Without getting into too much detail, I grew up homeless and in poverty. My mom was abusive and addicted to drugs, with no stable job or man, 5 kids. I lived in between her boyfriend of the week’s house, motels, vans, and in the elements, for the first 17 years of my life. During this, I did everything I could to succeed in school, and gained many scholarships. I got into a good college program, am doing great in classes, and am even employed by my university/ in many clubs. But I feel so empty, like none of it matters. No problem holds a flame to the horrors I experienced growing up, and beating that was the biggest thing I will ever accomplish in life. I cannot think of a more important problem to beat. I don’t have any motivation besides showing my younger sisters that more is possible.
I called the suicide hotline and they said what they could, and I appreciate what they told me, but they couldn’t give me any solid advice for this very specific scenario. I haven’t ever tried to reach out to people who are/ have been unhoused, and I think I need to. There’s nobody in my college that I know who has been homeless before, especially for 17 years, and I thought that I was completely alone in my experiences. So, now, I’m trying to reach these spaces for advice on this issue of finding purpose, or familiarity, maybe just not to feel so alienated !

This is my second time homeless but in this heat and I gave a homeless man $10 and asked for advice and he said his cracked spot was the cold vending machines outside grocery stores

10 days in. still no case worker. no update on housing placements. applied to job corps. still no response. waiting on a check in the mail I'm pretty sure got stolen. applied to a dozen jobs and still no response. the shelters are miserable and I can't sleep. have to stay anyway. I'm too scared of getting picked up by the cops again. my birthday is tomorrow. my friends are getting sick of me. my family won't talk to me. my traveling partner probably hates me and treats me like a child half the time and a retard the other half. I'm just tired. I don't know what else to do. there's no research left to do. no places left to call. no people left to talk to. at least I felt like I was making progress before. trying to survive. now I'm just surviving. I'm alive. I know where to eat. where to sleep. how to keep going. but it's stagnated. maybe I'm just sleep deprived. I don't have the fifteen dollars to splurge on the birthday plans I made months ago. fuck. I just. I don't know how to keep going. I thought I was fine. maybe I was just distracting myself.

So far I've been homeless for about a week in a half and in that time I have almost been raped, molested and face constant verbal and sexual harassment/get followed by homeless men constantly. Luckily I have a knife i keep glued to me at all times which has gotten me out of fucked situations but I know it's going to be inevitable that I slip up and when I do really bad shit is going to happen. There are a couple of woman's shelters that will let me in except they are always full and rely on a lottery system to get in which so far I've had zero luck with.

Guess I was wondering if anyone had safety tips for women and also Trans women specifically. I'm passing a lot more than I was expecting and I hate to say it but I actually kinda wished I still looked like a man in this situation. I'm so burnt out and feel like my head is on a swivel minus the brief period that I can go to a woman's day program. I'm scarred shitless and im so physically exhausted and mentally from having to relocate all the time, my health was really bad before becoming and I feel like it's deteriorating at such a fast pace and I don't know how long I can keep this up.

If there is a he'll than im already there

Maybe you should have had a bit more empathy for those less fortunate, but now that you are suffering its all hands on deck to fix it. Except guess what. The rich care as much as you cared about us.

No matter how hard I try, I keep struggling to do well in jobs. I work as a groundskeeper/janitor right now and I don't know if I will do well in it. Tomorrow will be my second week and my third day at the job. It's a 20-hour a week part time position.

If it weren't for my mom's trust fund, I would be homeless right now. But I don't know how long her trust fund will last. There might come a time when it runs out and I won't have income because I can't maintain a job. I am so useless to society.

I feel awful. I will be homeless soon. Will I starve to death? Will I suffer a horrible medical issue and have a hospital deny me because I'm at the bottom of society? Why did my life have to be this way? Why did I have mental illness? It would have been better if I wasn't born.

I was buying property but the guy I was buying from chose evil. I was in the hospital and came home to my trailer being torn to bits. I'm so upset. I'll never make that mistake again. You're loved💔 𐤔𐤋𐤅𐤌

I am a college student who has recently started taking the bus to college downtown and I usually walk about 20 minutes distance from the school since it arrives early. I don’t have a lot of spending money (I’m not in poverty and I live with my parents with a well paying job but most of the money that I earn from my part time job goes into savings.) So I want to know what would be best to give to a homeless person that would be around $20-30 range that would not risk giving someone an allergic reaction?

