Rex Hohlbein 0:02

This podcast contains potentially sensitive topics including strong language, drug abuse, and other conditions of human suffering. Listener discretion is advised. I'm Rex Holbein and welcome to you Nomi. Now, a podcast conversation that strives to amplify the unheard voices in our community. I want to remind all of our listeners that the folks who share here, do so with a great deal of vulnerability and courage. They share a common hope that by giving all of us a window into their world, there'll be opening for us an increased level of awareness, understanding and connection within our community. In that most of us don't have first hand experiences with homelessness, our knowledge is limited. What we read or hear in the news, or as is described by the negative stereotype often is what forms our only view on the issue. To address homelessness, we must know that the solutions will only be as good as our understanding of the problem. Rather than be overwhelmed by the complexity of homelessness, we can begin our journey of understanding by taking the time to see the person experiencing homelessness. We do this by listening to their voice. today. I would like for you to listen to Courtney, as she shares about her life journey. Can you start by again saying who you are.

COURTNEY 1:36

I am Courtney Burnett, or Courtney Burnett Lauer. And I am a mother and disabled woman. Right. And we moved from Florida to Seattle and 2014 and became homeless. Courtney

Rex Hohlbein 1:54

and I have become good friends over these last eight years. We first met back in 2014. She was with her husband Wayne. There are three young and extremely bright beautiful children. Were there as well as Courtney's mom. And also Wayne's brother. As a family. They were living day to day between tents in, in Woodland Park and and when they could afford it, cheap motel rooms along Highway 99 in Seattle. I first learned about Courtney and her family through a woman by the name of Emily who, while driving by had seen the family flying a sign alongside the road asking for help. Emily had reached out to me to see if I could then reach out to them and find out a little bit more about their story and to see if the community could be of help to them. With a little bit of searching, several days later, I found them at a hotel. They were all crammed into this one single room, including their little dog, Bear. And I I remember it all vividly like it, honestly was yesterday. And the reason the reason I do is because I was overwhelmed by the scene. It was both sad and beautiful. Sad, for the obvious reasons of struggle, but beautiful because of the connection and closeness they were sharing despite all of the hardship that they were going through. This story really begins by sharing that Courtney is this amazing person. She is an extremely can do. And resilient woman as a mother she was or I should say is to this day, single minded in keeping her family together, regardless of what that takes. And of course, as I'm sure anyone can guess, being homeless, the odds of doing that are greatly stacked against you. You don't have to look any further than the CPS process and the resulting foster care system to know where Courtney's kids were headed. I know that Courtney worried about this constantly. Before we talk about where Courtney and her family are now, let's first go back to when Courtney was just a child. She was born in Elmira, New York. When she was four years old, her parents moved the family south to Florida. Because her father had health issues he suffered from serious lung complications. The doctors recommended that he would do better if he lived in a warmer climate. Courtney spent the majority of her younger life in Florida. Like her father, she had her own serious medical issues, ones that have plagued her most of her life, some of which she still struggles with today.

Speaker 1 5:05

As a six year old, I was very sick. When I was about two years old, I was diagnosed with autoimmune neutropenia, which is a blood disease. I was in the hospital a lot, they were trying to figure out how to help me, you know, go into some kind of remission. So I was like, pretty much in and out of hospital.

Unknown Speaker 5:25

And the symptoms are that you were just getting sick.

COURTNEY 5:29

I was just like, I had a lot of ear infections, and my teeth got abscessed a lot. No, just I, my body just couldn't recover, you know, like completely from any kind of illness. And eventually, they put me on antibiotics twice a day for like 12 years. Despite

Rex Hohlbein 5:50

her health issues, Courtney will tell you, she had a good childhood, her mother and father had a reasonably good relationship. And for the most part, they were there for her as parents, I would say, or rather, Courtney would say at the end of the day, she felt taken care of and loved.

COURTNEY 6:11

I think in my perspective, I thought they had a good relationship. Because I always had them with me, like when I went to hospital and things, both my parents would be there. So I always felt like I had us normal, stable home, they were struggling. They were definitely struggling all along. But they held together for our sake, you know, as long as possible. I, they got divorced when I was 10. I always had a family like we were always still close my after they separated. My mother, my father stayed friends. And you know, for parenting purposes, we were always together. Our family had a lot of values. And from the time that I was very, very young, you know, my father was teaching me about equality and treating all people the same no matter what disabled, you know, what disability they had, or what color they were any of those things. You know, it was just he wanted us to understand that everybody was pretty much the same. Everybody deserves to be treated with dignity and decency, and respect. And so we grew up like that, you know, high values and a good fabric

Rex Hohlbein 7:29

23 years ago, in the summer of 1999, when Courtney was 18, she and Danny, who was her best friend, decided to go on a road trip to visit his grandparents in Pennsylvania. And on their way there, they also decided to visit Danny's brother, Wayne, who was in Wilmington, Delaware. And he was there because he was in jail.

