janet's story
Janet was only 15 when she began seeing her boyfriend. He was her first real boyfriend and she thought he’d be her true love.
She’d had a less than stellar childhood, never getting along with either of her parents very well. She left home shortly after meeting him. She felt protected by him. He would call her all the time on her cell phone and always wanted to know where she was and who she was with. Compared with her parents, whom she felt really didn’t care what she did, his interest in every aspect of her life made her feel special. They moved in together right away. “I thought he was the best thing that ever happened to me. But then things got bad.
“It felt like my life was ripped and broken but now it’s getting fixed.”He would call me names like "slut", "whore", "bitch" and just laugh. Later he started to hit me. He would follow me around and question people about my whereabouts even though I told him I was at school. He told me there was no life outside of him. After living with him for a while I tried to move away and went to stay at a girlfriend’s house. But that was no help. He found me anyway. He promised things would be better and for a while they were. He bought me a necklace. So I went back with him.
Then things started to get bad again. Really bad. A couple of times I tried to call the police. But they came to the apartment and he’d say I was hitting him. The police would believe him. The police would ask me to leave the apartment for the night and cool off. They once threatened to arrest me if it happened again. I had no where to go. I even slept in the bus shelter outside of our building to avoid him but that only made him angrier with me.
For the last 6 months we lived together he pressured me to have sex with other people in exchange for drugs and other stuff. Eventually he began to accuse me of liking his friends better. One night he beat me so badly I could barely walk. I called the police. When they came I was really scared. I didn’t think they would believe me because of what had happened in the past. But they arrested him and I went to YWCA’s 1st Stop Woodlawn, where a counsellor helped me find another place to live. I was at Woodlawn for four months before I got subsidized housing on the special priority wait list.
When I accepted the housing offer I was really happy, but I didn’t know where I was going to get money to help buy furniture. I left all of my belongings with him except the small things I could carry and really needed. Then my counsellor told me about the YWCA December 6 Fund and I was given a loan for furniture. I was so happy because I knew that was the missing piece to my starting my new life. It is great to have an apartment, but if there’s nothing it, it’s a reminder of all of the things I left behind. Now I only need to look forward.
YWCA’s 1st Stop Woodlawn is a comprehensive shelter, offering transitional and permanent housing programs with specialized services for young women. Situated in a safe, quiet, residential area, 1st Stop Woodlawn is ideal for women in changing situations. Under one roof, we provide specialized shelter and services for young women, 16-25, as well as emergency shelter for mature women of all ages. We also provide second stage housing for women who require additional support in times of transition in their lives, and long term accommodation is available for women seeking the stability of a room of their own.
Our residents are as young as 16 years old and come from all over the world. Immigrant women, women of colour, lesbians and transgendered women all stay with us. We know that anyone can become homeless, no matter who you are or where you’re from, and you are always welcome in our diverse community.
