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Jo-anneJoy
Senior Contributor

I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Just parking all my info under this one banner so I can keep tabs on me self.

 

Introduce yourself here  (First post 13 April 2020)
 
 

Hello everyone,

I've been living with varying degrees of agoraphobia and panic attacks since 1989 and, right now, I'm looking down the barrel of homelessness after drawing the short straw with my rental property being sold in mid-February and the new owner not open to extending my 60 days notice.  Have to be out on 28 April.  I'm over-55 and have no family whatsoever.  Was going

to be a difficult move in the first place, but the lock-down has raised the ante with being 

able to connect with support agencies.  After a lifetime of being resourceful and always

managing to pull myself away from the ragged edge of disaster, now I am starting to 

feel like I'm all out of moves.   For years now, whenever I talk to somebody on the phone or in person, the focus is on what I can't do, what I don't have, what I can't afford and how restricted and limited my choices are - I am looking forward to being on the other side of this phase of homelessness and being assisted into a 'forever home'.  Just right now, it's *gulp* and you know, wake me up when its over!  I've been sorting and packing up for weeks now and that has been triggering memories of past trauma and flying monkeys ... and auuggggghhh!!

 

* * *

Re: Introduce yourself here (13 April 2020...later)
 
 

Thanks NatureLover  Maggie   and Wenna   for the welcome.

As I was chasing the dust bunnies under the bed this afternoon the thought came to me to have another chat to the property agent and request he mediate with the new owner so I can get an extension until 8 May.  

 

Don't ask, don't get.

 

I look forward to the time when I can put aside the need to come up with strategies to keep myself safe. Hasn't been that great where I have been for 14 years and everyone else has moved out, as the whole complex was sold, so there are layers of loss.  A quirky fact about me : I'm the last resident tenant here who knows where all the cats are buried and their names.

 

* * **

Reply to Maggie and NatureLover (14 April 2020)

 

..... because my rental property was sold (along with other units in the complex) ... and vacant possession is a condition of the settlement, it's not an eviction for rent arrears.  

 

It's one of these scenarios where people go "oh....I haven't heard of that before".  This morning I put my case to the property agent and outlined what the scenario was going to be if my request for an extension was knocked back.  

 

Last night, I learned about a crowd in Victoria (Anika Legal) that provide free online legal services for tenants experiencing disadvantage during this time and have contacted them.  

 

First 30 years of my life, I was caregiver to parents with severe and persisting mental illness and war trauma and I struggle with boundaries and taking care of myself.  It's how I'm hardwired; the perfectionist, purple polka-dot people-pleasing thing that can't be in the driver's seat right now.

 

As I was surfing around this forum with all it's lovely click bait to other resources, came to a page with a review of a recently published book titled  We Are Here, Stories of Home, Place and Belonging with this quote that helps me to keep it all in perspective and not go slide into the swamp of internalised stigma.

 

 

Meg Mundell’s Introduction tells us that the stories in this collection reveal just how easily, if our own luck turned bad, we might find ourselves unhoused.  (p.xiii)  She also tells us that

Homelessness is often seen as a result of bad choices made by flawed people.  This convenient myth supports the illusion that it could never happent to ‘us’, ignoring the well-documented structural causes and unforeseen life events that can render people homeless.  These include a dire national shortage of social and affordable housing, punitive welfare policies, inadequate social security, poverty, unemployment, rental stress, gentrification, family violence, sexual abuse, discrimination, injury, disability, mental illness and traumatic incidents. (p.xiv) 

 

(anzlitlovers.com)

Let the good times roll....

 

 * * * *

 

So .... I didn't get the extension that I requested  (boo hiss).

 

As I am placing items outside for a scheduled hard rubbish removal, the word has gone out on the grape vine that there are freebies available at Jo's place.  Every morning I wake up, take a look and it is like the elves have been and the pile is getting smaller. 

 

Six more sleeps.....

 

 

85 REPLIES 85

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

@Jo-anneJoy  Hey Jo-anneJoy can I firstly say that I am so sorry that you find yourself in this situation. I am a single 55 year old woman with a heavily disabled son who rents and  have recently signed another 12 month lease thank god.  I know the feeling of uncertainty too well .... do you have friends that you can couch surf on for an extended time. I did that with my mum when I came out of hospital for 3 months before I could find a place.  Btw I have pawned my rings and earrings too in the past when I was ill and broke ..... I know the feeling if it helps at all.

 

I am going to bring in a @Former-Member  to see if they can help with available services. Please keep me posted with how you are doing. Love greenpeaxxx

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

I too am sorry to hear about the situation. I think an option would be to contact their states Salvation Army Crisis Service and see what they can offer. I'll send an email suggesting that.

Thanks for caring.

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Hello and welcome @Jo-anneJoy 

 

The title of your thread caught my eye because that's one of my favourite songs by a favourite singer.

 

It sounds like you're up against enormous pressures right now. I wish I could offer more practical advice. Have you contacted your local MP? Sometimes they can be helpful.

 

I hope that there is help for you  to prevent you from becoming homeless. You sound like a kind, caring and thoughtful person. Best of luck

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Hi again @Jo-anneJoy , I totally get how anyone can become homeless. It's a great fear of mine, as I am at risk of homelessness. The shortage of affordable housing, especially for singles, is appalling. So my heart goes out to you.