COURTNEY 7:55

That's how I met him. I met him in jail. His Wayne was in jail and Dan and I went to visit him there. I just thought he was so stupid. I was like, you know, I just think he's so stupid. He's in jail for doing drugs and you know, just stupid shit. And I could, I couldn't even imagine being with him. I was just so much better than him. Yeah. Just, I just couldn't even imagine I was writing back then a lot. And, and I was that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a writer. So I was like, I'm never going to end up with somebody like that, you know, criminal.

Rex Hohlbein 8:33

Around that same time, Courtney started to develop new health issues to which the doctors prescribed the latest painkillers.

COURTNEY 8:40

At 17, I was diagnosed with pseudotumor cerebri. I started having migraines and problems with my vision. And that was what they did for it. They gave me a mass quantity of Percocet Somas and Xanax and saw these pills like this, we'll fix it all. You know, when I was 17 when I got on pills, in between the ages of 18 and 28. I was like hardcore doing painkillers, but the doctors were giving me a lot of it was a bad time for a long time. But when I turned 25 I had gone through this horrible relationship and ended up pregnant and and I chose to have an abortion. You know, because I knew that if I'd stayed with this person, then it would never end. Well. You know, and I wouldn't end well for a child it wouldn't end well for me. After getting out of that relationship I got. I went to rehab and I got off the pills.

Rex Hohlbein 9:49

Short shortly after rehab, Courtney went to visit her friend Danny at his house, but he wasn't there and his Brother Wayne was there instead. I

COURTNEY 10:00

went to see Danny and he was working, but his brother was there. And he just gotten, just like, came to live in Florida. And I didn't have anybody to hang out with. I was all alone and sad. But I was sober. I was happy being sober. I just got my first car. But he was there and Danny wasn't. And we, he's like, Well, I'm gonna, I'm done with work. So we'll just hang out. And we just started hanging out. When we spent like, the whole day, just walking around that neighborhood and picked me up, like 100 flowers out of everybody's like flower beds, you know. And he just paid a lot of attention to me. Like, he really listened to everything that I said, and we had a lot to talk about. And he was so funny. He was just so funny. He made me laugh. And I think it was the first time that man had ever really paid attention to me and like, yeah, you know, like, just made me feel. I don't know, he always made me feel like I was like so much, you know, like, so on this pedestal? And that was it. I mean, we were together after that. Does he still pay attention to you that way? Yes, he does. He still calls me beautiful. It's job boy, like 100 times a day I wake up to that, you know, so tells me he loves me a million times a day. And when we decided to have our little ceremony, you know, I was six months pregnant with that it was 2005. And when we have that we made the same vows that you would have a normal wedding, you know what I mean? Any other normal wedding. And I was raised that like when you promise somebody something that you stick by that, you know, you don't just give up on it. You know, you have to keep trying to make things work until there's absolutely nothing left.

Rex Hohlbein 12:04

Courtney and, and I know Wayne as well will tell you that Wayne had a very difficult childhood. His parents gave him up as a baby to his grandparents to raise. He suffered from issues of abandonment and was in and out of drugs throughout his teens. There were countless, many run ins with the law. In 2005, Courtney and Wayne's first child was born. They named him Adam. Soon after Aiden was born. And then Athena. From very early on, Courtney son, Adam felt different than the other boys. His interests were more feminine. By the time he was four, he was already expressing a desire to be a girl.

