Imagine having to make the choice between buying vital medication for yourself or putting food on the table for your child.
For most parents, such a situation is utterly beyond comprehension - but this is the grim reality for one mum in Liverpool trying to find a way to survive the summer holidays on the breadline.
Her story came to light after staff at an Everton community centre heard she had stopped taking tablets when she was unable to afford prescription charges and basic essentials for her child.
It is a damning indictment of the current state of our country if society's very poorest face six long weeks of not knowing how they are going to feed their children.
Stories of parents going without themselves or even turning to shoplifting just to make ends meet are all too common on Merseyside as the summer holidays roll around and free school meals no longer guarantee deprived children at least one hot meal a day.
No family should be living in relative poverty in our city in 2019 - but this is the reality faced by staff at the L6 Community Centre who are fighting to help families survive the summer holidays.
We spent a day the centre to see the vital work they are doing every day and to try and understand what it's like for families struggling to get through the summer.
"We should be running ballroom dancing classes but instead we are literally keeping people alive"
For many parents, the start of the school holidays means thinking of ways to fill the six weeks with enough activities to keep their kids entertained.
Sorting out childcare, booking in annual leave and planning days out to make sure the kids aren't bored feel like a mammoth task for many.
But for Merseyside's very poorest families, the advent of the summer break means facing six weeks of wondering how to make ends meet.
For those struggling to simply put food on the table, the L6 Community Centre on Queens Road is trying to plug the gap where benefit payments just can't cover it.
Every morning they offer breakfast to children who might otherwise go hungry, with around 30 children showing up each day.
There's a hot lunch served every day between midday and 1pm, with a youth club and homework club in the evening that makes sure everyone goes home with a full stomach.
It should not be down to a local community centre to ensure children are getting three meals a day, but this is the every day reality for staff at the centre.
Local Labour councillor Gerard Woodhouse , who runs the centre, told the ECHO : "We do youth club and a homework club - they come here to get food. This is what we are having to do in this day and age - this is a community centre where we should be doing ballroom dancing clubs and keep fit classes but instead we are literally keeping people alive."
The help these meals offer is clear to see. Barely five minutes past midday when the free lunch starts, a mum in her mid-thirties walks in with her young son.
He just turned five last month and now qualifies for the free meals on offer, which are available to any child aged between five and 18.
Speaking to me at the entrance to the centre, she says that now she knows this is here and he qualifies for meals, she'll be back throughout the holidays.
On another table, a dad who moved to Liverpool from Nigeria sits with his three young children as they wolf down the shepherd's pie and gravy being dished out from the hotplates.
Most children their age are notoriously fussy eaters, pushing food around the plate or refusing certain bits of fruit and veg. These children aren't like that - they polish off every bit and are grateful for it.
Gerard said: "The kids are on six weeks holiday so they don’t get that guaranteed meal at lunch time. Then the kids next door are going on day trips and things like that. I don’t think parents are wrong to forego rent to taker the kids out.
"It’s not their fault that we are in the situation we’re in now. There are kids coming in on their own for food. We make sure they are getting three meals a day during the summer and we are seeing more and more kids turning up.
"We run a carvery every Sunday and give the tickets out to each school. We are never ever going to be able to give everyone three meals and more people turn up and I can’t turn anyone away. We cater for 70 kids and get 110-120."
"They are surviving day by day and hoping something happens each day"
The steady stream of people coming into the L6 Community Centre asking for help is staggering.
A young couple, not yet out of their teens, come in with their three-week-old baby girl in a car seat. They are facing eviction due to benefit complications and are desperate for advice.
Gerard takes them into a side room downstairs, listens to their situation and gets them booked in for the earliest possible appointment with a Citizens' Advice advisor who comes to the centre every week.
Just a short time later, a schoolgirl walks in with one younger brother clinging onto each hand. She's here to pick up their free school uniforms.
Asked why she's having to do this alone today, she laughs and replies: "My mum's got other kids so I've got to come here with the whole firm!"
The door is never closed, with families coming in constantly to get a hot meal, pick up free uniforms or seek advice from Gerard and his staff.
Standing back as an observer for the morning, it's impossible not to be overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the problem and how many families desperately need help.
Gerard said: "They are surviving day by day and hoping that something happens each day. We had a case on Monday and it was a real sad cause where a man had a heart attack and we were asked could we do a food parcel for him and his 12-year-old kid would come and pick it up.
"We went around to the house the 12-year-old had cancer, leukemia, and he’s looking after his dad who’s had a heart attack and they’re living in squalor in this place.
"We cleared the house up and bought the kid some computer games and things like that and now he’s on our list to go out each week but these are cases that are slipping through the net."
The demands on Gerard and his staff mean they are stretched as thin as it's possible to be.
Sitting in Gerard's office at the back of the building there are empty Diet Coke cans and crumbed plates cluttering up the desk where he's tried to grab something to eat in between jobs.
Despite the immense strain it clearly places on staff at the centre, no one is ever turned away, asked to come back later or made to feel like they aren't the absolute priority.
Gerard said: "Sometimes we can have a bid that needs to be in at 1pm and you get a person come through that door who needs to see you. We are always struggling for money."
But the service they offer is so vital, there's no way they could stop what they are doing at the L6 Centre.
Gerard told the ECHO : "Parents aren’t eating - they’re switching the heat off when the kids go to bed and the TV too. It’s all things to make sure there’s enough for the kids.
"There’s one parent who I was working with who’s still trying to get her prescriptions and things, trying to get that sorted. She’s now not taking her tablets because she has been fined twice for not paying for prescriptions.
"She’s on a benefit that doesn’t cover prescriptions. People might think 'they can pay £12 a month' but when that day comes their kid needs something."
When it comes to meeting the most basic requirements throughout the summer holidays, for some parents it is simply impossible.
Nowhere is this more obvious than at the centre's free uniform shop, which is in constant demand from families who just can't afford to send their children back to school in new clothes.
Why living in poverty should never mean compromising your pride
Getting the kids kitted out in new school uniforms can be a big expense for lots of families, but for those surviving on meagre benefit payments, it's simply impossible.
This isn't due to lack of budgeting or poor planning - speak to any of the families coming into the L6 centre and they can tell you their exact benefit entitlement to the pound and penny, including the date it comes in.
The reality is that for families living in poverty in Liverpool, their money will not stretch to cover basic essentials like school uniforms.
This is why Gerard and his staff launched the uniform shop at the L6 centre, where families can come and pick up brand new clothing for free, based on a referral.
Everything inside the shipping container is brand new, from school coats to Adidas trainers and backpacks. It all leaves the centre in new bags so it looks like it's come from a shop.
This is an important detail - Gerard is adamant that being poor should never mean a family can't still be proud.
He said: "We don’t serve anyone s*** - I wouldn’t give them what I wouldn’t have myself. We go out like we are buying for our own kids."
This is reflected in what parents tell me at the centre, who would be mortified sending their children into school wearing grubby donated second-hand clothes that would mark their children out as bullying targets.
One mum-of-three I spoke to had come in to pick up uniform for her youngest two children. She works in schools for an agency, but in the summer holidays when there is no work, she gets no pay.
As she picks up the uniform packages for her two children her face lights up at the quality of the items and how smart it all looks.
This gets to the hear of what the L6 Community Centre is doing. Families can access help and advice during their very darkest times - but they can do it with their heads held high.
That such services even need to exist on Liverpool's streets in 2019 is a tragedy, but as long as families are in such desperate need, the L6 will continue to provide an absolute lifeline.
To donate to the L6 centre's uniform fundraiser click here.
