NEWS & STORIES

Help us raise funds for a life changing project, that will transform the lives of 16 women who have experienced the trauma of rough sleeping.

STORIES

Words taken from women experiencing homelessness on the streets of Central London, October 2020

Home for me is a place of warmth, love and somewhere to get your head down at night.

Home means dignity, somewhere you can feel safe, have a shower, take off your clothes and wash them, and not have to sleep in them at night. On the street you can't do that. You can't wash for days. Home is being able to wake up and know you've got your own front door, and your own dignity and feel safer, and it's nice.

Home means you can close the door behind you, you don't have to be afraid of going back on the street. Security. If you have a nice dry bed and a safe home, that's what it means. Being able to sit around a table and drink a cup of tea and have a chat with people who have been where you have been and understand you.

Give a person with a flat and a television. You are better off in prison. It's being lonely and being left with your own head, thoughts. I'd sooner be locked up or here in this doorway.

A roof over my head where I can call my own. I'd be as happy as Larry. Someone who can say "Yeh, we can help this person". Going through that front door, put the kettle on, put the radio on and relax. Not worry about the next meal, or what's going to happen next.

Security. Just routine and normality. Just feeling human because out here you don't feel human. I feel like an animal sometimes, the way you get treated. Stigma is what you feel. I am homeless and I am not an addict, or an alcoholic, just genuinely on hard times, suffering in my mental health. Security, consistency. That's what home means to me.

Home is security, a roof, the basis of feeling human, and getting on with your life.