Poor: Grit, courage, and the life-changing value of self-belief

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O’Sullivan went on to achieve a first class honours degree in psychology and now works in Maynooth University breaking down barriers to education for marginalised girls.

Amazing read by an amazing woman. Some parts were absolutely gut-wrenching; really brought a tear to my eye. The fortitude she had to get through what she did amazed me, and to get to where she is today even more so. However, as Katriona herself points out, she didn't make it out alone, there were numerous people along the way who helped her up, as well as programmes and social investment schemes that paved the way. Now all those schemes are gone at a time when we need them more than ever. There must be so many like her out there, struggling with abuse, addiction, terrible parents, with no-one to see them as they really are.

Moving, funny, brave and original - just like the author ... absolutely incredible' - Roísín Ingle, Irish Times Women's Podcast Our servers are getting hit pretty hard right now. To continue shopping, enter the characters as they are shown However, let’s not forget hard work. Katrina was a single mother, studying, working and still trying to hold her family together. This lady deserves our utmost respect. It brings to the forefront the struggles faced by those suffering from poverty and the services that are just not available to those in need anymore. As she says after the financial crash these services were the first to go and the lower classes were the worst affected. At the time, the young mother was raising her young son alone all the while daring to hope her life might eventually take a different turn.

It is impossible to overstate the significance of this in Katriona's life I think - she says so herself. It was a pivotal moment in helping her understand that she was worthy of loving care and attention; that she was somebody. All children deserve love and respect and without that and the necessary societal supports and pathways to education, the cycle of poverty will continue unbroken. The book helped. She likes herself now. “I think I’ve always liked myself, though. What’s really sad about growing up is that I can clearly remember being a young girl, alive to the world, inquisitive and bright, like all kids are but, unfortunately, I was born in this community where I wasn’t given an opportunity to flourish.” She feels now, nearly four decades on, closer to that girl, before the weight of neglect, predatory men, fear and low expectations crushed her. “Like, I’m alive again.”This is a harrowing tale of Katriona’s life as she was brought up by drug-addict parents surrounded by poverty. Her world around her was soiled, filthy and squalid. Quotes like "Poor cuts through lots of jargon, words like disadvantaged, underprivileged, deprived or under class. Words that have their place but don't capture the visceral truth of what it is to grow up the way I did. The way thousands of children are growing up right now. This is the extraordinary story - moving, funny, brave, and sometimes startling - of how Katriona turned her life around. How the seeds of self-belief planted by teachers in childhood stayed with her. How she found mentors whose encouragement revived those seeds in adulthood.

A really thought-provoking and worthwhile read. Thank you so much @penguinbooksireland for the #gifted copy. Highly recommended. Poor is not only Katriona's story, but is also her impassioned argument for the importance of looking out for our kids' futures. Of giving them hope, practical support and meaningful opportunities. At the end of the book she makes a challenging assertion. That the likes of the Trinity Access Programme is only aimed at the super-brainy of the poorer classes, like that author herself. (She didn't make those claims about herself. They're mine). The people who are only middle of the road good, AND poor, there's a shoulder shrug. Middle of the road good from middle class families will thrive and survive, but in the TAP they only push the boat out for the super-dupers. Being a child in poverty is the greatest indicator you will suffer from asthma, cancer, heart disease or mental illness, that you will go to prison, be addicted to drugs , get divorced, die young or commit suicide. Despite this understanding we allow children to go to school hungry and live in danger where drugs and alcohol are used. Despite what we know we still pretend that all it takes to succeed is hard work when the truth is only the privileged can. One of the best [books] I have read about the complexities of poverty . . . one of the most remarkable people you will ever meet' GuardianThere were glimpses of other lives. At three, she remembers her friend next door being given a hug by her mum, and wondering why her own mother didn’t hug her like that. For a short time, she and her siblings were taken into care, where she “got food, and washed”. She always believed she deserved more, but over the years, she says, “hope and belief get eroded”. The effort of survival was exhausting. “As a kid, I was hopeful, vivacious. All kids are – some are quiet, some are loud, but we all have potential. And then as a teenager, with all the shit constantly, in the end, you just lean into it.” There were people, she says, “trying to keep me hopeful, but it’s very hard to battle against a lifetime of poverty and belief within a family. Eventually, it’s like your light goes out.” Being able to hear Katriona tell her story in her audiobook, in her own voice brought me to tears several times. Growing up in a working class community in Coventry to Irish parents, Katriona O'Sullivan dealt with far more trauma and poverty than any child should ever know. In her book Poor, Katriona speaks about her hardship growing up as a child of parents who were drug addicts, and how ofttimes it was school and kind teachers that first taught her that she deserved more than what she had, and instilled a love of learning and education within her.

I read poor in one sitting ... I found it so complelling. An amazing story ... moving, uplifting, brave, heroic ' - Nuala McGovern, Woman's Hour, BBC We love a rags-to-riches story, and we love to see someone triumph through sheer determination. But the story is rarely that simple. My story isn't, anyway.'Katriona was born in Coventry to Irish parents. She grew up in dire poverty, became a mother at fifteen and ended up homeless. Moving to her father's native Dublin, Katriona was hopeful that a change of place would bring positive changes to her life. As she says herself, it turned out that "nothing would change in Dublin......I had come to Dublin and to change my life and simply replicated it". Her relationship with addict parents Tony and Tilly is gut-wrenching and yet, because of O’Sullivan’s empathy and love for her parents, my judgment and disdain that I had for them at the beginning of the book falters. There’s no doubt of their negligent, harmful actions. But you are also given an understanding of the turmoil that Tony and Tilly lived through. Katriona speaks about the people in education and social care setting who helped her, and those who failed her. I cried when reading about her early childhood and the abuse she suffered. I cried when I read about her older brother coming home from work to find her and her siblings, hungry, with not a parent to be seen. Some chapters are truly harrowing. I found myself with a pain in my chest and thinking of that little seven year old and her brothers and sister long after I'd finished reading. When she told me she was in Trinity I thought, if she’s going there, I’m going there”, the author says. That day O’Sullivan marched up to the Trinity Access Programme and asked to be accepted into the college. This was the beginning of her new life in academia. But there were also the people – children, and adults, too – who were repelled by poverty. “Poverty has layers. We were probably the most extreme – no food, not washed, nits. Kids don’t want to play with you, so it’s horrible because not only are you suffering at home, I was also going to school and being on the outside. Sometimes, teachers would treat me that way as well, or expect me to perform in a way that was just beyond me because of what was going on at home.”