For over twenty years, Sheila worked at the same fast food restaurant, making salads for little more than minimum wage. After all that time, she earned just a dollar an hour more than the day she started. When a cut in her hours brought her to Crisis Assistance Ministry seeking assistance, her path began to change.
Octavia prayed she would find a way to cool her home again after a landlord failed to repair the only window unit in her 3-bedroom home.
Despite working five days a week to support herself and her two children, she didn’t have enough cash left after bills to do anything about it on her own. To top it off, the crushing heat made it harder to manage her recent Lupus diagnosis. Then, during one of the hottest weeks of the summer, the community answered her prayers.
A survivor who proudly proclaims her identity as a “person with a purpose,” Abigail arrived at Crisis Assistance Ministry in the coldest part of winter. Thanks to you, Abigail finally has a place to reclaim her purpose: not just to receive, but to give.
No amount of financial or material assistance can replace her mother. But Mandy is grateful for the generosity of people like you who stepped in to lift her up during her darkest time.
Because of you, things are looking up for Patricia and her family. “I know it will get better,” she says. “Knowing you can reach out and get the help you need, it’s just a beautiful thing. That’s all I can say. You changed my life today. Thank you.”
Angel and Tony earned trips to sleepaway camp through the Bruce Irons Camp Fund. But with their mom already struggling to make ends meet, the long supply list was a bit daunting. Fortunately, they were able to shop at the Free Store for flashlights, swimsuits, pajamas, towels, water shoes, toiletries, summer clothes, and more.
When her husband walked out on her, Patricia and her 15-year-old son Jamil were plunged into an unfamiliar world of financial distress. Fully disabled after a surgical mistake years earlier, Patricia had relied on the income from her husband’s job to pay the mortgage and other bills. Left with only her monthly Social Security disability payments, she soon found the situation unmanageable.
Between the two of them, Michael and Ronnie have survived two heart attacks, a near fatal infection, P.T.S.D., and a stroke. After all that, the two friends who met at the Men’s Shelter of Charlotte are ready to settle into “everyday life,” as Ronnie puts it, after working together for over a year to meet goals and achieve housing.
