I want to tell you a story that happened many years ago, as recently as today and will happen again tomorrow. It is a story about a deceptively familiar place where securing the basic necessities of life, health care, housing, transportation and communication, requires persistence to overcome one obstacle after another. I call this place “The Parallel Universe.”
Nine years ago, I began serving as a volunteer hostess at Hope House: A Shelter for Women and Children in Wilmington. Our guests are women of all ages who are living on the street for a variety of reasons. There are as many stories as there are individual women each with her own hopes and dreams, times of joy and tragedy.
Our story begins on a bright September morning when I agreed to take Trila* to her hearing aid appointment. I drove 38 miles to the audiologist’s office and told the nurse why we were there. She disappeared, returned, and sliding the glass panel back open, said gently, “I’m sorry, but because her Medicaid supplement won’t reimburse us, we cannot examine her.”
Trila’s disappointment was heartbreaking. The only solution was to make the 198-mile round trip to Cincinnati to the closest audiologist who would take her insurance. Two months and three visits later, Trila sat in the passenger seat of my car clutching the sturdy little storage case designed to keep her brand-new hearing aids safe and sound.
“Now,” she said beaming from ear to ear, “you don’t have to yell no more cause I can hear you!”
That experience introduced me to the world where women who qualify for transition housing are living on the street and sleeping at Hope House as they wait for a unit to become available. Then one day it happens: an apartment opens up bringing with it an assortment of new challenges. Trila and I as her companion have entered The Parallel Universe where we will spend entire days seeking ways around the innumerable obstacles which threaten her ability to remain in a home of her own.
The moment I decided a 198-mile trip was the only way around the insurance obstacle, I stepped into The Parallel Universe totally unaware of and ill prepared for the challenges my friends were facing. I invite you to join me in upcoming columns so together we can experience The Parallel Universe in which hundreds of thousands of Americans live.
* To protect their identity, Trila is a composite of these women. All the stories are true and describe my experience as companion in each case.
Patricia Thomas has volunteered as a Lead Hostess at Hope House for nine years. Currently she is experiencing firsthand the numerous obstacles the homeless encounter as they attempt to get off the street.
