Helping Hearts Foundation Resident Craig

 Blog, Resident Biographies  No Responses »
Feb 102012
 

Helping Heart Foundation Resident Craig from Helping Hearts Foundation on Vimeo.

Craig became a Helping Heart Foundation Resident a few years ago when he realized his options for safe, secure and affordable housing were running out. Having battled a lifelong addiction to alcohol and drugs Craig was beset upon by injuries and illnesses that made life on the street–and therefore life in and out of hospitals–an impossibility. Craig’s life is still difficult, but with the stable environment that the Helping Hearts Foundation provides he is making it one day at a time.

Helping Hearts Foundation is an IRS recognized 503(c) non-profit organization that was created to help those in need of everyday living assistance. We believe our work lies in relieving the stress of the emergency rooms, hospitals, shelters, and the working poor who, due to an unending economic downturn, can no longer properly provide for their loved ones on a fixed low income. We want to be there for those people that are misplaced or are difficult to place, people from skilled nursing and referral agencies that have a difficult combination of problems to address, and people who need a high level of care and have a low income.

Helping Hearts Foundation Resident Kurt

 Blog, Resident Biographies  No Responses »
Nov 152011
 

Helping Hearts Foundation Resident Kurt from Helping Hearts Foundation on Vimeo.

“Nothing can get me down.” Kurt always says. A professional arm-wrestler sponsored by Budweiser, this Auburn native was a peer counselor for troubled youth when a workplace accident—a mere slip on the floor—altered the course of his life. Becoming L-1 paraplegic and legally blind due to complications with aggressive Dry Macular and Retinal diseases, he also has a pacemaker, and Six Sinus Syndrome and Regional Complex Pain Syndrome. To help him contend with these seemingly overwhelming disabilities one rescue Chihuahua from Kern County named Hami and a Canine Companions-licensed service Labrador named Anika.

While attending Hadley School for the Blind he regularly lifts weights and swims at the YMCA . He also plays baseball through Sacramento Access Leisure, plays the drums, is teaching himself bass guitar, and is a balsa wood model enthusiast.

Helping Hearts Foundation is an IRS recognized 501(c)3 non-profit organization that was created to help those in need of everyday living assistance. We believe our work lies in relieving the stress of the emergency rooms, hospitals, shelters, and the working poor who, due to an unending economic downturn, can no longer properly provide for their loved ones on a fixed low income. We want to be there for those people that are misplaced or are difficult to place, people from skilled nursing and referral agencies that have a difficult combination of problems to address, and people who need a high level of care and have a low income.

Helping Hearts Rescue Brothers Brad and Tim

 Blog, Rescues  No Responses »
Oct 272011
 
Helping Hearts Foundation Resident Brad

Helping Hearts Foundation Resident Brad survived a lot more than Detox

Piled up mattresses and broken down, disused furnishings litter the walkway up to Brad and Tim’s room and board. The smell hits you before you open the door. You can’t quite say what it is, other than rot, but it’s pungent. So much so, Jimmy and Pak both need clean suits, masks and gloves before entering. Cockroaches lazily feasting upon trash, piled up for months, in the open. Toxic black mold covers the ceiling like a layer of paint. Cracked walls full of jagged breaks and holes, impassable hallways and the flooring rotting away beneath your feet have created squalid living conditions.

When Helping Hearts walked in they were two. When they walked out Helping Hearts had grown richer by two residents–Brad (pictured) & his brother Tim–who have been with the organization for more than a year now. Their previous living situation proved to be so infested with fleas, ticks, roaches, rats and other pests that none of their furniture could be moved to their new house and their clothing had to be sanitized by professionals.

Seeing good people in bad housing is a terrible thing, but all too common in situations where people in need of physical and / or psychological help have only their monthly pensions on which to depend. Veterans like Brad, who looks after Tim, do receive a bit more, but often it is still not enough to provide safe and secure shelter that is convenient to hospitals and public transportation.

Their new house is a far cry from what they had convinced themselves was normal. Now they live in relative comfort and security and are in close proximity to healthcare facilities, bus and light rail, supermarkets and shopping centers as well as parks. They have a house, but what’s more, they have a community of people that understand what they have gone through living all around them. That’s more than a house. That’s a home.

Helping Hearts Foundation Residence

Brad & Tim's Helping Hearts Foundation Residence