Client Stories

Debbie’s Story in Her Own Words

I grew up in Berkeley – my mother was a single parent with three kids. When I became a single mom, my income was $535 per month with a monthly rent payment of $435.

I stayed at Mission SOLANO off and on for five years. They would ask me to leave because I wasn’t working and I was using. I relocated to Napa around the same time another Mission guest named Debra passed away. They all thought I had died.

I went to the homeless veterans’ Stand Down event in Dixon last Fall. I saw Ernie and he came up to me, looking kind of funny. I told him, “you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Ernie said to me “I have! I’m here looking at you! I thought you were dead.”

The other Debbie died with a needle in her arm. When I found out about her I was three weeks clean and I thought, “It could have been me, but I’m alive. I’m going to go back to the Mission and get some help.”

I didn’t know these people loved me so much. I felt really bad about the other Debra, but amidst all the mourning, I felt community and I felt loved.

Insert Barbara’s quote: “It was around this time last year. We found out that Debbie had not died like we had heard and when we saw her it was a tremendous relief. She came back a new person, ready for a new life.”

The staff at Mission SOLANO’s Bridge to Life Center have encouraged me to enroll in college. I started attending college in August. I haven’t had a bank account in 15 years and for five years I’ve lived on next to nothing – but now I have a bank account!

I look forward to working at a full-time job, having responsibilities. I just want a real life. I want to be cooking Thanksgiving dinner, watching movies with my kids, washing the car, taking care of the dog, doing what normal people do.

The Mission helped me feed my children before I became homeless and because of these programs, my life has been changed. I can see that this will work out. I’ve helped other people and now they believe they can do it too.

Little did I know I’d become so enmeshed in this community and that God would give me a heart for other people who need a hand up.