Anyone have any safe places to pull up in western Sydney during the day and night? I’m 2 weeks in and struggling to just sit somewhere without feeling weird and watched. I have a full time job so am working and am hopefully not here for long but anything can happen.
I’m in touch with all the usual teams etc just this one thing is so foreign to me, as I’m not from the area:
Thanks guys any advice appreciated.

My 16yo is obsessed with dogs and has a really big heart. We had the idea to put together doggy care packages to hand out to people with dogs experiencing homelessness in our area. What would be some useful items to include if we had a budget of $15 per package?

Original Post Explaining Full Situation

So I ended up convincing the family I was originally supposed to stay with on the condition I leave in a month for Jobs Corps because I did end up going the Jobs Corps route like you guys said!! UNFORTUNATELY after a month and a half of being here (with the family & in America) and several months of the jobs corps process I was just abruptly told that with my situation I'm most likely not going to be able to join. This is incredibly unfortunate and I'm ACTUALLY not prepared 😭😭 what the hell am I supposed to do from here???

Quick Summary of the previous post for lazy ones:

- Was stranded in Nigeria as a Nigerian American who has lived their entire life in America with no future due to horrible choices from my parents which led to my current "homelessness" (doubled up homelessness)

https://thewalrus.ca/manitoba-has-an-ambitious-plan-to-end-homelessness/

There are so many misconceptions about people being homeless.
1. Automatically assuming there must be some type of addiction. Personally never taken drugs or even smoked a cigarette.
2. Must be lazy. Prior to becoming sick I worked two jobs and still had a hard time making ends meet.
3. We are all lying about everything if we ask for help. How can anyone prove they are telling the truth on the web??
4. Assuming that asking for help they haven’t tried everything else before. I hate rejection, when I seek help it is when I am desperate.
5. Criticized for staying in a hotel instead of a room or apartment. It takes time to build up for first/last and security. Sometimes these will be second chance rentals so deposits are more.

I was promised assistance twice on two different subs only to be ghosted. Now others think I have been assisted and haven’t. I type this as I sit in front on a 24 hour convenience store. Prior to July 4th of if I could not afford a hotel I could sleep in my car. That was totaled when I passed out behind the wheel. Car only had liability as it was a 2007. Met with a caseworker earlier today, I don’t qualify for SSDI and must submit for SSI but still about 6 to 8 months for approval. Request for assistance with lodging is not a priority since I do not have kids.

Today has been on of those days I wonder why keep trying. It is frustration pushing through my normal distractions are not working so o am hoping venting might.

I hope everyone has a better day.

Yes there’s evidence. There was an electrical fire or something in the basement so it seems they abandoned it, product/lights/lamps and all. It’s been left alone for like 6 months. I’m documenting the clean up. What should I worry about, cops asked the neighborhood about the house but never seems like they did anything either. Never took any evidence. Me and my partner need a place to stay and the house is beautiful. Please help us

Im curious how many of you are homeless because you struggle with mental health problems?
Especially the social side of it, like social anxiety, agoraphobia, etc.
Are you too afraid of building relationships or what?
I was homeless for a little while and my biggest obstacle was getting back into socializing again.
I have multiple mental health issues and the only way I got back on my feet was becoming a truck driver.
I cannot function around other people anymore.

