For Joan Lennon, survival means making tough basic choices.

She makes $2,500 a week working as a helper and supports two girls, 14 and 15, who are attending school. She gives each girl $100 per day for lunch and spends approximately $1,000 a week on groceries.

Lennon describes her situation as barely surviving but says she hangs in there, taking each day as it comes, for the benefit of her girls.

How does she do it? Lennon 'dips' every now and then into her uncle's bank account. Her uncle lives in the United States but has a local account where he deposits money "for when he returns home to live". He doesn't know that Lennon takes out a "little bit for bills and food".

"I don't want to do it, but right now the water cut off and mi can't afford for them to cut off the light too so mi sometime take out a little money fi help out."

Carol Bannister, a janitor has devised her own survival tactics.

"I have suffered a lot and I have decided that I will not suffer no more," says Bannister who has four children, two of them in school.

She works as an office janitor and takes home $3,000 a week. Her expenses are as follows: $5,000 a month for rent, $500 a week for partner, $1,500 a week for lunch money for her children, and $600 a week for bus fare.

Without accounting for food and utilities this is more than she takes home. However, Bannister says she survives by 'conning' people daily: "When I am at work I beg a lot a people for a $100 (by telling them made up stories about the hardships of her life or telling them that she's only borrowing the money -- but she never pays it back). This I will use to give my son in the morning for lunch money or I will use it to buy my lunch."

Some days she gets nothing; other days she may get up to $300. In between this, Carol says she will take home co-workers' clothes for washing and gets $1,000 from each person, which she uses to buy food.

Sandra Brown earns $3,200 every other week working at a daycare and pre-school. She earns an additional $1,000 every week when she cleans up the premises, plus an extra $600 for taking care of two babies on Sundays. She has two daughters, 10 and 11, who attend primary school.

For a few days last week she made a diary of her spending.

TUESDAY:

I gave my two daughters $100 each for lunch and bus fare for school. It really pains my heart to know that I cannot give them more money to go to school. I did not get to go to the supermarket on Saturday so I went today and spent $1,500 on grocery and toiletries. I also spent $400 on meat.

The worst thing happened today. My (cooking) gas was finished and I had to refill it for $860. That made me feel downhearted because the money I used was already budgeted for something else. However, I had to make the sacrifice because my children and I have to eat.

To make matters even worse, my sister called to say that my father was very ill. He has been living alone since my mother died last year. When I heard the news, I went and borrowed $1,000 (to buy vegetables for my father and taxi fare to visit him) from one of my friends because I did not have any money left.

WEDNESDAY:

I left my children with a friend because I was going to spend two days with my father. I left $400 for their lunch and bus fare for the two days that I would be gone.

On my way to my father, I stopped and bought the vegetables which cost $400, plus I spent $200 on taxi fare to visit him, travelling from May Pen to Frankfield.

For the two days that I was there, I did not spend any more money because I only had enough money for taxi fare to take me back home.

Sometimes I have to say, 'Jesus I can't take this anymore.' Sometimes I want to buy a lunch for myself and I cannot buy it because I have to make sure that the children have money to go to school.

THURSDAY:

I am still at my father's. I am planning on going home tomorrow. I wish I could've brought my children with me but the money wouldn't stretch.

There are so many things I'd like to do for them, so many times when I would like to take them to KFC but can't afford it. This causes me to break down in tears and it is only God knows how I survive.

Sometimes I feel so low that my daughters don't even have church shoes. They often ask me for things like clothes and knick-knacks but I just cannot afford it.

My oldest daughter is so high-minded; she wants things that I cannot give her and that often makes me want to cry. She only eats foods such as frankfurters and macaroni and cheese, but she also wants Oreo cookies, Doritos chips and potato chips.

To make life better, I have often thought of moving to Kingston to work but no one will take me on with my two daughters and I have no one I can leave them with, so I just have to make use of a bad situation.