Click here and here for previous updates. Click here for the 2016 New Years update.

For women who struggle with homelessness, summer can be a bit of a reprieve. Because outdoor sleeping is a realistic possibility (unlike during the long Boston winters when they are stuck in overcrowded shelters with strict bedtimes, wake-up times and a plethora of rules) they may feel a bit less constrained, a bit more free.

Low income mothers who are hard pressed to arrange activities for their kids when schools are closed and temperatures are high often find summer to be challenging. Without a car or financial resources, July and August can seem unbearably long in hot urban apartments, especially when their children beg them to take them to water parks and on other expensive and inaccessible outings.

For women who are trying to arrange housing, welfare or other services, summer is a frustrating time in which social service employees are out of the office and paperwork gets stuck in the bureaucratic mill.

Here are early September 2015 updates on the women of Can’t Catch a Break.

Andrea: She still has her apartment but she gave up her job at the beauty supply store because they only gave her 2 days / week of work and she needs something to do the other days. This decision was taken back in the spring when a friend told her that she might be able to help Andrea get a job as a personal care assistant. At the time I asked Andrea whether she needs certification and a background check for this job. (Neither is simple in light of her prison record.) She told me that she has the certification but it turned out that she meant that she has the application to apply for certification but that she hadn’t yet filled it out. She was waiting for the friend to come over and help her with it (Andrea’s literacy is limited.) Andrea was not clear on what this kind of job entails – for example, whether she’d be working in a nursing home or for private clients, but she liked the idea that it pays $15 / hour and that she can work more hours.

By mid-July she had not made any progress and was unhappily unemployed.

Later in the summer Andrea was much happier. She’d recently heard about a “ladies drop-in place” where she now goes regularly and “hangs out with the people there.” She particularly likes that the women themselves plan day trips and activities, and the people who run the place help them with transportation. In the last few weeks they’d been to the museum, zoo and a water park. The volunteers who work there serve lunch daily and “they keep the place very clean.”

When we last spoke Andrea let me know that she was still with her long-term boyfriend but is unhappy that he takes but does not give. “I want a man who will take care of me and who wants a better life and to do things.” But her biggest complaint is loneliness: “I’m alone. No one comes to see me.”

 

Ashley: Ashley’s life today is as good as it gets. She is married to a wonderful man who works steadily at a highly skilled job. They have a child (absolutely adorable) who is welcomed and loved by flocks of grandparents, aunts and uncles. Ashley stopped working to be a stay-at-home Mom, and both she and the baby are thriving.

Carly is such a pleasant and easy conversationalist. Even though she is the youngest woman in the project, when we get together I often find myself telling her my problems before we even get around to talking about her life!

Carly’s has had some ups and down over the past half year. She had a job for a few weeks at a supermarket but was fired for getting into a fight with another employee. The final straw was when the co-worker called her “the n word” (in reference to Carly’s African American friends) and then referred to a black customer as a “monkey.” Having spent her teen-age years in foster care with a black family whom she still thinks of as her family, “I won’t put up with people using the ‘n word.”

She then landed a job working at a hotel but developed severe respiratory problems, most likely from the fumes of the cleaning supplies. She spent over a week in the hospital during which time doctors performed a slew of tests. Carly was told that the hole in her heart (she was born with a heart murmur) had grown and was now causing problems. “But then at church the Holy Spirit came on me and gave me the gift of being able to see [sense] things that are hidden from most people.” And, when she went back for a check the doctor said the hole in her heart closed. In the meantime she was fired from the hotel.

Since then nearly all of Carly’s attention and conversation is about the Holy Spirit. She can “see” Satan and knows when bad spirits are in people. Carly says that she feels empowered by this, but at the same time she is worried about spiritual warfare, believing that to be the reason why there have been so many obstacles in her life and why and bad things continue to happen to her.

Daisy’s life has settled down significantly. It is a great tribute to Daisy that her children graduated college and have good, professional jobs and solid, healthy relationships. And now that her children are adults, they are able to help her hold onto some level of stability and look out for their mom while maintaining boundaries that allow them not to burn out on Daisy’s endless needs.

