New ask Hacker News story: Ask HN: How did you escape homelessness?

Ask HN: How did you escape homelessness?
19 by clubm8 | 29 comments on Hacker News.
I have multiple degrees, I don't use hard drugs. I lost my job during COVID. My family pulled all support, leading me to be evicted due to nonpayment of rent. Flash forward, the folks I got tenure, internships, and jobs have not connected me with work. I lowered my standards and applied to things like dishwasher with no luck. I feel harassed, and exhausted my savings on a Bellingcat certification and verifying my eligibility for Italian citienship. Is that what I should do... emigrate back where I came from? I'm currently in a hotel that lacks basic anemities like a functioning shower, paid monthly by family who demand I "get a job" but don't help in that matter... when the medical advice I was given was to cut ties. This is complicated by things like being an activist but... I was a feminist. I was a hacker. I was kind to people. My heart is broken, and not in a romantic way -- they took advantage of me, always one offer at a time, forcing me back to have guns pointed at me and abuse hurled. Anyways, how did you escape this? Are there specific nonprofits in states other than PA? Did you speak to an embassy? How do I avoid a situation where I get as upset as I am right now and do something extreme? Everyone I met in this predicament, it was due to severe mental illness (like, schitzophrenia, etc) or a severe substance abuse issue. I took years off from drinking, and am perfectly capable of having just one Guiness socially. I struglle, some days, to contain my anxiety, because I'm literally homeless and I am that way because I wouldn't tolerate bad behaviors -- we removed some politicans, arrested others. It feels like I'm nudged down a dark path, and I wanted to ask for help -- someone posted a link ages ago for jobs for people with depression... They told me in grad school you're not depressed per se... you have C-PTSD... a series of events. I'm capable of controlling it, but... it requires not being reliant on handouts, or I have to make bad decisions like "eat a big breakfast of meats I found in a charity fridge, let my blood sugar drop having too much caffeine so I can wait til dinnertime to eat again because I can't afford to buy food in the place that's nice enough to give me hot water if I sit in the corner" Are folks willing to help? Or am I just a signal in the noise to be discarded when I'm no longer useful? I've never killed or raped anyone. I'm not a monster. Why won't anyone help me?

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