"The challenge was the discipline of not having what you want when you want it, not being able to just reach in and grab something to eat.
"The discipline of planning everything was good and I haven't missed meat but there are no extras - no nuts, and snacks and nice drinks," she said.
"It is important to be inconvenienced in life by the ideas and realities that are worth thinking about."
Although she let her younger children bend the rules slightly, she said it was important to think about people in truly unfortunate situations.
"I wasn't 100 per cent strict on the kids, I wasn't going to say, 'no you can't have an apple' but they liked the idea of taking a stand for kids on the other side of the world, for kids who don't have a choice.
"You get a tiny, tiny sense of standing alongside somebody who doesn't have a choice."
Bagust is the face of the Tear Fund charity that works with local organisations in Third World countries to stop sex trafficking of girls and women.
In March she went to Nepal and saw the way poverty made victims vulnerable.
It was estimated one child was sacrificed every 30 seconds.
"Breaking the cycle of poverty is integral to breaking the slavery of these young girls and women," she said.
"So often it is just because they are poor and vulnerable.
"These guys befriend the women and say, 'I can get you a job and it will be great and you can buy clothes and send money back for your family.'
"Some girls get tricked into marriage ... and they end up detained in a foreign country with no [immigration] papers where they don't speak the language and they can't do anything.
"Meanwhile, their parents are hungry and resourceless, they can't start a campaign to find their child."
The Live Below the Line challenge is also conducted in Britain, the US, Australia, Canada and Colombia.
Campaign manager for the New Zealand effort, Sam Drumm, said it gave participants an insight into what was an everyday reality for people around the world.
"Every year people go into it positively and plan well but can't get around the fact that living on $2.25 per day is actually really difficult.
"We live in a culture that is so focused around food so it is a real challenge to people's mindset and brings it home to them in a very small way what it feels like."
The other charities that were supported by this years' fundraising drive included the Global Poverty Project, World Vision, Aotearoa Development Co-operative, Orphan's Aid and Engineers Without Borders.