Daisy is still living in a room that her daughter found for her in a rooming house in a suburb outside of Boston. While the living arrangements are minimal (shared kitchen and bathroom), they are far safer and saner than the homeless shelters where Daisy had stayed for nearly a decade. Her children also arranged for her to continue in an out-patient day program that picks her up in a van four times / week and brings her to a social center for disabled adults. Though there are few activities or enrichments at the center, Daisy enjoys playing bingo and talking to other people.

When the center is closed (three days / week plus holidays) Daisy is alone and isolated. On cold, snowy winter days and on hot, humid summer days she is essentially trapped in her room – it’s quite a long walk on a steep hill to get anywhere from her house.

I recently took her out to lunch for her birthday and she cleaned herself up and dressed nicely for our date. But she seemed very sleepy, most likely, she said, because of her medication. She has been drinking less and has not been in trouble with police for drinking outside for quite a while. But on the downside, the borders of her life are very constraining and when the social center is closed she often does not exchange a word with another human being for days on end.

For more on Daisy see Outcast Island.

Elizabeth: See Eulogy for Elizabeth.

After the omission of patent from the Sildenafil citrate, you will come across generic viagra from usa for sure as it is one of the best. Kamagra is the only medicine providesusers http://cute-n-tiny.com/category/cute-animals/page/18/ cheapest cheap viagra several options to cure the problem of erections. In most cases the side effects are more likely for taking place in patients that consume http://cute-n-tiny.com/cute-animals/cats-and-water-dont-mix/ viagra 100 mg alcohol. Erectile buy canada viagra dysfunction, the inability to gain and maintain erection during sex, you know how depressing it can be. Francesca: The ups and downs continue. Last spring she ended things with Joey, went to detox (again), and moved in with a friend whom she has helped out with childcare in the past. She enjoyed the domestic scene for a while but then began to feel sick. At the hospital she was told that, “I have an inflammation around my kidneys which caused some muscles around my kidneys to tear; I have a virus and fever and need to go home on bed rest.”

A few months later she met a new man and moved in with him and his family in a somewhat rural town without easy access to Boston. She embraced the domestic life and the opportunities to cook and clean and help care for his grandchildren. Her own grandchildren came to visit several times and she loved being part of a big family.

This man treats her well – he is not an addict and not violent – but her does have a busy life with work and hobbies of his own. So, after some time Francesca started to feel restless and isolated and now circulates among her son’s apartment, her friend’s apartment and her boyfriend’s house.

Her stated goal for the summer was to confront her fears and make choices for how she wants to live her life.

For more on Francesca see The Bitch at the Welfare Office.

Ginger has been having a hard time since her mother died. She misses her all the time and feels that the center of her life is no longer there. She spent part of the winter and spring in Florida with her brother and then moved back to Boston where she stayed on the streets and with various relatives. She was involved in a volatile relationship with a man – a relationship that involved a few police interventions and quite a few break-ups and reconciliations, as well as at least one incident in which her attempt to throw something at him ended up with her injuring herself.

She knows that it’s not good for her to keep moving around (Florida to MA) because of a man and that “I need to do me.” In the late spring she rented a room in an apartment and seemed settled. But after less than two months she moved out because the person she was renting a room from brought in people who were smoking crack and one time Ginger came home and found a man in her bed. Homeless again, she spent the summer “sleeping here and there.” The last time we spoke she had moved back to Florida.

Isabella’s two big concerns are housing and her step-son who has been in and out of juvenile detention. These two concerns are intertwined: When she and her husband lost custody of his son they also lost their eligibility for family housing. The last time I spoke with her (June) the three of them were staying with a friend. Her husband and step-son were sharing a futon and she was sleeping on a love seat with her feet dangling off the end.

Isabella is capable of working: She is bright and has solid work experience. But between the demanding hours of the methadone clinic (she has to go to the clinic every morning for her dose and she has to stay for group therapy several times a week) and the endless search for a solution to their housing problems she has not even been able to look for a job.

For more, see: Failure by Design: Isabella’s Experiences with Social Services.

