So many individuals and families served by Volunteers of America of Kentucky have overcome homlessness, hardship and disabilities to achieve self-sufficiency and success. Here are just a few of those inspirational stories.
CHARLIE'S STORY
Charlie was eight years old when he came to our Family Emergency Shelter with his mother and two older brothers. His mother’s addiction had led to their transient lifestyle.
One day Charlie’s mother left the shelter and didn’t return, abandoning her children. As protocol, Volunteers of America couldn't provide shelter to children without a parent or guardian.
Jayne Harbin, then a Volunteers of America case worker, sat with Charlie as he waited to be transferred. Tears streamed down his cheeks. She says, “It was heartbreaking.”
Charlie later went to live with his grandmother, separated from his brothers. Jayne kept in touch with Charlie and his next oldest brother. On occasion she spent time with them. The years passed. Contact became less frequent and then stopped.
Then, “one day, out of the blue, he called me at work,” Jayne remembers. “He seemed to be so excited that I was still working here.”
During that phone call, Charlie told her how fortunate he felt to have had Jayne there for the support he needed at one of the most difficult periods of his life. He told her that he and his brothers were never reunited with their mother and that she died from a drug overdose.
He wanted her to know that he was doing well, was in the Navy, and he soon would be going to school and fulfilling his dreams. He wanted her to know that one person really can make a difference in someone’s life and for him, that person was Jayne.
Jayne is now Transitional Housing Program Manager for Volunteers of America of Kentucky.
PHOENICA'S STORY
Phonecia is a 28-year-old Army veteran and a single mother of an 8 year-old boy and seven-month-old girl. This is her story in her own words:
“I was 4 months pregnant with my daughter when my son and I became homeless. We were living with my sister and her family in a three bedroom apartment after I had got evicted from a house that I was renting with a roommate. However, my sister also got evicted from her apartment which then left my son and I with no place to go. My sister and I both grew up as wards of the state, so we didn’t have any immediate family to turn to for help. Following the weeks up to the eviction my sister and her family moved in with a long time friend of hers. Since I had no place to go or anyone who would help me, my son and I remained in the empty apartment for an additional two weeks without running water, electricity, or gas.
Everyday we would wake up early, trying to beat the sun’s horrific heat to the corner store. We would buy food that we could eat for the day and then ride our bikes, a little over a mile, to a friend’s house so we could shower, eat a hot meal, and stay cool from the heat. We would stay at my friend’s house until the sun went down, since the temperatures were around 100 to 104 degrees during the day and we would return back to the apartment at night.
For these two weeks I was also calling around to different shelters hoping and praying that someone would take me and my son in. Finally after two weeks, the lady who answered the phone at the Volunteers of America family emergency shelter said, “We have a room for you”.
The staff at Volunteers of America embraced me without judgment from the time I walked in the door. They helped me learn the skills I was lacking to be able to survive on my own. After residing at the shelter for 5 months, Volunteers of America helped me with a voucher so I could afford my own three bedroom apartment.”
Phonecia went on to attend Phoenix University, where she is working on her Associates Degree in Business Management. She works part-time for a catering temp agency. She hopes to become “a successful business owner so I can afford to help people less fortunate, the way Volunteers of America has helped me.”
SHAWN'S STORY
April 15, 2004, will always be a special day for Shawn and her family, for that is the day they moved into their own home. This special day was ten years after a ten year journey of homelessness that eventually led her to the Volunteers of America Family Emergency Shelter, where the family completed a home ownership-training course and achieved the American dream of home ownership.
Shawn points out the contrast between her circumstances long ago--an unwed teenage mother, welfare recipient, high school drop-out--and her life later as a student at the University of Louisville, scholarship winner, employed as a supervisor at a human services agency serving children in need, resource director of a ministry at her church, and home-owner.
The following is an excerpt from a motivation speech written by Shawn:
“I chose to move on and leap over the hurdles of my life. My license plate reads “O-V-R-C-M-R” (overcomer). Don’t let yourself be counted as a statistic unless it is on the side of success. Success starts with a prayer, wish, or dream. Your imagination fuels it with “what if's” and carries it forward with desire, which burns, grows, and gnaws at you until it brings out achievement. Recapture your dreams, stoke the fires, surround yourself with positive people, separate from the naysayers, and you will make it.”
THE STORY OF DEBBIE AND KERRI
Like many families who end up homeless, Debbie and her 14-year daughter had exhausted every option.
An out of state move and a debilitating injury left her with few resources. After seeing an ad in the yellow pages, she called Volunteers of America’s Family Emergency Shelter. What she found was not just an overnight stay but a continuum of programs.
“If it wasn’t for them, I don’t know where I’d be."
