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Story 2
Please Report the Errrors?
Hi, Debbie.
Thank you so much for agreeing to this
interview and consenting for your video to be on
as well.
Um,
if
I
so if I could ask you what are your experiences of being homeless,
Please. Right.
Um Well, I was made homeless in,
um,
a friend of mine was going through a really bad depression,
so I basically moved into her flat.
Help her look after the kids, you know, because they were really young at the time
and
lost my flat through that.
She found herself a nice little toy boy half her age
and decided to throw me out. So there I was on the streets,
Um, scared, stupid. You know,
um,
I couldn't
think of anything to do
anywhere. I didn't know where to go.
Nothing like that.
So I decided to leave Portsmouth.
Um went to the National Express bus station
and said, I'd like to get on your first bus out of here, please.
Um ended up in Shrewsbury,
and that was an experience.
The town is beautiful
old Tudor houses.
It's an amazingly beautiful place.
And I'd certainly recommend anyone to go and visit it for the day.
The people, however,
are not particularly nice.
They're, um
but their own back size is about the polite way I can put it. Really?
Um,
every every October,
there is one particular night in October when they
do a census of people that are rough sleeping.
That night, the police vans arrived.
They rounded everybody up into a van,
took us outside the town limits.
And surprisingly, there was nobody rough sleeping in Shrewsbury that night.
I fell in with, um,
a decent enough crowd.
I suppose that, you know, there was about eight of us six tents,
half a dozen dogs to look after us on a night sleeping in, um,
a clearing in the woods by a stream.
Um
really, really good.
Until the police decided to move us along again, split us all up, and I ended up with
a couple and two dogs.
Um,
and things were going fine for a week or so. And then I
They were red
one day.
I'm like you two are alright.
Oh, yeah, Yeah. Fine.
Next day, I
caught them sticking heroin in their arms. Mm.
No. I'll admit I've got my problems
with alcohol with weed,
but that is one thing I Well, I would never, ever do I would never go into cork heroin,
anything like that.
So I picked up.
I moved to
Sunny Manchester.
And to be honest, it's one of the best things I've ever done.
I found a load of friends, all of whom were drinkers and weed smokers.
Yes, but that was all we did.
That's all I ever saw them do.
Yeah. And they've become such good friends
that
a few times I thought about leaving Manchester because my problem
with just life in general,
but I couldn't do it.
I mean, there's one guy in particular Becky know him well,
and he has literally saved my life on several occasions
for the simple fact that
I thought about I thought about committing suicide. I felt like it a few times,
but I knew it would be him.
The family
and I couldn't do it. I just could not do that to him.
Um, and
now I've come through the
I have 18 months clean of everything.
Better you become
Yeah, if you become a friend
because she sat there.
But yeah,
life is so much different.
Um,
I couldn't go back to the streets. Now
I'm nearly 50
you know.
No, you don't. I don't like it either.
How long was you on the streets for?
Um,
altogether. I have been on the streets on and off for about three years. Wow.
Sofa surfing. Another
56 years
hostels, then another
on top of that. So
I would say approximately half my life, I've been classed as homeless. Wow.
And now you feel you have that stability.
Yeah,
Yeah.
I mean, I was saying to one of the others earlier,
um,
when I move on from here, I'm thinking about just
moving into somewhere simple, basic, shared house, Whatever. Until I reach the 55.
And then I get extra points
for the housing
and then find myself somewhere Really nice to settle down for my
retirement.
Oh,
that's great.
Oh, thank you so much, Debbie. I really appreciate you giving us time.
Yeah, that's great. Thank you.
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