Help with Hurdles
In 2016, I had been going to school full time during the week and working full time Fridays through Sundays. I did this as a single mother for six consecutive months. Somewhere in that six months time, I began using meth to try to manage it all. I began to burn out. I was late to work more and more often. Until one day I quit. Not long after I also quit school.
Within the month, I was evicted. My brother signed over our childhood home to try to help me out. The house, however, was falling apart. The roof was rotting, so I patched it up myself with materials lying around the house. The gas lines were leaking and the furnace was broken so the gas company wouldn’t switch the gas back on in my name. My kids and I lived there for a year. We used electric cooking appliances to eat. In the winter we used electric heaters. We took showers at other people’s homes. I struggled to find and keep work during that time. The water was cut off a few different times. Shamefully, I stole water from the neighbors to get by. And meth stayed on my to do list at that time.
Realizing the house had more issues than I could deal with, I sold it for next to nothing. I stayed with friends while I waited for the sale of the house to close. I planned to use the money to get an apartment. The problem was, I was on probation but hadn’t been reporting in because of my drug use. My kid’s father decided to turn me in and called CPS on me regarding my daughter who was not his. While I was in jail, he and an accomplice stole my money and belongings from the hotel room I had been staying in. When I got out, I had nothing left but a few belongings and my car. Within a month, I allowed myself to be victimized again when my car was stolen. Not that it would matter-the month following the theft of my car an unpaid seatbelt ticket cost me my driver’s license.
I struggled with homelessness for four years or so after that. I couch surfed, rented sleeping rooms, and was in and out of the Salvation Army many times over the course of that time. I had never been more alone. My mentality had fallen to a place of despair that believed that I was meant to stay homeless. I lied to myself about how I was there to be “in it” to help others. And I was surrounded by people who somehow knew things about me that they shouldn’t. Private, personal things. And they would toy with me both through Facebook and in person. I still don’t know why. But because they were toying with my mind, I got fed up and threw my phone in the river.
The next day, I went to Columbus and entered into a shelter on the west side. I reunited with my ex who was also in a shelter. He had his place a month after I arrived. I ended up moving in with him. The meth I had been using switched to crack. Eight months later, lying on our mattress in the living room of the one bedroom we shared with another addict, I talked my partner into going to rehab at the Refuge.
We witnessed our roommate be tazed for smoking up crack he was supposed to be selling. My partner had been to the hospital a few times for seizures and narcanned for overdosing on fetty and heroin multiple times. I was petrified that if our roommate had ripped off someone who wasn’t his family that we would have been killed just for being there. I was worried about my partner’s health and life. The pain and worry I experienced when telling EMT’s that I wasn’t sure if he had had a seizure or if he had used and OD’d was overwhelming. I wanted better. I needed more in life.
Although we faced an eviction at the time of the conversation, my partner and I worked with an agency to have the eviction lifted. We decided to proceed with our plan to attend the Refuge anyway. My pride got me exited from the program 24 hours later. Twenty-six days later, I went back to try again. Three months later, the women’s Refuge was closed indefinitely. I prayed about what to do. God answered, “Go home.” So, I returned to Newark to stay, once again, at the Salvation Army. I was hired as a package handler at UPS within the week. Within the month, my partner was exited from the men’s Refuge and came to stay in the men’s wing of the Salvation Army. With the help and support of Salvation Army staff, the Licking County Coalition for Housing, friends from Champions (a Newark extension of the Refuge), friends from Cornerstone Church’s Outreach, my aunt Dreama, and a friend named Roy, we found a two bedroom apartment in September of 2021.
Things have not been easy just because we found an apartment. There have been many obstacles. And there have even been times that I have wanted to give up. We moved in on September seventh. On the ninth, we found out we had been exposed to COVID and were officially diagnosed on the twelfth. On October 4th, my daughter, who was adopted by my aunt and uncle, finally came home to live with me. The very next day, I burned myself horribly in a grease fire I accidentally caused. I was off work for almost two months to heal. My partner and I have a past domestic violence case and he is still on parole from past crimes he committed. Due to an Ohio law that forbids parolees from living with past victims of DV, he has been removed from the home until his parole is over. This has left me with the burden of full financial responsibility that I can’t fully bear on my own quite yet. I pay child support out of every check leaving me between $80 and $100 a week to work with. So, a few months ago, in an attempt to become self-sufficient, I wanted to accept a position in Etna making $20/hour. The only way I could accept the position was to get my license back and a car to get there. In order to accomplish that, I had to pay a reinstatement fee, take the written exam and find a way to take the driver’s test. I was so stressed trying to find a ride to get there as well as someone who would allow me to borrow their vehicle to take the exam. I recall feeling like a burden for even asking for help.
But on February 16, 2022, my case worker from the Housing Coalition, Tiffany, offered to take me to take the written exam, without hesitation. The actual driver’s test at the local BMV would have been a whole month wait, but Zanesville had an appointment date available two weeks sooner. On March first, my aunt, Dreama, despite recently losing her father-in-law, was more than eager to take me all the way there and let me use her vehicle to take the exam. I passed!
My cousin, Holly and her husband, Drew, sold me the car to help me get to work. Unfortunately, that job didn’t work out. The hours were third shift, and the position was package handling, just like my other job. And maybe some would have chosen the job that pays a few dollars more. But the hours and location left me exhausted and affected my mentality. I found myself wanting to use (drugs) less than two weeks after I started working there. So I talked to Tiffany and quit the same day, with no remorse but not without worry. I spoke with Holly and Drew as well. And they most graciously are waiting patiently for me to get my finances together so that I can pay them for the car.
Currently, these are the things I have going on in an attempt to find and maintain my personal balance between mental and physical and emotional well-being, family and relationships, home, finances, and work: I am working with Acloché in order to start a second part time position that fits my schedule and physical limitations. (I struggle with arthritis in my feet and I have issues with my right knee.) Licking County Coalition for Housing is still helping me in every way they can. I am waiting to hear the results of the Modification Review I filed with child support. I maintain my appointments at Brightview for my sobriety. And I enjoy every moment that I am blessed to speak with or be with any one of my loved ones.
No matter how hard it has been or how hard it may become, going back is not an option. Getting to live with and love and guide my teenage daughter is worth every ingle hardship that I have and will endure. Regardless of what obstacles come my way, I will continue to seek solutions to become self sufficient and stable, not only because my daughter is worth it, but because I finally know that I am worth it!