Quote:
Originally Posted by rgcraig
Ferd,
You have worked against the obstacles placed in your life to make a difference - - wish everyone would GET THAT!!!!
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I too have overcome the obstacles. I was raised in a single parent household. My father used to beat my mother within an inch of her life and abandoned us. My mother turned to welfare for short term assistance. Once stable she tried to work because she didn’t believe in welfare. When she started working all medical, housing subsidies, and food stamps were cut. Overnight our bills (and we had next to nothing, not even a car) were far greater than her income. She sought help and she was repeatedly told, “Don’t be lazy, get another job.” So she did. While she was working two jobs I got mixed up in the wrong crowd and started running the streets. Mom was never home. I got into drugs and some things I’m very ashamed of. My mom realized that I needed a parent at home so she quit working and returned to welfare to raise me and reign me in. The adjustment of being governed by a parent led to many fights and confrontations. We were evicted from our apartment for fighting. My mother and I were then homeless. For three days we slept under a slide at Brown St. Park in Dayton Ohio. My mom then broke down and took us to a shelter and they referred us to an organization called The Other Place. They connected us with a Methodist church network that provided temporary shelter and a place to stay. My mother continued sinking deeper into depression. As we left the shelter she would go and apply for work and she was never hired. One person said that it was because we didn’t have an address. She broke down one night. I was younger and can’t remember everything she said but I remember how she said we had no hope. She met this guy some place while I was at school. His name as Cecil. He frequented the bar scene on a local strip called the Oregon District. He was into drugs and soon my mother was caught up and he used her…she became his “money maker”. I don’t think I need to elaborate. I watched her plead for help and rely on shelters that were full and charity that told us to come back. She tried working out of the gutter and realized that she had to choose working two jobs and loosing me or staying on the system and trying to parent me. Then she and Cecil had a falling out over some money that came up missing. I thought he was going to kill us. Mom took me and we left, we stayed the rest of that night at the Greyhound Bus Station in Downtown Dayton. I dropped out of school. I was thankful to be away from Cecil because he was very abusive. My mother finally pleaded her way into a local shelter called St. Vincent. They said I was too young to be put into the male area and too old to be in the ladies area so they put us up in a room at the EconoLodge off Dixie. She worked with some case workers who got us into Parkside emergency housing, a black ghetto. I seemed to do well there and had plenty of friends. But a few were dealers. I dabbled. Then my mother found more permanent housing at DeSoto Bass Courts (another black ghetto). This is where I was shot at twice and attacked in the middle of the intersection at Germantown and Lakeview. Cecil then started trying to come back around. One night things got heated and I stood up to protect my mom, I took a knife and stabbed him twice in front of 84 Benning Place. The courts said I had to get back into school and walk a fine line. This entire period is like some nightmare. Things I’m not able to even mention here.
So I tested up into high school and started going to Colonel White HS. Here I got into JROTC and began doing really well in my studies. My mom had taken me to an Apostolic church when I was younger. We attended for a while but my mom took us out because she was told that it was a cult. Well, while on my way home from school walking through “The Bass” a brother named Chester Matthews got an upset stomach and stepped outside, virtually right in my path. He stopped me and asked me if I knew Jesus. I told him that I had been filled with the Holy Ghost and he invited me to church…the very same church my mother had taken me to! Well I visited a few times but it was hard seeing that I didn’t always have a ride. I graduated from school and got a car. I then started going to the Lighthouse a little more regularly and even took my high school sweetheart with me and she got saved. Now we’re married and have a wonderful family who’s serving the Lord.
I joined the military and have worked as a factory mechanical assembler, Combat Medic, a CNA, a Therapeutic Programming Assistant for the handicapped, a help desk technician, and a financial account reconciler for the city government in the departments of Housing and Water.
The whole time I was getting back on my feet my mom lived in the Bass and was receiving welfare assistance. The charities only gave such temporary relief it didn’t make any real impact. But the system…the system provided a roof and food for us. I remember thanking God for it.
And brothers and sisters…I worked my way out…but the system helped us more than you will ever know. As a young man who watched his mom spend food stamps you paid taxes to provide…let me say…thank you. I’m am a life that made it.
But I know of many others who don’t have any place to turn. So I am outspoken about it. Until you’ve been on the street and needed the help desperately I don’t think you can understand what it means to those who are just praying to survive.