“Sometimes I have meltdowns; sometimes I say, ‘OK,’ and go on.”

This story is from the Invisible Project, a collaboration between the Welcome Project and Porter County Coalition for Affordable Housing, Housing Opportunities, Gabriel’s Horn, Dayspring Women’s Center, and Porter County Museum.

Editing by David M. Sula of Adelmar Entertainment.

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Transcript for Makes You Strong

We used to live at Hunter’s Pointe. And they told me–I lived there for three years and paid my rent, faithfully–and they told me they were not going to renew my lease. So I had to find another place to move to and Housing Opportunities told me I could move into their apartments.

When I had to move out of Hunter’s Pointe, I had thirty days. And I had no extra money to afford to pay for U-Haul and security deposits, all those security deposits. So that’s when I found about Housing Opportunities—of course, you have to do an application and everything else like that. So I stayed with my aunt for a couple days, and she wasn’t really nice, you know, because people are living in her house. My aunt was kind of selfish. You know, we couldn’t eat her groceries, so I tried to go get groceries. And I couldn’t use her shower because she said it costs money to take showers. So my aunt was kind of rough.

Because I think because they don’t…they have everything, what they need, and they don’t realize when you don’t have nothing and they have everything is kind of like you know, a burden on them, you know, because they have to help you out. There’s a couple times, you know, I didn’t think I was taking enough responsibilities. Because I had to ask for my family to help me. And in those times that’s why you’re supposed to have your family is to help you. And my family can be ugly at times.

You know, my daughter had, Monica had her back surgery, and nobody came, and she was in ICU. They didn’t think she was going to make it through. And I didn’t have no family there. She wasn’t coming out of the anesthesia. And they didn’t know why. So finally two weeks of laying in ICU, she finally came out of it. And I did that all on my own. That makes you strong. Sometimes I have meltdowns, and sometimes I say okay, and go on.

It was hard about being homeless because you don’t know where you’re going to go to lay down at night. You don’t know when your next meal was coming in. And I didn’t know how to go get diapers or wipes for my daughter because she’s, you know, wheelchair bound. And it’s scary – you just don’t know what you’re going to do. It’s an awful feeling. So when they told me I got the apartment I was so ecstatic. I could take a shower when I wanted to. I didn’t have no furniture, I had no TV. I had nothing. But I don’t care. I had my freedom. I had, I could take a shower, I could make my hotdogs. Whatever I wanted to. I felt like I was like a prisoner when I was homeless because you couldn’t do what you wanted to do.

I just look at my daughter and smile, I do it for her. I think people who are negative, they are sad in their life, they have to make everyone else sad. So you just have to be happy. She’s a lot of work, but she’s my baby girl.