Kenzie Skorepa – Voices For Dignity
My name is kenzie, I am a Mother. University student, writer, artist, warrior.. Homeless. I am a person just like any other. And at the beginning of January I had a big home. In November I had a husband and daughter. I am not a drug addict nor do I drink.
There is a very serious and real issue with the way people view homelessness. Homelessness isn’t a choice when the resources are not provided in a community.
I have been told to find shelter via the salvation army. Treatment, halfway, and transition homes. There are no beds.
I choose everyday to live in a tent in a shed. Because my daughter is here in Abbotsford, in care because I did not want her being abused, in a situation that swiftly spiraled out of control. I have ongoing court. I cannot leave my daughter so now unable to attain emergency housing I reside, cold on a blow up mattress with a hole.
I have no family here, I don’t have a whole bunch of friends. And I have had very little support in my choice to leave an abusive, dangerous man. I reached out to see if I could set up resources while I bided my time and waiting to get out, but I could not time was not a commodity any longer.
The homeless are not people who are drug addled. They are humans with stories much like yours, who one day, their lives melt and are forced to do what they have to do.
I am and have been going through multiple and varying severity health issues. Just one Of which being acute renal failure. I almost died. I was solely dependant financially on my partner. The rent cancelled, And I was left to scramble. I was told by my social worker if I left it would be detrimental to getting my baby girl back. I have already gotten a lung infection from being exposed to the elements. Slowly and not greatly recovering, from one more health problem.
I cannot afford to find a place suitable to mcfd s standards on welfare rental allocation. to rent one room in a home exceeds my whole cheque. I am desperately trying to survive, resources are not enough here. But I cannot leave.
Womens resources had little help to offer but the same list of full transition homes for battered women. Several of which have told me even if they had a bed it would trigger me and cause great mental distress for me.
Another voice silenced in the sea of homeless faces in Abbotsford the place of few resources and too great of need. I, the mother, the university student, the street kid once more.