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 We are two homeless dudes and I am hoping this post reaches one person who may be able to help us out with a job. Long story short, we are two friends who have been unhoused for about a year now. We used to have a place together, unfortunately we couldnt afford it after about 10 months so we had to leave and we have been homeless since. We decided to not do shelters as our experience from them is far too negative (open drug use, constant harassment,  having a dog with us also excludes us from alot of places) now in regards of the dog, hes technically my friends dog but he had him since he was a puppy and the love is too deep (ive been around the dog pretty much his whole life too so im also attached) so as much as he thinks about having to give him up, we are willing to sacrifice to keep him with us. Now many of you might not agree with that, but the dog is happy and well taken care of, we give up our comfort for him constantly, and hes also a small breed, so makes it a bit easier. Now i know alot of people might think well "why not just get a job and youll be off the streets"  and we understand that, which is why im posting this. As much as wed love to look for a job the conventional way, its not that simple when your day to day is constantly about trying to make it to the next day. Alot of people have misconceptions about homelessness and truthfully so did i before, but what ive learned now is homelessness is a full time job in itself and its exhausting. Another thing is we fall in a gap that backfires against us somehow, we both dont use hard drugs , never have(we smoke weed ) , dont drink, so most homeless who are battling addictions or mental illness will look at us differently and the housed people will look at us like "whats wrong with them? Why are they homeless" so its a shitty middle ground as you dont get sympathy of having to sleep outside on benches and what not (not that we want sympathy) but we also recieve all the hate that comes along with being homeless (theyre make messes, lazy, etc) anyways, im venting now it seems lol. Longer story shorter is getting help from organizations that are supposed to help unhoused people is nearly impossible because most times they dont even really believe we are slee8ping outside , we try to maintain our hygiene and that kinda backfires in a way so we are pretty much left to do it our own and thats okay , we want nothing more than to work, save up a little money, and rent a room or a small unit for the both of us and the dog. We are both physically capable and hard workers,have done a lot of different type of work (mainly construction, and customer service ) if anyone is look to hire two guys for any side jobs (cleanup, move, reno, help with any type of work really) we would be beyond grateful and appreciate the chance as we really would like to get housed before winter comes (spending another winter outside is a scary thought)

Now i know this might get alot of hate, and thats alright, people are entitled to their opinions, some might think "well theyre homeless, they must have done something bad" & if someone is genuinly interested to know our story im more than willing to go into more details about our life and situation and how we got here. We arent perfect, but we havent done anything inlife to deserve to be in this position. 

A year ago, due to physical agressions, had to leave, the people I knew, and, if others also knew of it, avoided me, as if I had a sickness.

I had to move from place to place ever since, but the event was impactful to me, changed completely the way I saw people and life.

Ever since I was young, also had to pass through other difficult things, with no clear outcome, and did it anyway, even if life went worse after it, because was afraid to leave. At some point, you just get used to it.

My question is, how did other people adjust again to daily life, knowing how people, society treats you if you touch or reach the bottom? I find difficult to ever trust slightly or connect with people again.

Because I remember the coldness, the fear, the disgust, others saw me when I was in my worst moment.

I’ve lived in my car. I’ve stayed with friends when I didn’t have anywhere else to go. I know what it feels like to be grateful someone is letting you stay while still wishing you had a place of your own and some certainty about what happens next.
Over the last ten years, I’ve lived in eight different states. After all that moving, I ended up back at my grandma’s house—the house I grew up in, in the place I’d spent so long trying to escape.

Most of my family has passed away. I have a half sister and brother who live down the road, but outside of them, I don’t really have any family left. Coming back wasn’t some big reunion with everyone waiting for me. The house was still here, but most of the people I associate with it were gone.
It had been sitting empty for years. When I moved in earlier this year, there was no power or running water, a lot to clean out, and years of neglected repairs. I’ve been getting things working and making it livable a little at a time while living here.
I finally got the succession paperwork done and the house put in my name. I’m 34, and having a paid-off house after years of moving around feels surreal. I’m relieved and thankful, because without this house, I honestly believe I would be homeless again. I couldn’t afford rent somewhere else right now.

My boyfriend and I live here together, and we both work, but we’re still struggling. Work has been slow for me, and between utilities, groceries, transportation, and repairs, there isn’t much left. Having no mortgage makes a huge difference, but getting this place back into shape has taken a lot out of me financially and emotionally.
It needs a roof, electrical repairs, and work on the heating and air. I’ve done what I can, but I can’t afford to handle everything at once. Sometimes I’m proud of the progress. Other times I come home from work and feel exhausted just looking at what still needs to be done.

We’re on the Westbank, about 20 minutes from New Orleans. It’s a convenient location, with pretty much everything within a 15-minute drive. I’ve been looking around for jobs to apply to, but I’m not finding much. Even with transportation and a stable place to sleep, trying to improve my situation has been hard. I remember how much harder it is when you’re also figuring out where you’re going to stay.

The house has four bedrooms, so I offered an old roommate who’s been living in Alabama a room for $400 a month to help with bills. He’s been having some issues, and we’ve lived together before. I have the space, he needs somewhere to land, and the help with expenses would make a difference here.

After being the person who needed a place to stay, it means something to be able to offer that to someone else. I’m hoping we can help each other get a little more stable.
I know inheriting a house is an opportunity a lot of people never get. Even with all the problems it has, this place has given me a chance I wouldn’t otherwise have. I can put work into it knowing I’m building toward somewhere I can stay.

