Menu
From healthy and happy to homeless and hungry
Lisa and Jason had all the makings of living the American Dream. They had the cars, a motorcycle, a home they were in the process of renovating and a great income that provided the luxuries to which they had grown accustomed. They had all the middle-class comforts made possible through good jobs and hard work, but a series of events spiraled them out of control and led them to a life they never believed they would be living.
They are a personable couple. Well-spoken and a little shy at first, the pair becomes emotional as they reflect on where they have been over the last 19 months and the experiences that led them to Nevada, the place they now believe they were meant to find.
“I had been at my job as manager for a tech support center in another state for a long time,” Lisa explained. “Our office was the highest level of tech support available in that field and I had worked my way up from the bottom. I went from opening boxes to managing the entire desk. The money was good. Life was good.”
Lisa had started feeling a little “off,” but put it off to stress. She and Jason had recently become engaged, they were purchasing a home to renovate and her job came with its own stress.
Shortly after the couple married, Lisa’s health took a surprising downturn. “My health just crashed. I couldn’t take care of my special needs granddaughter. We had just taken custody of two of our grandchildren. I could no longer care for them. I couldn’t even care for myself.”
Lisa had developed eight brain lesions and was diagnosed as having multiple sclerosis. “It was scary. I would wake up and be unable to see anything. I couldn’t feel my hands. My legs went numb. I was severely nauseated and the room wouldn’t quit spinning.” The illness was so severe that Lisa decided to go on medical leave. “I had to let my daughter go finish her senior year with her dad and my grandchildren had to go stay with my mom.”
Lisa went on medical leave and filed for short-term disability during that time, which she never received. Unfortunately, the company had recently come under new management. Since her doctor’s release was for only half-time work and she was unable to obtain a second leave request approval for the other half, “I received an email saying my employment had been terminated, and consequently, my health insurance was gone as well.”
Lisa had gone without income for seven weeks. Jason had to reduce his own work hours to care for his new wife. Medical bills and medication devoured the bulk of their income, which was by this time reduced to the money they received from selling their vehicles, one each month, to meet their basic needs. “We were making really good money – we were secure in our jobs. I had been at the same job for a third of my life. Between us we had a six figure income. We were living the American Dream. Now it was gone.”
Finally evicted from their residence because they were unable to meet their payments, Lisa and Jason loaded a backpack with clothes and left their old life behind. They had initially saved one car, but lost it in an accident, so the couple traveled on foot.
For four months they went back and forth between family and friends. “We also slept in parks. We eventually found work and Jason’s dad offered to let us stay with him at his place near K.C., even though his community is very strict on long-term guests. We weren’t really supposed to be there and we didn’t want to risk getting him into hot water, so after about five days we decided to leave. He gave us an older vehicle and we stayed in that.” It was now November.
While they were living in the vehicle, Jason continued to work and Lisa had become ill again. He decided he couldn’t leave his wife in a car alone, unable to fend for herself, while he was out working. Jason took a couple of days off and was then let go since he was still in his probationary period.
“We were living in the back of a little Jimmy SUV,” Jason said. “We had a mattress and were able to come up with a blanket. It leaked oil like crazy, the transmission was failing and it guzzled the gas. We couldn’t leave it idling to warm up, but we were grateful we had it. It was a cold November!”
The couple decided to take their chances and travel to Joplin. They had been told there were good resources for help there. To their surprise though, they found they went to the bottom of the list since they weren’t addicts or alcoholics. “It turned out that addicts and alcoholics come first for shelter, and they should. They did help us, too. We ate there every night and it was good to have a meal each day. We were so grateful for that assistance.”
On Thanksgiving Day, Lisa was admitted to the hospital for six days. During that time, the couple decided to head back to K.C. By their calculations, they had just enough gas to get there “We decided there were better opportunities for help and work in the city,” Jason said softly. “We started running out of gas at the Nevada exit and made it the Walmart parking lot. We didn’t know it at the time, but the transmission wasn’t going into overdrive, causing it to just suck the gas right out of the tank.”
