Building a New Life
When Daisy moved into her Christchurch flat, she bought a few things to celebrate finally having her own safe place. She picked out some plates and cups, linen for the bed, a couple of candles … and two pot plants. Artificial pot plants.
“I didn’t get the real ones because I thought I can barely look after myself, so how can I look after a real plant, you know, watering them and stuff ...” the words come in a rush from someone not used to talking to people and she laughs nervously.
“I didn’t want it looking in my room all dead and brown.”
With our help she is working hard to build a new life of hope and happiness after finding herself alone on the street under a year ago. Daisy* is a wonderful example of how we support people to get them back on their feet and caring for themselves.
She’s a shy, careful young woman who could have easily ended up in a very bad situation on the streets, but because of our help and her willingness to turn things around, she is looking forward to her new future.
Daisy has problems with her family in another city which means there is no possibility of turning to them for help. She suffers from severe social anxiety and depression and when she reached out to us after the Covid-19 lockdown last year she was alone and had nowhere to stay that evening.
One of our social workers was assigned Daisy’s case and that night stayed in our women’s emergency accommodation. Daisy doesn’t smoke, or drink, or use drugs, but she was very withdrawn and needed our comfort and advice to get her health back and gain control of her mental illnesses.
Daisy stayed with us for two weeks. Over the next few months she tried living at other places but struggled and was back in our emergency accommodation after slipping into a bad downward spiral.
““I was not well. I was not motivated, I just stayed in bed all day and did nothing. I had depression and anxiety definitely. I was eating too much, I had nothing to do and nothing to look forward to.””
“I was not well. I was not motivated, I just stayed in bed all day and did nothing. I had depression and anxiety definitely. I was eating too much, I had nothing to do and nothing to look forward to.”
At the City Mission we believe work and activity can help people heal and when she left us for a new place to stay the second time we offered her the chance to come back and volunteer in our Thrive Op Shop, one of our social enterprises.
Daisy liked the idea and came to the shop two days a week sorting, hanging and boxing clothes.
“I enjoyed it. I felt like ‘I have something to do today, that’s cool’. Like it made me feel good. The more I did, I started feeling really good. It was like motivating myself.”
After a while we offered more days volunteering in our Foodbank to help Daisy continue to gain confidence and a sense of purpose. The volunteer work became a paid internship and this has created a new sense of pride and determination to not need benefits.
Our social worker helped her find a place in a social housing apartment where she lives with
two others.
“The City Mission helped me in so many ways,” Daisy says. “I did get a couple of food parcels from you when I was staying at the YWCA, but then I was working and making some money so started getting my own shopping.”
We helped her enrol in a course at ARA called New Outlook for Women and she is looking forward to continuing to get her confidence back and “feel good about doing things and having a proper conversation with people”.
Daisy has a safe permanent place to call her home now and wants to get a permanent job. And one day soon she’ll be getting that real pot plant.
* Name and some details changed to protect privacy.