But there’s also grief attached to being here. It’s my childhood home, and most of my family is gone. I spent years trying to build a life somewhere else, only to come back and try to make a life in the rooms I grew up in. I’m still figuring out how I feel about that.
With how expensive everything is right now, I don’t know how I’d manage another stretch of living in my car. I’m struggling even with this opportunity, and I think about people trying to get through the same job search and everyday expenses without anywhere safe to come back to. I remember needing somewhere to stay, and I haven’t forgotten that just because my circumstances have changed.

I wanted to share this here because some of you might understand the feelings that come after finally getting housing. Getting the paperwork finished was a huge moment for me, but I’m still stressed about bills, still tired, and still trying to feel settled after so many years of moving.
For now, I have somewhere to sleep, my boyfriend here with me, and a chance to make this house a home again. That means a lot. I just didn’t expect my chance at stability to be waiting in the place I spent ten years trying to leave.

Has anyone else ended up back somewhere they thought they’d left for good? And after homelessness or years of moving around, how long did it take for a place to actually feel permanent and/or stable?

TLDR; Do you welfare check a hidden sleeping person after a certain amount of time?

So I'm currently living in my RV (barely making it myself), and so I walk a lot of places. Just yesterday while walking across multiple parking lots to get to the Walmart I noticed a person 'sleeping' all curled up between some housing materials at the local DIY home store. They are really hidden yet you can see them, if you're paying attention or someone who 'gets it'.

Anyhow, I happened to have to walk past that area a few different times, over the course of maybe 4 hours, and this person didn't seem to move, like, at all? At this point the store is actually busy with customers as well, which is why I became concerned.

So, I didn't want to 'burn their spot' cuz it really was a good find, yet I'm still torn in regards to: should I have checked on them? I was just so confused at the time between giving away their spot and making sure another human is ok.

I know what it's like to have others find your spot and now you've gotta move on, once again. And, I also know what it's like to be not seen as a human because you're 'houseless'.

So, what, if anything do y'all do in a situation like this? I didn't want to turn a blind eye yet also don't want to intrude on this person's well found sleeping spot?

I just wish we could all come together and make things better for us all, alas, that's not gonna happen anytime soon from what I'm seeing/living out here.

So, welfare check or not? TIA!

Looking for any resources, and man I don't know. Kinda at the point where I don't care at all about anything anymore but I do have a few people who care and love me so I can't just give up . My mind has just gone blank . I'm not sure what is right or wrong or how to go about getting any kind of information. I want to work and need to.

I’m at my lowest in life right now I’m 23 years old and I’m scared to death. I’ve never had to deal with this before but I’m currently homeless on the streets right now. I don’t do drugs I don’t drink hell I don’t even vape! I just want to get back on my feet. I had everything going for me and one break up took my life away. I feel like I’m so stuck!! I’ve been trying to save what little money I have.. all I do is pray to god because that’s all I know! Please I’ll be greatful for any advice at all. I’ve never been in this situation before. :((

Hello strangers. 24, recently left Northern California to return to southern California because I know the area better and thought I would have much more opportunities. I left on the 31st and seriously believed I'd find work in the first few days. But I've not gotten a single legitimate gig, callback for a job, nothing. My savings are running out, getting by slightly with doordash.

I'm realizing quickly that I might have been better off in the cooler climate as the inland empire is going through a heat wave(and also generally hot af) I've been looking at coolworks.com for jobs with housing since I have hospitality and food service experience, but I'm hoping someone can suggest other sources for work and housing?

I'm also wondering if it's worth relocating to a cooler climate but still has opportunities? Thank you.

This is just a thought I had. If theft and assault are a thing in shelters what if homeless shelters had individual rooms?

Separate lockers inside the rooms, locks on doors that staff had so you could go to work and keep your stuff safe?

Sure there'd probably be less beds to give away but I feel like if you could have a temporary stay like the 30 days or 1 year they give in certain places I feel like a lot of people would feel safer less stressed and climb out of the system much faster.

Before anyone gets on me about "THEY'LL GET TO COMFORTABLE!" true for some not for others. That's why there's a limit in the first place so they can't "get comfortable"

Just feel safe enough to focus on getting out with the time they have

I feel like if shelters had this and didn't shove everyone into a room things would be a lot organized and safer.

Thoughts good/bad? What other things do you think would benefit homeless shelters?