Joy: In the spring Joy seemed to be in good shape. Her daughter (who is in her father’s custody) was seriously ill and Joy’s parents allowed her to stay in the hospital with her daughter. Joy was up to the task and her parents were confident that she was not using drugs.

Then, “I relapsed.” With no place to live, she spent some time in an abandoned trailer and then hooked up with a young couple who owned a car and had an apartment. “They’d sit in the car and I’d go out and do my thing [prostitution] and buy drugs and we’d split everything three ways.” She understood that they were exploiting her but didn’t see any other options. In the meantime she had failed to show up in court on an old charge and a warrant was issued for her.

In the late spring she called me from the psychiatric ward of a local hospital. She had tried to kill herself. Joy told me that she was found in the woods (near where Linda was murdered) by someone she’d known many years ago. He called an ambulance and the paramedics had to work for 45 minutes to save her. She was taken to a hospital and then released her after a few days. She then went to the police and said she would kill herself again if they couldn’t place her in a treatment program. They took her to a different hospital’s psych ward where the staff would try to find a long-term bed for her. They didn’t, and in a week she was back out on the streets.

Over the summer two of her front teeth rotted out. We talked about how she always looked after her teeth and I reminded her how the first time we met she attributed her survival to always having a toothbrush and toothpaste even when she was on the streets. I asked her what changed. She said she basically has given up.

For more on Joy’s adventures in psych wards and rehab see, Alternatives to Incarceration: Be Careful What You Wish For.

Kahtia: Things have been rough for Kahtia. She’s been struggling with depression and anxiety, and spent a week on a psychiatric ward in the early spring. But Kahtia is one of the few women to have a truly helpful caseworker who assisted her in getting back on her feet. In April I met her at a soup kitchen where she helps serve lunch and clean up as well as eating her own lunch. She liked the structure this gave to her day while her children were in school. However, during her hospital stay her meds were switched to a new anti-anxiety drug and a heavy-duty anti-psychotic. As a consequence, when we talked she was struggling with intense drowsiness – literally falling asleep with her fork halfway to her mouth. She explained that both medications cause drowsiness and the interaction causes more drowsiness. For the first time in years she did not appear to be well groomed: Her nails were dirty and unkempt; her shirt was dirty; she had some crumbs around her mouth. Her children, however, were clean and appropriately dressed and Kahtia was able to pull herself together to pick them up and school and cook real dinners for them every day.

When we spoke in the spring Kahtia was particularly upset over appearing drowsy because if she “nods” at the methadone clinic they won’t give her the dose (that happened earlier this week) because they assume she is using drugs (even though they have the paperwork about her meds.) She felt (and I agreed) that she needed to talk this over with a doctor who knows her and all of her med history. She tried to call her own doctor but no appointment was available for a few weeks.

By the end of the summer things had deteriorated even more. The head counselor at the children’s day camp called DFS (child welfare services) to report that Kahtia often seemed high in the morning at 7:30 when she dropped her off. Kahtia explained to me and to DFS that she takes psychiatric medication which leaves her groggy in the morning but she is not high. Indeed, her urine is tested regularly at the methadone clinic and she has not used illicit drugs. In any case, the children were taken away and placed into foster care. Kahtia is devastated. And while she can see the children once each week and speak with them on the phone daily, they will start the school year in a different district (where the foster family lives) rather than return to their friends and teachers.

Read about Kahtia’s reflections on sex work here.

Vanessa spent most of the winter and spring in residential programs for treating substance abuse. These stints were broken up by several episodes of her leaving (and not being permitted to return) or her being kicked out for breaking rules or “relapsing.” Each time she ended up on the street in tears and frustrated at the barriers to getting back into a program. Even when she finds a placement, each time she has to “start all over” with detox and then waiting for a longer term bed in a rehab facility.

The last time I tried to call I couldn’t get in touch with Vanessa. Her cell phone number was disconnected. And, after many years of being a stalwart support, Vanessa’s mother is ill and told me that, “I don’t know where she is. I can’t deal with her. I’m too tired. I can’t deal with the aggravation.”