Q: My dad kicked me out of my house
and I have nowhere to go. I’m only a 15 years old. What am I going to do?
A: There
are many things you can do and believe me you are not alone! In Toronto for
example, a good estimate suggests there are at least 10,000 different youth who
are homeless for any given year and anywhere from 1,500 to 2,000 on any given
night. Homelessness can affect people of any age, gender or ethnic
background. It does not discriminate. Different studies and reports have shown that youth generally
leave home around the age of 15, they are poorly educated with a little over
half having grade 11 or less, about one third have grade 12 and about 10 % have university or college. Of
those who attended school 60 % of them were diagnosed with anger management
problems, ADD, hyperactivity or dyslexia.
What Does Homelessness Mean
Living on the
Street, and staying overnight in temporary shelters, staying in unsuitable
environments where people were not meant to live, moving continuously among
temporary housing arrangements provided by strangers, friends, or family, which
is also known as “couch surfing”.
Some teens love
going to school because of the comfort, warmth and security of the school
building. It is a place that provides safety, security and stability. However,
when the nights and the weekend come around, those students are homeless and
they are looking for a place to stay some warmth and some food.
It is said that
half of homeless teens age 16 and older, drop out of school. Due to their experiences,
many resort to using drugs which can lead to addiction as a means of
coping. They lack food and clothing, they need supplies, medical and dental
treatment and the list goes on and on. These teens lack stability which most of
us take for granted.
The Causes of Homelessness
Adults become
homeless for a lot of reasons like losing a job, marital divorce or separation,
mental illness and alcohol and drug addiction but for youth and children, the
reasons tend to be family related. In 2003 in Canada, there were
over 50,000 reports of runaway children and it has increased steadily. Most youth
don’t leave happy homes for the streets.
Teens that run
away over situational circumstances are by far the largest percentage of
homeless. They leave homes for a couple of days because of an argument with
parents and usually go home again. Some continue this trend and eventually stay
away longer and longer.
·
The largest contributing factor is family
breakdown. More than 70% of homeless youth are survivors of childhood sexual,
physical, emotional abuse and/or neglect
·
The
second largest contributing factor is
foster children coming of age and foster children who feel apart and alone.
·
Have difficulty with mental health problems,
·
Family
poverty or lack of affordable housing,
·
Gay,
lesbian or transgender nonacceptance,
·
Teens of
homeless adults
·
Having learning disabilities
·
Abandoned by their parents.
·
Substance abuse
Typically, the problems teens
face on the streets are much more dangerous than what they have to deal with at
home, like constant threat of sexual
exploitation, violence abuse and drug traffickers, but they still leave home believing
that at least they have some control over their own lives instead of having to stay
in an abusive situation. Between the ages
of 14 and 25 there is also an alarming rate of deaths which are mostly caused
by suicide and drug overdose.
When shelters seem too dangerous, the homeless are sleeping in ravines,
in houses under construction, in used clothing boxes and on top of strip malls.
About half of street youth report being attacked or threatened with attack and
half had been sexually assaulted or threatened with sexual assault.
Female street youth are 2 to 3 times more
likely to get pregnant than women who are not homeless. The younger someone
became homeless and the longer they stayed on the street the greater
probability they would become pregnant. Studies show that over half of the
girls on the street, in shelters or living with friends had their first
pregnancy at average age of 16 years old. And of those, half miscarried,
aborted or had still born births.
If you have left
home, it can be difficult to get a job for money without high school diploma,
and rent is usually too high to get a place to stay even if you could get a job
at minimum wage.
Most street
youth earn money by panhandling
Some do break
and enters
Some sell
drugs.
Some receive
social assistance.
Some have paid
employment.
Some work in the
sex trade work (about 1/3, both male and female, have worked in the sex trade at
least once in their lives)
So what
can you do?
- Is there anything I can do to improve the situation rather than leave?
- Who can I talk to about this?
- Where will I go?
- Who can help me?
- How will I survive?
- Am I being realistic?
- Who will I call if I get into trouble?
- What will happen when I come home again?
- Is leaving a safe option?
Then….
- Try talking to another family member, like grandparents, a parent, older siblings, other relatives. They may be able to give you somewhere to live for a while and help you get things organized.
- Talk to your teacher or someone else that you trust like a school counsellor if you are still at school. He or she could help you get into touch with people who can help.
- Do you have a relative, teacher or someone else that you trust?
- Can you gather up the courage to tell someone you trust that you can't live where you are anymore and why?
- Do you know where your local safe house or crisis shelters are
- If you are homeless there are many free services that can help you.
- Salvation army
- Youth Drop in centers
- Churches out of the cold programs
- Food banks and soup kitchen
- Youth shelters for a bed and food
- Covenant house near you
It is important to stabilize and get in touch with adults who care
and can make a difference.
·
Often the best strategy is to find help to get
back into your home:
·
What is needed to make that happen?
·
Who can help?
·
If there is no one to lean for support or family
cannot or will not support you, then you must work on a transition to
independence:
The Covenant house in Toronto has
an awesome directory of lots of resources if you need them, check out the link
below:
The housing Help Centers
No comments:
Post a Comment