on my mom.

My parents worked hard to get off of public assistance, but it didn't matter to me. Mom still paid with coupons and coupons became food stamps in my mind. Every time she pulled out her coupons, I gave her grief.  It was never a quick transaction with coupons back then. Cashiers always had questions. People always saw. Temper tantrums at the register became the norm.  

One day I walked out of the Five and Dime to go sit in the car with my Dad, who had been waiting in the parking lot in our light blue Ford Grenada. The kind with vinyl seats that you stuck to in hot weather. Mom was still in the store. I left without telling her because I was certain she would be using coupons. 

The time ticked by and my dad remarked that it was taking mom a long time. What was taking her so long, he wondered.  I slumped lower in the back seat and didn't say a word. 

After a while, my mom came walking out of the store. I could see her in between the blue defrost grid lines in the rear window.  She looked really upset and she was walking super fast toward the car. She spotted my blonde hair and guilty eyes peering at her.  She was pissed. The kind of pissed that made entire rooms go quiet, and dogs take cover. 

Splat!  The palm of her hand slammed down onto the window right where I had been peering out at her. She got in the car and told my dad what I had done. She had everyone in the store looking for me. She was coming back to tell my dad to drive to the police station.  

"Why did you leave the store?" She cried.

"I just didn't want to be in there. You were taking too long."  It was a lie. I just didn't want to be around if she was going to pay with coupons. (Silly, they didn't even take coupons.)

As I got older, mom tried to talk to me about the value of using coupons, and how hard she and my dad worked to earn money. 

She used to say, "When you get older, you'll use coupons too."

Defiantly, I'd reply, "I will never use coupons."  Once or twice, I even said, "No, I won't, cause unlike, I'll make enough money."

I was an ungrateful asshole.

I carried my disdain and misunderstanding for coupons with me for a long time. I never used a coupon in college, when I was really broke. I didn't use them when I was just out of college and finally making real money. I didn't even use them on diapers when my son was born... although I did start buying Target brand diapers. Slowly, I began to understand that I needed to stretch the money we earned.

When my son began ice-skating lessons and when it became evident that he wanted to play hockey, I realized that using coupons might be helpful. In order to provide my son with the opportunity to play the most expensive sport he could have possibly picked, I started to coupon. It took some time to get the hang of it. One week, I managed to save almost $90 by using coupons. It was almost the same amount of money we had just spent on T-Ball registration. Suddenly, the light switch for what seemed like a flood light clicked! 

Today, I have a stockpile of items, such as hair care products, tooth paste, mouth wash, toilet paper, deodorant, laundry detergent, etc. Things that I will never pay full price for again. (Free would be event better.)

I am a couponer and I am proud of it.  Today, my dad is the coupon clipper in their house. He gives me coupons all the time, and I gladly take them. I've even taught my mom and dad a thing or two about coupon stacking.

My mom finds this funny and ironic of course.  She's called me on it a couple times, and what could I say but, "You were right and I was wrong. I'm sorry." 

So many of my friends and people I've met have asked me about couponing. I get a kick out of sharing tips of the trade. I even presented a Couponing 101 program to my Rotary Club last year. 

Tomorrow, I will post some of my favorite couponing resources and tips for parents who want to learn how to keep more of their own money in their pockets using coupons.

I guess I've come a long way.

As for that child-hood classmate from first grade?  I avoided him throughout grammar school and even high school.  Sometime after Facebook became a thing, he sent me a friend request. I never accepted it.