Dawn's Story

I had no idea how important supportive housing was until I needed it.

I was born in Kolkata, India and immigrated to Canada in 1970 when I was eleven. When I was six years my older brother abused me sexually but I never told anyone because I was so ashamed and hid it for many years. In hindsight, I think this probably contributed to my mental illness. 

We moved to Toronto from India in 1970 when I was eleven, and lived in an apartment that all seven of us shared. As you can imagine, it was very cramped, but we seemed to be a pretty happy family. Four years later we moved to a house in Brampton, where I spent my teenage years going to high school.

When I was 18 I was hit by a field hockey ball at the side of my head. I had a severe concussion, and just slept it off without going to the hospital. Ten days later I went to my first high school dance and was given a drugged coke. I immediately went for a loop and lost my mind – While I was riding my bike home in the rain, I thought God was calling me to save my family and the whole world.  I then spent three months in the hospital. When I returned to school I told a “cool” teacher that I had had a nervous breakdown and that I had been experiencing really scary visions and hallucinations. He just listened and did not provide me with the understanding or support that I’d hoped for. 

Eventually, I was hospitalized again and spent the next five years in and out of the hospital, drugged up with prescribed medications. The doctors experimented on me so much that I felt like I was a guinea pig, and I became allergic to a lot of psychiatric medications. In my early thirties I faced some terrible memories of being abused as a young child, and while I tried to discuss this with my mother, she denied it. So I ran away toEnglandwhere most of my relatives lived and where I tried to get a job as a nurse’s aid. However, that failed, so I returned toCanadaonly to find out that my older brother had just died of an asthma attack.  I decided to kill myself in the hope that my divorced parents would get back together, but that backfired.  Soon after I tried to kill myself a couple more times for different reasons, but none of them worked, thank God.

I ended up moving toToronto, where I met my future husband and became pregnant.  They say when you have been abused as a young child and never deal with it, you eventually find abusive partners until you literally break the cycle of abuse that you have suffered from. Well, that is what happened to me.

I  never dealt with my childhood sexual abuse and therefore my mental health suffered as an adult. 

In the midst of all of this, I had my daughter in the fall of 1992, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me.  But when a single mother has a mental illness and doesn’t have any outside supports, she is almost guaranteed to have her baby taken away from her. So a month and a half after Mary was born, she was taken away from me and put in foster care until Mary and I went to live with my mother-in-law.  But then my mother-in-law took my daughter away from me, saying that I was an incompetent mother. The judge ruled in her favor. Eventually, custody was split three ways between the father and grandmother and me.  For the past 13 years, Mary has lived with her paternal grandmother and has been doing very well. She is happy, has done well in school, and is a social butterfly with a good base of friends.  She just graduated from Grade 12 as an Ontario Honors Scholar and worked as an intern at “Flare” magazine this summer. As she is now taking a year off to travel and work, I am going to miss her -- and I think I feel the growing pains more than she does. But I know she needs her independence.  Mary and I are close – she has been the light of my life and the apple of my eye, and even though I wish I had lived with her, I gave her up so that she could have a better life than what I could have provided. And that makes me happy.

Upon realizing that I was in an abusive situation with Mary’s father, I applied for supportive housing. Had I not received housing from Houselink in 2004, I would have ended up in a shelter and may not have been able to further my education or gain stability and independence. But since being given a safe, secure place to stay, I have gone back to Chef School and become a relief Kitchen Facilitator, and I’ve even volunteered for the Board of Directors of Houselink.

I’ve since moved out of supportive housing and into a co-op. But I’m still a non-resident member of Houselink, which means that I still have access to my supports. I attend Social Recreation Programs and Community Kitchens, and I have made numerous friends. I can thrive not just survive. Everyone needs support whether it is from family, or friends, or people of faith, or community members, or professionals; we all like to thrive, and some people could really use supportive housing in order to do so. This is why I volunteer with the Dream Team; we need a lot more supportive housing!