Physical Abuse: most kids are fleeing domestic violence.  Hard as street life is, it’s viewed as better than ‘home’.

Substance Abuse: if it hasn’t already started, it comes into the picture big time when the kids hit the streets.  It begins as self-medication to try to deal with pain of whatever they are facing. Then it turns into a physiological thing and then the kids need to maintain so as not to go into withdrawal.

All alone:  Even though they hang out in larger groups for safety, each of these ‘tough kids’ is just a kid, like the kid across the street from you, who has HAD to put on an image in order to survive. It is a mask, necessary for survival. No support, no one to help, none.  None.

Violence: is a part of it all, along with ‘survival tactics’ that are less than pretty: prostitution, drug use with needles and prescriptions and whatever else comes to hand, even running drugs for the ‘boss’ man.

We deal with these issues, portrayed through kids who mostly never had a fair chance because of their background.  So we love on them, encourage them in the smallest things you can imagine, build self-esteem whenever we can, and really, just try to hang on to them.

Statistics report that there are a few levels of socio-economic backgrounds of kids on the streets, but guess what?  The pimps, dealers and other exploiters, really do NOT care.  They see a source of income, a piece of meat to ‘sell’, a means to their own selfish ends.

They come to us.  They come every week.  They have no other place to go that is positive, encouraging and supportive.

Yea, it’s hard work, and it really hurts sometimes, but we believe in these kids with all of our hearts.

“I don’t like to look too far into the future, it’s overwhelming and you don’t really know what the future holds.  If I think about the future, I start to think, ‘I can’t do it’ and stuff like that.

Right now I just have small goals.  Like I am looking forward to the training to do street outreach, and start with that.  I want to help people, people that are like, in my position, and do what I can to really help in the outreach program. (Rachel  has joined our Urban Intervention Training and is preparing to do street outreach to people experiencing poverty and homelessness in Ottawa).

I’m praying a lot about what I am being called to.  I do my devotions every day, and read my bible every day.  I try to think about what God or Jesus would do and learn as much as I can.  I’m a new Christian I guess, and I want to help people.

A lot of my friends ask me ‘How did you do it? How did you do it?’ and I tell them, ‘It’s Jesus and the methadone program. I say both  ‘cause if you just say Jesus, they’ll say, like ‘Yah.  OK. Whatever,’ and not listen.  But it’s more than the methadone program.  I try to help them understand the change in my life.  We talk about the methadone, and then somehow they always end up asking about Jesus.  It’s true.  If I didn’t have Jesus, and if I didn’t have a relationship with him, I don’t think I would be clean.  He just led me to the right places.

The fact that He came to the earth, died on the cross, that He died for me, that’s what it’s all about.  That’s what Christmas is all about.  Because of what He has done for me, the least thing I could do is to live for Him. I just keep seeing things in my life that He keeps doing for me, and prayers that have been answered.  I used to be, ‘Yeah, God and all that,’ but now there’s just too much that He’s done for me, I just can’t deny it now.  There’s just too much God in my life to deny it now.”

In our Final Episode:  Listen as Rachel herself recounts her story about the Gift this Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at 8 and 5. 

THEN, starting Wednesday, return to our website to see Rachel make a video appearance and share a brief testimony of her life.  It’s a Miracle!  It’s a Gift to us all!  Merry Christmas!

This time when I got out of jail I couldn’t go to Ottawa – I was banned from Ottawa.  You know, I wasn’t supposed to be in Ottawa, but I didn’t have anywhere else to go. So, I got caught in Ottawa in a rooming house because I was taking a shower there and was arrested for a breach of probation.  I went back to jail for one month and then they released me in Ottawa (laughter).  I couldn’t go to my mom’s house because her husband at the time was totally against me living there.  I could see why.

I got out of jail and started doing the same things that I usually do.  I was staying in a heated stairwell at Nepean and Bank – it was public property so they couldn’t arrest you, just tell you to get along.  When you are in drugs, people only want you at your house when you had something for them, they say, ‘I would never see you out on the street.’ But when you were in need and you didn’t have any drugs, they would say, like, ‘We can’t have people staying at our house’.

There are some places to stay when you live on the streets, but you have to be careful.  Staying in a shelter was much worse – in my eyes it was like the bottom… as long as I don’t have to go to a shelter, I hadn’t hit rock bottom.

I didn’t have a place anymore, and I found a website where you could and used that to meet guys for a date…  So, I stayed on the streets or maybe in hotels sometimes.  I don’t know, it just became a way of life, survival.

I basically sick and tired of doing drugs, like heroin… I just couldn’t do it anymore.

I ended up in a crack house downtown: people coming and going all the time; drugs in and out like crazy, and I was still using.  I had started the methadone program, but was still using street drugs.  Anytime I used anything other than opiates, it screwed up my methadone and I would get even sicker. 

I guess I just hit rock bottom then.  Doing things I would never do and being somebody that I totally never was.  People totally lost respect for me.  I would overhear people talking about me, and think, ‘Is that what they really think about me?’