“We stayed for like three days in the Walmart parking lot,” he continued. “We found the Community Kitchen where they let us eat each day and we met someone there who told us the Sheriff’s Department would give us gas money to leave since we weren’t from here. So we called them and sure enough, they gave us a $25 gas voucher. We got gas and guess what? The vehicle wouldn’t move. The transmission was shot.”
Lisa and Jason spent their nights in the Walmart parking lot tucked inside their broken down vehicle in record low temperatures. Tears welled up in Lisa’s eyes as she recalled the freezing temperatures, scraping up change for noodles, and the fear of having a full bladder. “We even swallowed our pride and applied for food stamps. We were literally counting change to buy noodles for dinner. I remember one night Jason said, ‘No, go ahead. Go ahead and eat those. We’ll save mine for tomorrow just in case we can’t find change to buy more.’”
“I remember scraping ice off the inside of our windows it was so cold. It was the coldest day of the year, like six degrees. I remember being in the car in that parking lot dreading having a full bladder. It was so painful. We just held it as long as we could because we had to get out and go to the store to use the restroom.”
Once the cold snap passed, they were able to get themselves out of the shock of their current situation and started calling around to try to find help. That’s how they ended up meeting Carol Branham. They say she was a life saver and helped them devise a plan. “She told us, ‘First we get to A; then we get to B and so on. She connected us with Pastor Chris, who was also a life saver.”
Through a local network, the couple was able to have four nights of shelter in a local motel until they were able to secure housing at Chapman Estates. “We got to take a shower,” Lisa smiled. “I soaked in a hot bathtub because I was so, so cold. Pastor Chris and his wife brought us home-cooked meals and cookies. Boy, did we eat some cookies!”
Finally, with a roof over their heads again, the couple ventured out to the Career Center to search for jobs. It was there Lisa saw a poster about a program called SkillUP. They explained that SkillUP offers free college tuition and services to people who receive food stamps.
“It seemed like the purpose was to get people off food stamps and get them retrained in a different field,” Lisa said with a smile. “After we discussed the possibilities, we decided to apply. We wanted to do something to earn a living again.” Since Jason had previously held his CDL, the couple decided they would see if that was something they could both do. It was important to them that they stay together.
The pair leaves for school in early February and are planning to drive as a team once they complete their training. “Typing is really hard for me because I can’t feel the keys, but I can drive because I have feeling in my palms,” Lisa beamed. “I have since been able to get my medication so I am doing much better. We have been trying to find work around here. I love the community, but there really aren’t that many jobs here. We are going to be truckers!”
Jason reflected on the kindness that met them in Nevada. “We have met some great people here. Pastor Chris and the Ministerial Alliance helped so much. Carol Branham helped so much. Pastor Chris managed a motel room for four days and he and his wife brought me new pants. They brought us home-cooked meals. Carol. Steve and Jeremy from Lifewalk are also awesome. We have been trying to help them out working at their new duplex to try to give back. They have given us bikes so we can get around. When a bike broke down, Chris brought another. We have been meeting so many good people here.”
Lisa’s teared up again as she explains how their experience of homelessness has affected her. “I am thankful. This has made us stronger. I’m thankful for everyone who has come into our lives. I’m thankful that we had these hardships, because had we not…I don’t know. I’ve seen another side of life that I think maybe we were shielded from.”
“I look back now and it’s like wow, I used to go to Starbuck’s twice a day. I used to spend $13 a day on Starbuck’s and didn’t think another thing about it. But at the same time, I was a very giving person and I think I was losing sight of that because I was so focused on happenings at work and in my own life.”
“Now we have been on the bottom. I’m so grateful for all those obstacles, I mean we’ve lost a lot of stuff, there have been hard feelings and it’s been tough, but at the same time, I have regained so much. We have met such wonderful people here and we are much stronger for it – as individuals and as a couple.”