Housing Helps
Our first success story is about a woman who lived at our group home "Fellowship House". She has a history of substance abuse, major mental illness, a history of getting into significant confrontations with police and other authority figures hurting herself and others in the process and being hospitalized and/or jailed as a result. As a younger woman, she was often homeless or at risk of being so, and often didn't know where her next meal was coming from. Since living in "Fellowship House", she is clean and sober, has learned how to manage her mental illness, is working out and managing her physical well-being, which includes diabetes, a side effect of some of the psychiatric medications often used. She now says eloquently that one thing she had very much learned while living at "Fellowship House" is how to control her anger and communicate her feelings constructively.
She has recently moved from the 24-hour staffed house to an independent apartment through Fellowship with her longtime partner. Now she and her man friend enjoy living on their own with some support from both Fellowship and Riverbend, hosting family, grandchildren, and great grandchildren who come to visit with no hospitalizations for years.
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