Debbie and her daughter were able to leave the shelter in just over two months. Thanks to the Transitional Housing program, they moved into an apartment, each with their own bedroom.
“I love the people, love the staff. This place is so nice. We have our own freedom now. It’s a miracle.”
SHANE'NA'S STORY
"When I found out, I was three months," she said. "After a half dozen pregnancy tests, I had to accept it." I didn't think it would happen to me, and I was afraid to tell my mom."
She was fifteen years old, her dad was deployed to Iraq and her mom was trying to manage a household, job and three kids.
"At first, I considered putting the baby up for adoption, but then, after a while, I decided to keep her," she said. She described feeling pressured and confused by everyone's suggestions that ranged from abortion to adoption to keeping the baby.
During her second trimester, she moved to a home in New Albany for pregnant teens. There, she went to high school and focused on her pregnancy, school and on her future. Natalie Alexandra made her debut December 20, 2006, weighing in at 7 lbs, 4 ounces. It was Christmas break. But it was no break for Shane'Na.
Just a few days later, Shane'Na and her newborn daughter arrived at Volunteers of America's Transitional Living Program in Frankfort, Kentucky, a program designed to provide housing and comprehensive services to homeless, pregnant or parenting teens between the ages of 16 and 21.
"It was hard!" she explains. "My day began at 4:30 a.m. feeding the baby, getting her items packed for the day, getting myself ready and out the door by six to take the baby to the sitters located 30 minutes away." She continued, "School began at 7:30 and ended at 3:30 and I worked after school making minimum wage. I easily put in an eighteen to twenty hour day."
The exhaustion took its toll. She transferred from her high school to a nontraditional educational program in Franklin County. After there, her day began at 9 a.m. and ended at 3:45 in the afternoon. Work, motherhood and school became a bit more manageable. Later she enrolled in Bluegrass Community Technical School and completed the Certified Nursing Assistant Program. This technical skill helped her land a position at a local nursing home, nearly doubling the hourly wage she was making at a local restaurant.
She boasts of Natalie's most recent accomplishments: "She can talk! And, she began walking at nine months!" In her room at the Transitional Living Program are photos of a beautiful, bright- eyed baby girl, smiling from ear to ear.
"I want to go to college," she said. "Someday, when I grow up," she continued, "I want to be a paralegal."
Read about our Real Solutions
So many individuals and families served by Volunteers of America of Kentucky have overcome homlessness, hardship and disabilities to achieve self-sufficiency and success. Here are just a few of those inspirational stories.
CHARLIE'S STORY
Charlie was eight years old when he came to our Family Emergency Shelter with his mother and two older brothers. His mother’s addiction had led to their transient lifestyle.
One day Charlie’s mother left the shelter and didn’t return, abandoning her children. As protocol, Volunteers of America couldn't provide shelter to children without a parent or guardian.
Jayne Harbin, then a Volunteers of America case worker, sat with Charlie as he waited to be transferred. Tears streamed down his cheeks. She says, “It was heartbreaking.”
Charlie later went to live with his grandmother, separated from his brothers. Jayne kept in touch with Charlie and his next oldest brother. On occasion she spent time with them. The years passed. Contact became less frequent and then stopped.
Then, “one day, out of the blue, he called me at work,” Jayne remembers. “He seemed to be so excited that I was still working here.”
During that phone call, Charlie told her how fortunate he felt to have had Jayne there for the support he needed at one of the most difficult periods of his life. He told her that he and his brothers were never reunited with their mother and that she died from a drug overdose.
He wanted her to know that he was doing well, was in the Navy, and he soon would be going to school and fulfilling his dreams. He wanted her to know that one person really can make a difference in someone’s life and for him, that person was Jayne.
Jayne is now Transitional Housing Program Manager for Volunteers of America of Kentucky.
PHOENICA'S STORY
Phonecia is a 28-year-old Army veteran and a single mother of an 8 year-old boy and seven-month-old girl. This is her story in her own words:
“I was 4 months pregnant with my daughter when my son and I became homeless. We were living with my sister and her family in a three bedroom apartment after I had got evicted from a house that I was renting with a roommate. However, my sister also got evicted from her apartment which then left my son and I with no place to go. My sister and I both grew up as wards of the state, so we didn’t have any immediate family to turn to for help. Following the weeks up to the eviction my sister and her family moved in with a long time friend of hers. Since I had no place to go or anyone who would help me, my son and I remained in the empty apartment for an additional two weeks without running water, electricity, or gas.
