TABLE 3.

Quotations Describing Contributors to General Household Financial Strain and Food Insecurity

Subthemes	Quotations
Difficulty meeting basic needs	1: “It was hard what we went through because we had to pay the rent, we had to pay phone bills, you must pay for electricity; so yes, it was a bit hard. That time we also had to leave the apartment where we were staying and go live with my sister-in-law.”
	2: “You have to pay for…rent…phone…or…cable or…whatever. So you try to pay that and…and if you have enough money to buy food, fine.…So you try to buy the most necessary things that you can afford.”
Job instability	3: “For about three, four months, I got behind with the gas, more or less like eight months or six months, they cut it off because I didn’t have money to pay for it…he was going through a time when they cut his days and since we got used to his salary…the electricity I have been paying for it late.”
	4: “Because his dad lost his job and there was a time in which there wasn’t money to pay the bills. We went through a crisis. There wasn’t even money to pay the bills. One had to be…I didn’t spend on things. Only the most important things.”
Vulnerability during pregnancy	5: “I was working while I was pregnant, but sometimes I had to come to the hospital many times. Then I couldn’t work, because I was alone at that time...my husband and I were separated…I didn’t have enough money to pay my expenses. I had low resources.”
	6: “I was pregnant, it was a little frustrating. I cried because I wanted certain things and I couldn’t have them. I cried because I wanted to help [my husband], but I know that I couldn’t because of my belly. I’ve always liked to work, and at that stage I stopped working. I had a lot of bleeding, so it was frustrating for us, and more so for him…Because we are four, now.”
Vulnerability during infancy	7: “Well, then we had to pay for diapers, the rent, and all that. Well yes, several times I didn’t pay for gas or electricity, but next month that she had diapers and all that, well, I’d go and pay the electricity bill.”
	8: “Even though both of us work and we pay for one apartment, cable, gas, electricity, the Pampers and those are extra expenses that weren’t in our house, so…one doesn’t find a way out and ‘What will we do? What will we do?’ And everything is just for paying, paying, paying.”
Double expenses for immigrant families	9: “We are my husband, my two sons, and me. So we pay for the apartment and it gets more difficult because we pay for all the expenses here. My girl is not with me. She is in our country, so it’s an extra expense. We have to pay for the house where she is living, her diet, and everything, so it’s like double expense…and we have been delayed.”
	10: “It’s already a big family, we’re four here, there’s my son here, I still have two sons back in my country, in Ecuador, where we have to support practically two homes, because I still have to pay rent, we don’t have our own house and I have to pay the bills, the school for my kids, and we’re a bit, I mean, I’m worried about the situation because only my husband is supporting the home, then it’s very difficult for us to buy let’s say, the food, everything that’s, everything that’s necessary. Not what we want but what is necessary.”