The Urban Life of an Urban Nomad Couple

To Jason Hernandez and others who have been through such difficulty: we have been through our share of mental problems of all kinds. Yes there is great prejudice out there and grave misunderstandings! There is also such an array of spiritual ignorance as well. There will always be in this Age Good people and organizations and Bad. We,ve seen many of the latter and a few of the former. Hang-in and pray because I know God is the best friend to those of us who have been "left behind".!

It is very sad the way single women are treated in the homeless system. The words "dignity and "respect" are missing in the thoughts of bureaucrats that run city shelters! Since we are a married couple we too have suffered from this lack. We are both practicing Catholics, going to Mass daily and do not garner dignified respect even among our brethren. Single women has little choice of any positive shelters in N.Y.C. This should not be because with all the "me too" politics women are still treated very badly! My heart aches when on the subways we have seen the same women and their belongings going in helped for years! Please view this song  video by Rene Marie! And help!Watch "Rene Marie - This is not a Protest Song" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/4vBNedRsPSI

A song from Rene Marie about homelessness:Watch "Rene Marie - This is not a Protest Song" on YouTube
https://youtu.be/4vBNedRsPSI

Jason Hernandez wrote:Oh, there is so much I could say about this. You wrote, "Not every person is mentally ill,addicted or even destitute." I would point out that despite the stigma on those who ARE mentally, ill, it wasn't something they chose. No one in their right mind would choose to be mentally ill, LOL. Mental illness can happen unexpectedly for various reasons that the patient has no control over.

The number of times I had to move back in with family members so as not to end up on the streets... and autism spectrum disorder is not even technically a mental illness. You often hear that in the job market, "It's not what you know, it's who you know" -- well, to an autistic person, that looks like blatant ableism. The whole job seeking process, from the way you write your cover letter, to the way you present yourself in your follow up after the interview, is all about socializing your way into the job. And that is why, if autism comes into the picture, an applicant with a master's degree ends up working as an unskilled laborer, if at all. I had to LEARN not to be ashamed of moving back in with family. I had to LEARN to reject the mainstream's judgment of why I was a failure.

This thread's descriptions of what the homeless have to do to obtain assistance rang so familiar to me. I once stayed for a week at what was then called Union Gospel Mission. A week was all I could stand! The list of rules, which they read off every night, got longer every day. You needed permission for literally everything -- I kid you not, to maintain some feeling of human dignity, I took to scavenging bits of toilet paper out of the waste basket, saving it up until I had enough for that day's bowel movement. I agree that's disgusting, but my only other option was literally to go up to the desk and ask permission to go to the bathroom, which I hadn't had to do since elementary school! That's right, no toilet paper was kept in the bathroom. Where do people get the idea that helping someone gives them the rights of a dictator?

. We know what you went through Jason. We've been through shelters more than seven times. No issue is handled in an individual and humane way. Just an example: after being in an old Convent with 16 bedrooms and five bathrooms we became homeless again because the new Pastor was selling the Convent.Four years of living there and they literally put us out on the street. We again went to the city shelter evaluation center and waited a day and a half.A new mayor but same old crap. A disabled couple (both amputees of legs) were sent after 12 hours by subway to a nursing home. 3 hours later they were back because the nursing home would not allow them their T.V.! Amputees cannot get around so well but they wouldn't allow them the distraction of the T.V.!  Do you have to give-up your life because you're very poor? Your freedom of choice in where you can live? That next day they forgot to get sandwiches to feed everyone. We were finally sent to a shoddy room with broken chests and a bed on milk crates. Noisy and hot as all hell!  Money and good jobs bring freedom to those who can manage to get them! This is life in America!
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Rose Bourdeau wrote:Sorry if I offended you somehow. I am homeless too, have been off and on for years now.

.  I was not offended but hurt. We tried to relocate in Albany,in Catskill, in Kingston and in White Plains. In Albany they had nothing for married couples and we had already lived there six months. In Catskill they gave us a hotel room for one day and sent us to Kingston. In Kingston welfare rejected us. We didn't qualify in White Plains or Kingston because we had not lived there.  So we know the frustration of being homeless very well and what you are going through.Plus we need to stay here for clinics that we are with.  And no car or ability (disability) to drive. We are praying for us all Rose!

The harassment continues under our British N.Y.C.Transit President Andy Byford. He is shaking up the system and it's going to cause pain he says! No pain no gain he says. The "pain" has been going on for more than 30 years! Every time they make an "improvement"there is months of massive delays and tortuous rerouting! This only makes even more pain for those who have no choice but to live at night on the subways. And how gross it is to bother people already in such pain who are homeless by waking them up with a clanking stick in the middle of their sleep! And when temperatures are above 45 degrees they leave doors open for sometimes ten minutes! This is another new harassment as they used to close them partially. Many homeless lack sufficient covering and this leads to much suffering physically and mentally! Should we give  Andy a double thumbs up?!!!