Everyday we would wake up early, trying to beat the sun’s horrific heat to the corner store. We would buy food that we could eat for the day and then ride our bikes, a little over a mile, to a friend’s house so we could shower, eat a hot meal, and stay cool from the heat. We would stay at my friend’s house until the sun went down, since the temperatures were around 100 to 104 degrees during the day and we would return back to the apartment at night.
For these two weeks I was also calling around to different shelters hoping and praying that someone would take me and my son in. Finally after two weeks, the lady who answered the phone at the Volunteers of America family emergency shelter said, “We have a room for you”.
The staff at Volunteers of America embraced me without judgment from the time I walked in the door. They helped me learn the skills I was lacking to be able to survive on my own. After residing at the shelter for 5 months, Volunteers of America helped me with a voucher so I could afford my own three bedroom apartment.”
Phonecia went on to attend Phoenix University, where she is working on her Associates Degree in Business Management. She works part-time for a catering temp agency. She hopes to become “a successful business owner so I can afford to help people less fortunate, the way Volunteers of America has helped me.”
SHAWN'S STORY
April 15, 2004, will always be a special day for Shawn and her family, for that is the day they moved into their own home. This special day was ten years after a ten year journey of homelessness that eventually led her to the Volunteers of America Family Emergency Shelter, where the family completed a home ownership-training course and achieved the American dream of home ownership.
Shawn points out the contrast between her circumstances long ago--an unwed teenage mother, welfare recipient, high school drop-out--and her life later as a student at the University of Louisville, scholarship winner, employed as a supervisor at a human services agency serving children in need, resource director of a ministry at her church, and home-owner.
The following is an excerpt from a motivation speech written by Shawn:
“I chose to move on and leap over the hurdles of my life. My license plate reads “O-V-R-C-M-R” (overcomer). Don’t let yourself be counted as a statistic unless it is on the side of success. Success starts with a prayer, wish, or dream. Your imagination fuels it with “what if's” and carries it forward with desire, which burns, grows, and gnaws at you until it brings out achievement. Recapture your dreams, stoke the fires, surround yourself with positive people, separate from the naysayers, and you will make it.”
THE STORY OF DEBBIE AND KERRI
Like many families who end up homeless, Debbie and her 14-year daughter had exhausted every option.
An out of state move and a debilitating injury left her with few resources. After seeing an ad in the yellow pages, she called Volunteers of America’s Family Emergency Shelter. What she found was not just an overnight stay but a continuum of programs.
“If it wasn’t for them, I don’t know where I’d be."
Debbie and her daughter were able to leave the shelter in just over two months. Thanks to the Transitional Housing program, they moved into an apartment, each with their own bedroom.
“I love the people, love the staff. This place is so nice. We have our own freedom now. It’s a miracle.”
SHANE'NA'S STORY
"When I found out, I was three months," she said. "After a half dozen pregnancy tests, I had to accept it." I didn't think it would happen to me, and I was afraid to tell my mom."
She was fifteen years old, her dad was deployed to Iraq and her mom was trying to manage a household, job and three kids.
"At first, I considered putting the baby up for adoption, but then, after a while, I decided to keep her," she said. She described feeling pressured and confused by everyone's suggestions that ranged from abortion to adoption to keeping the baby.
During her second trimester, she moved to a home in New Albany for pregnant teens. There, she went to high school and focused on her pregnancy, school and on her future. Natalie Alexandra made her debut December 20, 2006, weighing in at 7 lbs, 4 ounces. It was Christmas break. But it was no break for Shane'Na.
Just a few days later, Shane'Na and her newborn daughter arrived at Volunteers of America's Transitional Living Program in Frankfort, Kentucky, a program designed to provide housing and comprehensive services to homeless, pregnant or parenting teens between the ages of 16 and 21.
"It was hard!" she explains. "My day began at 4:30 a.m. feeding the baby, getting her items packed for the day, getting myself ready and out the door by six to take the baby to the sitters located 30 minutes away." She continued, "School began at 7:30 and ended at 3:30 and I worked after school making minimum wage. I easily put in an eighteen to twenty hour day."
The exhaustion took its toll. She transferred from her high school to a nontraditional educational program in Franklin County. After there, her day began at 9 a.m. and ended at 3:45 in the afternoon. Work, motherhood and school became a bit more manageable. Later she enrolled in Bluegrass Community Technical School and completed the Certified Nursing Assistant Program. This technical skill helped her land a position at a local nursing home, nearly doubling the hourly wage she was making at a local restaurant.
She boasts of Natalie's most recent accomplishments: "She can talk! And, she began walking at nine months!" In her room at the Transitional Living Program are photos of a beautiful, bright- eyed baby girl, smiling from ear to ear.
"I want to go to college," she said. "Someday, when I grow up," she continued, "I want to be a paralegal."
Read about our Real Solutions
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