Tressa W. - A Powerful Story
Tressa W. is a 60-year-old woman currently experiencing homelessness. She had a very good life growing up, as she lived with both of her parents & her siblings in a nice home. She went to school regularly for the entirety of her childhood and shared that “there is nothing bad about my childhood that I could say.” After high school, Tressa went to college & then went to a broadcasting school at NBC Studios. Throughout her life, she also worked in construction, was a medical administrative assistant, and worked as a caregiver from 40-56. Tressa is also a mother of 6 and a grandmother of 7! She raised all of her children prior to her experience with homelessness.
Tressa began experiencing homelessness in March of 2017. In 2016, she was renting an apartment and the landlord consistently sexually harassed her. Because she was not "going along with what he was saying," the landlord tried to evict her. Even though Tressa won the eviction case in court, she decided that she still needed to leave because she could not live with the harassment any longer. In 2017, she moved from LA County into Orange County, as one of her friends was already experiencing homelessness & told her to come & be with her. While she was in Orange County, she tried to stay in a Courtyard Marriot, but when that was shut down, she began to live on the street & tried to sleep in different cars. She said that nothing bad ever happened while she was living on the street, but that she got back into drugs. She expressed that she had struggled on and off with drugs for a long time, but that for the majority of it, she was living in a home, and that, this time, she had fallen into it harder than ever before. She was also diagnosed with cancer & paranoid schizophrenia in 2017. In 2018, she underwent surgery & has been cancer free since then! She has also consistently seen therapists & psychiatrists for her schizophrenia. She has been medicated for a while & now says that she does not have to struggle with hearing voices anymore and that she is "becoming a whole person again." Tressa's advice for anyone experiencing homelessness with a medical condition is to "see a doctor and get medication," so that the medication can help, just like it helped her! She shared that experiencing homelessness was one of the most miserable times in her life, but also one of the best times in her life because she gained so much insight & experience through it. She said that "the experience I've gained through being homeless is wonderful. It propelled me to do better, to get off drugs, to become a caring grandparent, and to be there for my children.
Continue reading Arielle Zappia's full article on Project Why's website