I just took a look around one day. I was introduced to Jesus a few years ago.  When I was in jail I accepted Jesus but I was doing my own thing.  Then one day, looked around and said, “Oh God, I know that this is not what you have planned for me, I just know it isn’t.”

I walked out of that place and got a place with some girls, and it was a safe place.

Next Week:    The story takes a significant turn for the better.  Stay connected, you don’t want to miss this!

So I was at a party and I saw my mom doing a line of coke and I was shocked.   “Wuh?  What are you doing?” and lost my mind and I started to party real hard.  I was confused and concerned and kinda wondering all at the same time.

 I really started to think.  My mom was using a lot, and using more and drinking and using coke and I was wondering why this was so much better than your children, than loving your children – using coke that is.

 I love my mom a lot, and I still do.  Whatever it was about coke, it must be good. That’s what my thinking was.  I did my first line of coke shortly after that.  I was seventeen.

 I had been living on my own, but one of the things that happened when I discovered coke was, I couldn’t pay my rent anymore.  I moved in with my boyfriend and his mom.  I worked a couple of places, but I was always going in hung over.  I had to get out of that small town.

 I moved to Ottawa and I moved in with my dad. I had nowhere else to go.  I ended up meeting this guy that my dad introduced me to, which ended up being his crack dealer, and I started dating him. My Dad was doing a lot of crack then and I ended up paying the rent – or trying at least.  I was working a bit, but I was partying hard at the same time.  I don’t know why, but my dad really got mad at me.  I mean, he was using all the time then, not working, making deals, and I guess he looked at me and couldn’t stand to see me doing what I was doing – with the drugs and all that.

 I lasted three months and then got my eviction notice – signed by the mayor. They (the authorities) basically brought boxes, packed my stuff and moved me out.  My brother was in jail, but his girlfriend had an extra room and I moved in with her.

By this time I was selling drugs big time with the guy that I met through my dad.  Every day was the same – using more and more, all the time.  I got busted and went to jail for a while.

  When I got out of jail I had nowhere to go, I was just like floating around.

 Next week:  Rachel really does ‘hit the bottom’.  More drugs, living on the streets, the crack house… the cycle continues with no apparent escape.  What will happen next?

OIM does not receive on-going government funding to operate any of our programs, but instead we rely on the good will donations of concerned citizens and business owners in the National Capital Region.  We need your help to continue our youth outreach program.  Please make a donation today. Click “Donate” at the top of this page.  Thanks!

“We moved a lot, especially from the time I was nine until sixteen.  I counted, and we moved thirty-eight times in those seven years.  Just one step ahead of eviction some of the times, mostly we got the eviction itself.  It was hard to live like that. 

I didn’t do well at school.  Even though we moved, there always was a party at our house.  And drugs.  Lots of drugs.  Drug dealers, users and all kinds.  Cocaine, heroin and mixtures of drugs I didn’t even know.

I know I missed a lot of school, ‘cause my mom was always hung over.  We moved a lot and with the partying, we never seemed to have any money.  I used to always wonder why we were always broke, and didn’t really find out until later in life.  The pattern was always the same: somehow scratch up the first and last month’s rent, take one month for the eviction to take place and we were on the move again. 

I left school when I was sixteen, no actually before that, ‘cause I never really went to high school it was just the way it was.  There was a guy that lived with us, tried to raise us or whatever – he used to beat my mom up a lot.  We ended going out to Calgary, but the pattern kept with us – we were only there for three months.  Life at home was pretty hard, but I made it through.  Whatever. 

When my mom went back to Ontario for grandma’s birthday, she met someone new and decided on the spot to marry him. 

I was 15 at the time.  We moved back east, and into this guy’s house.  It wasn’t long before I was kicked out of the house.  I can’t really remember where I stayed then, when I first got kicked out.  I eventually moved back in with them – it was a disaster.  There was more partying and the guy ended up cheating on my mom.  The guy was charged with assault and he had to leave.  More partying and then more – it got to a point where I couldn’t handle It anymore.  I had a boyfriend at the time, so I moved out.”

Next Week: The first time I used Crack Cocaine, evicted again, dealing drugs and then jail.

Kids on the street, for example, might find themselves there for many reasons.  A seasoned leader of a youth street outreach agency told me this:  on average 1/3 of the kids come from broken and disfunctional homes; another 1/3 come from regular homes; and about 1/3 come from homes where the kids have everything they need.  But on the street there is a very level playing ground. 

Pimps, drug dealers, con artists, pedophiles and other exploiters really do not care where the kids come from!  They are quick to befriend, deceive, and use for their own purposes.

We are there on the streets.  We meet the kids where they are and offer support, help and friendship.  Sometimes it’s a small beginning, but it’s something to build on.  We look for the strengths that the kids have, but maybe do not even recognize themselves.  It is one of the hardest things we have done, and at the same time, brings a satisfaction and a sense of thankfulness when we see the kids make positive life choices.

