OUR STORIES
Ledwith (2005) suggests listening respectfully to a person’s account is an act of personal empowerment, however by locating these stories within the wider structure the process of shared stories can have collective value and promote change for social justice.
Jonathan's Story
On RTE (2014) Jonathan Corrie's family said he had wanted to start a new life. Jonathan Corrie died in tragic circumstances on Monday December 1st 2014 on the streets of Dublin. The 43-year-old had been sleeping rough and died in a doorway of a building just meters from Leinster House.
​
His death has led to a public outcry about homelessness and rough sleeping but behind the headlines is the story of a man - a son, a father, a partner.
Mr Corrie had drug and alcohol addiction problems and his family and friends had tried many times over the years to help him get clean and get off the streets. Originally from Kilkenny Mr Corrie had lived in the US but he returned to Ireland eight years ago a heroin addict. He moved to Dublin in search of treatment with the aim of getting clean and starting a new life. Jonathan's former partner Catherine McNeill said that this never happened as the drugs overpowered him...
​
Elaine's Story
Focus Ireland
​
"I was in a residential home for several years when I was small,’ Elaine tells me, ‘but then I was moved to a foster home for a while before I came here.’ ‘Here’ is Chéad Chéim, the Focus Ireland house that provides supervised accommodation for young people leaving the care system. It guides and supports each individual as they make the transition to fully-independent living. Located on the North Circular Road in Dublin, Chéad Chéim offers fourteen apartments, ranging from low- to medium-support options....
​
She is in contact with her mother and her foster-mother, and is close to one of her sisters. She is grateful that she got a good education, and that she is able to continue at college. ‘Education makes all the difference,’ she says. ‘It’s really important to have one.’ She’s doing her best to save for the future, too – budgeting is one of the skills she’s learned, and she values it greatly.
But above all, she values the companionship and the support of her network of friends. ‘They’re steady and mature,’ she says, ‘they have my back. And they make me laugh. I’m very lucky. I have no fears for the future.’
​
​
Alan's Story
Focus Ireland
​
​
.... Alan remembers an orderly, disciplined family life in Britain. An ordinary life, shared with his parents and his seven siblings.....they came back to Dublin when Alan was nine.
​
After their return to Dublin, Alan remembers that his family life became completely chaotic...Alan remembers how badly he needed to escape in those days: how he used to steal his mother’s medication on a regular basis. Just a tablet or two, nothing major. But anything to bring relief....‘I was tired of the chaos, the police raids,’ he says. ‘I wanted out of the house... he remembers that moment as one of an intense awareness of himself and his future. He knew, he says, that he was poised at a significant crossroads. He had decisions to make.....
​
He contacted a social worker, who agreed that Alan was a vulnerable young teenager who couldn’t live with his family anymore.
​
The social worker found a place for him in the care of Don Bosco House: I thrived under the boundaries there. I had a regular routine, an apprenticeship. It was good.’...
​
But it was becoming increasingly difficult to keep his life on the rails.....
​
A Dublin school girl speaks about being homeless
""You feel like you have no life left’
​
Clark (2018) writes that a Dublin teenager has spoken about the struggle of being homeless while going to school and feeling that her life has been “stolen” from her.
​
The fifth year secondary student, who has spent the last two years living in hotel room with her mother, brother, and sister, said she felt she had “no life left”. “It’s really diminishing and degrading having to wake up and look at the dirt, the mould. It’s a struggle everyday getting up and even just taking the blankets off yourself every morning. It’s horrible,” she told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland.
​
“People need to know that it is deadly to live like this. You feel like you have no life left, living in here with no security, you just think ‘what’s the point?’ you really do”. The number of 18-24 year olds in emergency accommodation has increased by 8 per cent in the past year – from 811 in August 2017 to 875 last August. She said she was too afraid to tell school friends that they are homeless.....
​
​
