This is a long tale, but I appreciate you taking the time to meet my friend Chris and help her out if you can.
TL;DR: my friend, an elderly queer woman I met when she was homeless just lost everything she owns in a fire at her first permanent home she had after becoming unhoused. Luckily, she and her cat were not home at the time. Please help if you can by donating or boosting.
This is a queer elder who needs our help. I'm hoping tumblr can come through for her
A friend of mine just lost everything except herself, her cat and the clothes on her back to a fire at her apartment (her first after being homeless for years) on Friday. We learned yesterday that nothing from her apartment is recoverable. Please help!
(Long post with cute cat pictures behind the readmore)
I met Chris one Sunday afternoon after driving past her three times as she sat on a bench outside our local library after closing. I stopped to ask if she needed a ride, and found out that she was homeless, staying in motels when her SSI came in and on the street when it ran out.
As the years have passed, I've learned a lot about her. Despite her parents kicking her out at 17 when she was outed to them as gay, she went back to school and became a social worker, working in several Chicago hospitals through the 80s and 90s, and, like a lot of queer women in the caring fields at that time, tended to and provided comfort and care for (among others) so many gay men, young and old, living with and dying from AIDS, from the earliest days of the disease through the availability of the triple cocktail and to the brighter days of hope.
Through it all, she had relationships with women in a time where that was something that wasn't always safe to do. Some were good, some bad, and some resulting in her losing nearly everything, but she struggled through. She quit social work in 99 or 2000 when her mom got sick and passed away, and then stayed out of the workforce to care for her dad until he passed in 2006. Those experiences impacted her deeply, and she became permanently disabled during that period, leaving her living on SSI, and struggling with her own mental health. She eventually lost her condo, and bounced in and out of apartments and motels.
When I met her in Sept 2019, I helped her get back into the motel she'd been staying at and bridging her to her next check and then making sure that she could stay there, and reliably get her maintenance meds and start rebuilding her life and credit.
This is her and everything she owned as we left her hotel room for the final time on Valentine's Day 2022.
The cat there is Bailey, her constant companion since they adopted each other in September 2021. They've both been through a lot and are absolutely the picture of "Who rescued whom?"
We started having biweekly dinners and I worked with her creditors and tried to get her credit score back into a good place, and helped her get banked and fixed up with access to the Internet and just help her feel more solid and stable in her life.
Just over 2 years later, in February 2022, we were finally able to get her into a senior independent living apartment, her first permanent home since about 2017. She had no furniture, but with some secondhand pickups and occasional pickups, we got her something resembling a home.
It wasn't perfect, and she had her grumbles, certainly, but it was her home. It was a place that she could launch from to recover and consider moving some place even better, if she chose.
However, Friday, July 14, Bailey had an afternoon vet appointment. Everything was fine when we left, but when we got home, with Bailey in a carrier in the backseat, we were shocked to see what looked like a million emergency vehicles & a whole lot of seniors sitting on the grass.
Chris and Bailey came with me to take my daughter into the city that evening, giving the situation 2 hours to develop and for us to get more information. We heard a few newsradio updates and saw this story on abc7, getting the sinking feeling that that balcony looked too familiar.
When we got back from the city, we were able to drive around the back of the building and confirm that this was her apartment.
We were able to get back to the building on Tuesday and get into the apartment to get her medications, but everything is water damaged from the sprinkler system (with all of its stagnant water) and the firehoses. All her furniture. All her clothes. Her bed. Her degrees. Gone.
Everything she owned is gone. She literally owns less now than when she was homeless. She's despairing and trying her best to keep it together, but she's lost so many homes in her life, going back to when she was 17 and her parents found out she is gay and kicked her out.
This all feels like too much. Please help. Please donate what you can, and share where you're able.
hey im so sorry to beg again but my past post lost traction and i desperately need help.
can anyone please help me get groceries to eat? i haven't eaten anything solid in 2 days, please if you can donate or boost i would really appreciate it 😭
hey moots and moots in law i'm so sorry and embarrassed to be doing this yet again but i really need everyone's help and attention if you can
recently i had to quit my last job due to discrimination and verbal abuse coming from my bosses (due to my ethnicity) and i ran out of money to get groceries and food for my cats so can anyone please help? i would be really grateful <3
P*yP*l:
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Hi everyone, I'm Cal, a 26 year old cancer survivor facing serious chal… Caytlin Barwick needs your support for Help a Childhood Cancer Surv
my irl best friend cal has started a campaign to fund a pair of forearm crutches for helping him with mobility. please consider donating, we used to love to hike together and this will make it possible for us again
the goal is $180 so even a small donation will help greatly!
A group of passionate art and animation professionals have launched a Patreon campaign to try and finish telling one of the greatest Sonic stories never told – that of Sonic the Hedgehog’s Saturday AM (SatAM) long lost the third season. The project is being led by long-standing community group FUS (Fans United for SatAM), who … Continue reading Dedicated SatAM Fans Crowdfund ‘Season 3’ Production
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Luca is a non-binary trans Muslim and has been an active member of the Queer Muslims of Boston community, advocating for queer muslims in both interfaith and in terms of inclusive mosque spaces.
