Challenges of Rebounding from Homelessness

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For a short period of time, I was technically part of the homeless community, although I never saw myself that way. I was on drugs and unable and/or unwilling to stop. I was forced to give up my place and as long as I was using drugs, I couldn’t go home to my family. I believed I was different because, “I never actually slept on the street”. Then again, I hardly slept at all. I had a car with most of my belongings in it and stayed in motels or with fellow addicts whom I called friends. I knew many other homeless people at the time; I assumed that they were living that way because of the lifestyle. Now I wonder which came first. The homelessness or the drug addicted lifestyle. My period of homelessness ended with an extended stay at the Sadie Darnell Hotel. It was a very short period of my life and easily pushed to the back of my mind. When I began this semester I was like many others. I knew that homelessness was a huge issue, but I didn’t really allow myself to “know” the extent of it. I would give out a few blankets in the winter and some money whenever possible and continue on with my normal routine. Is it possible in a country such as ours that nearly 700,000 people were homeless in 2011 alone? (Witte, 2012) The truth is that is most likely a low estimate, due to under coverage because there is no finite way to measure homelessness. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, a homeless person is defined as “an individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence,” and “a person whose primary nighttime residence is a public or private shelter, an institution, a public or private place not designed for a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings” (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), 2007). What are the main causes of homelessness and why is it so hard to come back from? In my paper I am

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