 

I also have agoraphobia. It's not severe so I can go out, but I can't go far from home or stay out long. How bad is yours? Surely having your home ripped from under you would be very traumatic? I know you are putting a brave face on things, which blows me away, but I feel for you.

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Thank you all @NatureLover  @Sans911 @marchhare @greenpea  for your support

and suggestions.

 

Over the course of many years, at least seven, I have kicked over the traces with all of the housing and helping services in my area.  Seriously, I am burning the t-shirt!   

 

There are waiting lists.  They take down your name and weeks later you get a letter/email

giving you an estimate of how long it may take before you are allocated to a Housing Worker.

First thing you get told is about their limited funding and government cutbacks, then it's

the luck of the draw as to the housing worker you get : their personality, their time in the job, if they're shut down with burnout, compassion fatigue or institutionalised contempt for their

clients.

 

I have been on the public housing waiting list since 2009 and was about to push through with an emergency appeal and the lockdown swooped in and ..... here we are.  

 

Complicating my efforts and self-advocacy since 2012 has been the life-crippling impacts of panic agoraphobia and I have significant barriers with using public transport.  I actually stopped using public transport when I was a younger woman in my mid-20s, after being verbally accosted and menaced by an older male who was tanked up on booze.  There were heaps of people in the same carriage coming home from work, and not one person came to my assistance.  Some buried their heads in their papers, others enjoyed the show......this is way before complex-ptsd entered the diagnostic vocabulary.

 

At the heart of my phobia are several lived experiences of being in distress and no one coming to help me couple with a very real concern that I won't have access to a public toilet as the panic attack of the gut gives me intestinal hurry.  If I know there is a facility available, where the exit doors are, then I don't get my freak on.

 

Most of the time when I go out, it's an exercise in graded exposure and I was functional when I still had my own car (which got written off when a idiot went through a stop sign) and that was my worst case scenario; losing my agency, losing my safe place (the car being an extension of my home).  Ironically, only a few weeks before that life-changing collison, I had told a so-called psychologist who was interviewing me for a job capacity assessment, that I feared losing my car; that I would stuffed without it, that I was concerned I would take my own life......here I am 8 years and 10 months later....and much fitter than I look because I walk everywhere with my knapsack on my back....

 

Val-deri, val-dera
Val-deri, val-dera
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.

 

I have long wanted to leave this place where I really have been trapped, it has been the 8th level of Hell, so I'm not devastated to be getting shot of this place at all.  Truly, I am relieved to be leaving under my own steam and not on a gurney with a blanket over my face and tag on my toe......like another woman who lived in this complex.

 

After all that I have been through, the thing that I find most disturbing, is how prevalent sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity is, out there, amongst the public servants .... but this is an essay for another platform.

 

Once I was a home visitor with a very well known and respected helping agency, I have been on both sides of the poverty line, and have been an an advocate/activist for mental health awareness late last century.  Due to my own personal circumstances, I withdrew from that work and engaged with more studies. 2020 is the year I come back.

 

I get that from the outside, taking in what I write there, that it appears I am putting on a brave face, when really, I am in a state of surrender and leaning into the fire - I do have well developed coping strategies and as they say in the army : embrace the suck.

 

Having said that, I need to get my scaredweirdlittlebackside up to the storage facility to sort out the documents and that means taking a taxi (half-fare card) and that is another can of worms to feed the flying monkeys......

 

.....so having stalled for a couple of hours (important stage of psyching myself up) I better get a wriggle on now that the meds have kicked in.  

 

 

 

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

It does help @greenpea  

 

Never had much family to start with, didn't have siblings, and I had moved around a bit following work so there's been a natural attrition with friends.  As my agoraphobia has been  pesky with catching up, seeing a movie, socialising, that weeded out the fairweather friends from the stayers.  Just the way the cookie crumbled....lost a large network of friends in a divorce.

 

Glad you mentioned about pawning rings....need to dig out my grannie and great-grannies

bling - the last resort is selling those items to a collector.

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Heart thinking of you @Jo-anneJoy 

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Stardate: 97905.57

 

Am I ever so glad that I did the trip to the storage facility today as the a-hole tried to fob off a crap  storage locker on me and I just had to channel my inner.....

 

don't talk to me.jpg

 

..... and give him The Glare.

 

Mission accomplished after an excruciating 30-40 minutes with a person who insisted on going the whole hog .....

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmemOAnbQls

 

..

 

, I thoroughly enjoyed the taxi ride back home, through suburbs and scenery I haven't seen for such a very long time - over 10 years - beautiful afternoon here and it was a lovely day out.  I really miss having my own car and just going for a drive, no specific destination, just see where the road takes me.  I miss being that person.

 

Going to chow down on a big feed of tacos and I bought the heavy duty expresso coffee from the Woollies as I am going to be pulling an all-nighter with cat-packing (sweeping everything off the table into a box)

.

Current mood:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8xScxmekQk

 

 

 

 

Re: I lost my shirt, I pawned my rings; I've done all the thumb dings...

Hello @Jo-anneJoy 

Good to see you have already met a few people here.  I love your humour and attitude.  I also know what it is like to deal with parents with MI and war trauma, but I had a few siblings.  Also known homelessness twice. I hope your situation unfolds and you get a better place soon.

 

I have also suffered from people who do not do their jobs.

Take Care

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