For Sam, homelessness felt safer than abuse.
After tragically losing her eldest son, Sam became trapped in an abusive relationship. “He tormented me,” she shares. “He stole my car, locked me away, kept me from being able to finish my college studies. The abuse got really bad, and I had to leave everything to be free of him so that I could be safe. Homelessness was preferable to abuse.”
Sam left everything behind and spent a year unsheltered for the first time in her life. For more than a year, she was without a home. “I had never in my life been homeless, so I didn’t know what to do,” she recalls. At Community Resource Center, Sam received compassionate care: nutritious food from our client-choice pantry, holiday baskets, transportation help, counseling, and case management to find a stable home and cover her first month’s rent deposit.
With encouragement from her CRC case manager, Sam said she felt she could keep moving forward. Sam shares:
“Rising above this big of a challenge is next to impossible unless you have a lot of support. CRC met me with arms open,” Sam says. “They helped repair my car so that I can continue to go to job interviews and work as a caregiver. Talking with my case manager, Karina, really gives me that uplift to feel like I can keep going if I keep trying.”“I have days where hope is a rare commodity – and that is something CRC has in abundance. When each person shows up with hope in their pocket, it adds up to a mountain of hope for someone like me who has been physically and mentally abused.”
