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Families In Transition Offers A Path To Stability

Courtesy Rachel justmakeit via Flickr/Creative Commons

Families in Transition provides safe, affordable housing and support services to families and individuals who are homeless or at risk of homelessness. The goal is to help people achieve self-sufficiency. Rebecca moved into Families in Transition housing when her youngest daughter was two months old.
“My life at that point was chaotic to say the least. I had a drug addiction, I was on probation for an arrest for a minor possession charge.” Rebecca was also homeless, which meant her children could not live with her. “so they never knew when they would see me. I didn’t know where I was going to go. I didn’t know what I was going to do, where I would be laying my head at night.”

 
Rebecca enrolled in a recovery program, but combatting addiction without a home makes a very challenging process even more difficult, “if you have housing and you know every night you have a place to lay your head you can completely focus on recovery.”

 
She filing an application for temporary housing while in recovery, and was awarded one of the programs units. “The first day I went to the building I was going to live in, I signed this paper and I was given the keys. We opened the door and I just started to cry. I didn’t know what it was like to have my name on a mailbox or a piece of paper that I was responsible for.”

 
Finding shelter was just the beginning of Rebecca’s experience with FIT. She was assigned a case manager, treatment coordinator, and therapist who formed a team that helped her learn how to operate in the community. She also took advantage of the childcare program and family support services, which included things like monthly dinners and activities for the children. 

 
“From that moment on I made a promise to myself and to my children,” says Rebecca. “I was going to do the best I could with the resources given to me and change for the better and I haven’t looked back since.”

 
“Today my life is vastly different,” she says. Rebecca has moved out of the transitional housing and now rents a house in Manchester with her family. “I work full time as a case manager and admissions coordinator, and am heading to UNH for the master program in social work. I’m just extremely happy in my life and it’s all because I was given a chance at stability.”
 

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