A month of medication or the train fare home

I asked the university health service and they were far more helpful than I had assumed they would be. Worth trying before assuming.

What helped was finding out exactly what I was entitled to, which took an afternoon and turned out to be considerably more than I expected.

Coming back at the end of my second year to say I managed it, it was tight throughout, and it was entirely possible.

Doing this without money is a completely different exercise and most of what is written assumes a car, a fridge and a stable address.

What helped most was one member here who had done this on a similar budget and simply told me the practical order to do things in.

Building on what Obie wrote rather than answering the original question.

My experience of the health service as a student was much better once I stopped treating it as a last resort.

I would encourage anybody here to write down what things actually cost over a year. Mine was less than I had feared and knowing was worth a lot.

Something practical: I registered properly rather than staying with a home practice, and it removed about half my logistical problems.

The fridge in a shared house was a genuine problem and I solved it with a small locked box and a conversation with my housemates.

What I would say is ask about every reduction and scheme that exists. Nobody tells you and several of them applied to me.

No wisdom, just: I am sorry. That sounds genuinely hard.