At I Can for Kids, we hear countless stories of parents and kids weighed down by stress, anxiety, feelings of shame, and stigma surrounding food insecurity.
In families we support through our grocery gift card program, about 45% of parents and kids struggle with poor mental health. Among our frontline agency partners, mental health counselling is one of the most common wraparound services or referrals for our recipients.
We help moms, dads, and other caregivers facing overwhelming pressure every day. Many are single parents, struggling to find steady work, or surviving on fixed but insufficient incomes. Kids may be having difficulty at school, living with disabilities, or coping with trauma. Added to these realities is the constant worry about food – and the impossible choices between buying groceries or paying for other essentials such as housing and medication.
This takes a profound toll on mental health – affecting parents and children alike.
Yet our latest program evaluation shows that our grocery gift card model brings immediate relief, by addressing the root cause of food insecurity – insufficient income. When families regain the power to buy the food they need, it quickly improves their mental health and well-being.
Food-insecure kids pay a profound emotional toll
Research consistently shows that the more food-insecure a family becomes, the more their mental health deteriorates. The reverse is also true: when mental health declines, the risk of food insecurity escalates.
When adults can’t afford to eat, they are three times more likely to experience depression, anxiety, and other mood disorders compared to food-secure individuals. On the flip side, those with severe mental illnesses – such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or depression – are also three times more likely to experience food insecurity.
Kids notice everything. Children are highly aware of financial strain and food insecurity, even when parents try to shield them. Youth and teens face progressively worse mental health outcomes as the severity of food insecurity increases, including anxiety, mood disorders, and risk of suicidal thoughts. They also have greater risk of autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. They observe parental stress, delayed grocery trips, and food restrictions and may even begin to ration their own food intake.
During our own interview-based study, parents who accessed our program noted that their children expressed less distress once their household could buy enough groceries for everyone. Children could pack lunches so they no longer had to avoid food breaks with peers at school. Parents also described positive emotional impacts for kids when they could afford special meals such as birthday celebrations.
And, about 70% of the parents in our latest program evaluation highlighted how access to our grocery gift cards allowed their children to worry less about running out of food.
Mothers carry a heavy psychological load
A Canadian review of many studies found food-insecure mothers suffer from intense feelings of shame, powerlessness, judgment, and stigma. Many women feel incompetent when they cannot afford to feed their own families.
Moms often fear harsh judgment when they access charitable food support. During an interview-based study in the United States, mothers said that food insecurity added stress to their lives in multiple ways, including ongoing anxiety about money, struggling to satisfy complex eligibility requirements for charitable food programs, and feeling deflated by the cost of nutritious foods recommended by health professionals.
Food insecurity during pregnancy is also linked to higher rates of depression and anxiety, with effects that can continue well after childbirth. Across multiple studies, food-insecure women faced more than double the odds of experiencing depressive symptoms while pregnant compared to food-secure mothers. A study of nearly 2,000 new moms in Ontario showed that women living in food-insecure households were twice as likely to seek mental health treatment during the six-month period after delivery. Their babies were also 18% more likely to need help from an emergency department in the first year of life.
In 2025, this data inspired iCAN to form new partnerships with the public healthcare system to reach food-insecure mothers through prenatal and postpartum programs. In a pilot with Primary Care Alberta, four out of five mothers used the grocery gift cards for immediate urgent needs, reducing their overall worry and stress levels over food while supporting their babies’ nutritional requirements. They preferred grocery gift cards over food hampers because the cards were easy to use and gave them freedom to buy what they needed most.
Fathers endure the same burdens
There is a shortage of research on the impact of food insecurity among fathers, yet up to 10% of the families who access our program are led by a single dad.
We encounter many devastated fathers who must start over after a relationship breakdown or the death of a spouse. An extensive analysis highlights how both sexes are equally likely to describe adverse mental health outcomes when they cannot afford to eat.
An American study noted that food-insecure fathers reported serious psychological distress four times more often than food-secure dads. An investigation in the United Kingdom discovered that food-insecure fathers are just as likely as mothers to experience shame, failure, and powerlessness. Research in Australia uncovered how fathers living under financial strain reduce food intake to shield children and partners and may unconsciously shift towards more controlling feeding practices to soften the anguish caused by an inadequate food supply.
Helping dads afford enough food – with grocery gift cards – boosts their mental health, stability, and dignity.
Income-based responses lead the way forward
Food insecurity is not about a lack of food – it is about a lack of income to meet essential needs. That’s why traditional food programs are failing to address food insecurity and the mental health burdens that come with it.
So, what will work better? A national study of more than 300,000 adults determined severely food-insecure adults would experience depressive thoughts 25% less often if they gained enough income to buy all the groceries their household needs.
And, a year-long investigation of nearly 500 low-income households in Europe demonstrated how the sudden experience of food insecurity predicts worse mental health the very next month. These emotional harms disappeared just as rapidly once people could afford groceries. The researchers estimated that eliminating food insecurity could ease anxiety and depression symptoms by 20%.
That’s why I Can for Kids delivers an income-based response to food insecurity – grocery gift cards provided by our trusted network of frontline partners to the parents and kids most in need.
Grocery gift cards empower food-insecure families
Our grocery gift cards empower food-insecure families to shop in their local grocery stores, where everybody else shops. Families gain direct purchasing power and the freedom to choose the foods that meet their cultural, religious, and health needs.
This model alleviates both financial and emotional strain. More than 75% of caregivers who participated in our 2025 program evaluation worried less about running out of food. And, nearly half experienced lower distress about money.
As well, parents consistently say they prefer grocery gift cards over traditional food programs. Our income-based approach leads to fewer trade-offs among basic needs and lifts household anxiety about finances and food. Caregivers also value how our approach reduces their social isolation by shopping in the same stores as friends and neighbours.
When they walk into a grocery store and pay like everyone else, something shifts.
Because in that moment, they aren’t “a client.” They aren’t “a number.” They’re just parents doing what parents do – taking care of their families.
And that is dignity.
References
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