Thanks for your support!

Our family tradition is to have Thanksgiving at a ‘hunt camp’ on a private pristine lake in Quebec.  Somewhat ‘rustic’ but worth the cost by anyone’s standards!  Imagine with me for a moment: no sounds except the wind in the pines, the call of the loon and the calm of the lake mirroring the emblazoned hues of the maples of the mountain.  Truly amazing.

Seventeen people for an overnight at a camp that comfortable sleeps 14 – so we brought our tent trailer and set it up.  I left the bonfire a little earlier than the others and snuggled down under four layers of bedding: a blanket, a quilt, a wool ‘Kenwood’ blanket, and a down sleeping bag over top.

It wasn’t really even cold, relatively speaking, certainly not below nine or ten degrees, but I was uncomfortably cold.  It just didn’t work for me, and I spent some time thinking about the cold and my plight.  One consolation: the dawn was comin’.

I thought about my friends who sleep outside, not only at Thanksgiving time, but in the midst of the coldest blasts of winter.  If I was cold  under the protection of the tent trailer and with several layers of dry bedding in tepid temperatures - I just could not imagine what it is to sleep outside with maybe a sleeping bag.

What if we didn’t have any choices about where we would sleep – for whatever reason?  What if we had to ‘make do’ alone in the elements?  What would that be like?

Here’s an experiment: take some time outside with clothing appropriate to our current weather, and force yourself to stay outside on the deck or back yard for two or three hours.  You can’t go inside to get warm, can’t have coffee or hot chocolate on hand, and you can’t add any more clothing as the time goes on. 

Then think: people on the street can’t go inside when they’ve ‘reached the limit’.

Mich came home to their small apartment and saw his mom lying on the kitchen floor – her third suicide attempt!  He called 911 immediately and after the paramedics came, they told him that if he called just 5 minutes earlier, his mom would not be here.  The next time he came to the art program, he asked if he could speak with our youth outreach worker in the hallway for a few minutes. 

When they were alone, he said, “We’ve been talking about spiritual stuff for a while now.  I’m ready.  I need to have Jesus in my life.”  Mich prayed and so began his spiritual journey with Jesus.

Fast track a few weeks later and Candace asks to speak with me at the drop in.  In the adjoining garden we take a bench and she tells me about some of the things happending in her life and she asks for some advice.  She is scared and doesn’t know what to do.  We talk and conversation comes around to the change in life that Jesus can bring.  Mich joins us and the conversation about spiritual things continues.

“Did I tell you what happened a few weeks ago at the art program?” Mich queried.  I nodded yes.  “How’s it going with you?” I ask.

“I don’t really understand it all – but I sleep each night with my bible right beside me in bed.”

“You know, we have a great program just about to start here at the drop in – it’s called Alpha.  There is a video each week, you ask questions and we talk about the Bible.  Would you guys like to attend?” 

To make a long story short, both Mich and Candace have indicated interest in our Alpha course.  Until then we will work with both mother and son, to help them in their spiritual journeys.

God can take the very worst of situations and turn things around to make good.  If we can be there to be a part of what He is doing, it is a privelege and blessing!

I just started back to school – well adult high school to make up two classes, and then college.”

The next week we met them on outreach again, and first saw Bess panhandling with a sign that said, “Need $ for a ticket to Owen Sound”. A quick glance around saw Ken across the street keeping an eye on her. We sat and chatted. The sleeping bags were working out great, they were both doing well and did not need any outreach items. We said goodbye and then went across the street and chatted with Ken. He mentioned that they were still having trouble finding a place because rent was much more expensive than they had anticipated. He told us that Bess had been pan handling with a sign asking for money for first and last month’s rent, but that it had not made very much money. He said that he was feeling guilty about the new sign because it is dishonest, but that it is making them much more money. We told him that the important thing was that the money was going to be spent on something positive, like an apartment. After a brief conversation we offered outreach items and then said goodbye.

We were well on our way back to the OIM office about ten minutes later when I heard someone calling for us. It was Bess and Ken.  They were running to catch up with us. Bess handed me something and asked me to return it to Karen, one of our outreach workers. Opening the envelope we saw five twenty dollar bills. Bess explained that she had met Karen the night before on outreach. Karen returned the next day and gave Bess the money and a sandwich.  Bess and Ken were feeling very guilty that Karen had given the money thinking that it was going towards a ticket to Owen Sound. Ken added that he felt that Karen might  get discouraged if she found out that they had been lying on their sign.

We were speechless!  We promised that we would return the money to Karen so that she could decide what to do with it. They seemed relieved. My fellow outreach worker told them “God will bless you for your honesty”. Ken replied “We already feel so blessed. He’s already blessed us so much.”

Bringing you up to date:  Bess and Ken have become our friends.  They have entrusted us with $1,000 to hold for them so they can pay their first and last month’s rent.  Last Friday, September 16^th, they got their place!!  Now that they are set up, Ken is actively looking for work, and Bess is planning to finish her high school. She is sixteen.