“Equality”, a single mother of 3 young boys, came to our second stage shelter in hopes to have a safe place for her and her children to stay while they awaited relocation to a new city. She had no income and was unsure where to start. She was overwhelmed.
“Equality”, a single woman fleeing her female abusive partner, came to our emergency shelter a year ago with a few bags of clothes and her cat. She needed help to meet her basic daily needs and felt she had no one to help her, she had no family and lived a very sheltered life with her partner. Equality was not in a position where she could start working on goals or look for funding and a new home, rather she needed to have a safe, warm and friendly environment where she could gather her thoughts and make a plan.
“Equality”, a mother of 5 was referred to our second stage shelter last year. Due to capacity at that time, Equality was brought to the emergency shelter for safety while she awaited her new unit at the second stage shelter. She was not from Alberta and at her request, shared little information with staff about her past and where she was relocating from. She was shaken and scared, hungry and exhausted.
“Equality” came to Odyssey House after things escalated between her and her abusive partner. She stated that things were becoming worse, “no” was no longer an option with him. Only “yes”, she began doing whatever he said because she couldn’t take the physical abuse anymore. She left with just my passports and the kids’ birth certificate.
Young expectant mom, “Equality” with two children came to our shelter at the beginning of September. She travelled from another town, fleeing abuse. Her goal was to find safe housing for herself and her children before the birth of her baby.
Equality is a 36-year-old mom of 3 daughters. She has been in a relationship with a man who worked away from home for nearly 12 years. Her partner did not believe in marriage, working mothers, and he did not believe that she as a mother/wife needed friends, she was only “allowed” family for support. Since the birth of their first daughter, Equality began to develop social anxiety, hypochondria, and lives in constant fear.
“Equality” had been with her abusive partner for five years, before coming to Odyssey House, she recalls
“I was controlled. I could not be my own person, I had no voice! I felt isolated from the community and from the world. I was drugged by sadness, I was prisoner to my hopelessness and I had no control of my feelings.” – Equality
The control she experienced, had pushed her family away, as she did not want them to know what she was going through, she remembers thinking that staying with her family was not an option.
“Equality” had been at Odyssey House for 5 months. She escaped an abusive relationship with her 4 young children, and immediately started working to secure housing and get her children’s life back to normal. She was persistent, diligent, and wouldn’t take no for an answer when it came to moving forward and out of the shelter.
Before coming to Odyssey House, “Equality” was struggling with homelessness and addiction. She was struggling with a lack of a credit rating, due to everything being in her partners name many of the places she viewed and applied to wouldn’t take her. She came very close to going back to her abuser because she wouldn’t have had to worry about a place to live or finances. After staying at the Emergency Shelter, it had been decided her and her family would be a good fit for the second stage shelter.
Equality came to the shelter in November of 2018 with her three children. She was experiencing mental health issues and addiction and had left an abusive relationship several months before coming to Odyssey House. CFS became involved and over the following eight months, she had struggled.