COURTNEY 12:54

Okay, I almost can't remember it like accurately. You know, Addy being Adam. Because she always felt the same to me. You know, she always felt like a girl to me, you know? Maybe not until she said that she wanted to be a girl. But she was so adamant about it, even when she was four or five years old that she was not in the right body. And she definitely hated us for like her making her a boy. And she wanted to dress like a girl. And my father is the one who brought it to my attention about Addy. Like he knew before. I really knew what was going on with her. You know, like, he sent me an email with a story about a 12 year old boy, I remember a little boy's name was Michael. And he was transgender. And he kept trying to get his parents to understand that he wanted to be a girl. And they kept pushing him to be a boy and making him dress like a boy and present as a boy. And his parents found him hanging in his closet when he was 11 or 12. Right. So my dad said, you need to do something because this is Addie, if you don't, you know, admit who she is and let her be you know who she wants to be. She's going to end up in the same thing. She came to me at such a young age, you know what I mean? And she wanted to be somebody else. And she there was no way she was going to survive doing it in Florida. Everywhere that we went that I would allow her to be in public dressing like a girl, I would have somebody selling telling me that I was neglecting her or that I was making a mistake somehow by allowing it you know, just what what kind of parent was I to be so, you know, foolishly allowing my child to dress like that. Makes me tear up. Yeah, it was. It was hard even even at the end, you know? She went through such bullying, you know, not so much even by children so much as adults. And we had a neighbor and every time every time that Addy would walk by with Aiden to come home from school, one of my neighbors would call her the F word, you know, and I and she would come home and she'd be crying and she'd be like this guy called me. And how old was she was seven or eight, you know, she was a child, she kept calling her an abomination. Like, we had neighbors and these these neighbors, this one woman came to my house and said, you know, you shouldn't allow your child to do this. She's an, he's an abomination and, and you're neglectful, we're gonna call CPS on you, you know, for neglecting your child. And I'm like, your kid is out at four years old, running around at 11 o'clock at night with no shoes or shirt on. Just randomly hanging out with his cousins or whatever, but you're going to talk to me about being neglectful to my children.

Rex Hohlbein 15:57

Around this time, Wayne was bitten by a spider while on the job. He was hospitalized, and because of it eventually lost his job. After months and months of unemployment, Courtney and Wayne decided that he would come out to Seattle to look for work and find a better place for them. A place that would be more accepting of Addie, and a place that the family could have a fresh start. Courtney also had a desire. For more in life, she wanted a much bigger adventure. I

COURTNEY 16:30

can remember since the time I was 16, I wanted to get away. It was just so flat, and boring. And it was like Sandy and so hot. And it just didn't feel like a big enough adventure for me. You know, like I needed to experience something bigger. And I can remember when I was about 20 or 21, I went to stay with one of my friends in in a small town in Nevada, right near the Steen mountains. And his father drove cattle for a living so I got to go with them and like drive cattle and it was a tiny, tiny town there had to be like 30 people in town. It was also kind of dry and deserty you know, in that area, but it also snow there. And there are mountains us. Yeah, it was beautiful. You know what I mean? I had such an amazing experience in that one month that I was there. And then I can remember watching Twin Peaks, you know, and just being in love with Washington and those stupid Twilight movies came out. Jolly even more in love with Washington, you know, so we watched that stuff for years in Florida. Like, that's where we want to be. We want to be there and

Rex Hohlbein 17:56

Courtney and Wayne drempt to the Pacific Northwest. I'm guessing it's probably the same dreams that have attracted so many people to move west.

COURTNEY 18:07

We'd have like a little homestead or something. That's what we wanted when we moved down here. Yeah, we wanted to live on the Olympic Peninsula by force. Yeah. And have have a house with four bedrooms and a little workshop type of thing or rain could do carpentry and a garden. If I had my way, I'd have like 20 acres. You know another thing have a shitload of chickens in a cow and I believe be self sufficient. Wanting to live off our own land. You know, maybe a little stream or some shit and yes, that's all we wanted. That's a dream.

Rex Hohlbein 18:55

Well, Wayne was in Seattle, looking for work. disaster struck the family back in Florida. Addy

COURTNEY 19:01

and Aiden were playing outside. And that same gentleman who kept calling her the F word I hate saying it like it was just like saying the N word. You know, there's just such hate behind these words. I don't even want it to come out of me. You know what I mean? I can remember the kids were outside playing and just running inside the house just the door like abruptly swinging open and ate and screaming and blood just pouring down a side of his head. And that same gentleman had allowed his dog to go after my kids. And the dog went after Addy and Aiden got in the way of it the dog and the dog bit him in the head. And he and the guy had no remorse about it. He admitted that he left the dog out after my kids and the police told me that I was neglectful. I was neglectful because I allowed my kids to play outside and then I I was agitating my neighbors by allowing my son to dress like a girl. And if I continue to do that these things would continue to happen. And I was like, you've got to be kidding, right? You know, you have to be kidding that this is acceptable. So we're not going to do anything to this guy who's admitted that he allowed his dogs to go after my kids. And my son now like, 30 stitches inside of his head, you know how to go through like a CAT scans and all kinds of shit because of it. But there was nothing wrong with that it was me who was allowing my, my son to dress like a girl. That was a problem. So it was right, then, two weeks later, we were here. And that was, yeah, that was it. I there was no way I could allow it anymore.

Rex Hohlbein 20:50

Well, Courtney was scrambling to get her family out of Florida. Things were not going well for Wayne in Seattle, even though he had been free of his addictions. For years. In Florida. When he arrived in Seattle, he began using drugs again,

COURTNEY 21:08

he has struggled with drugs forever, since he was a teenager. He he's definitely struggle with those demons. But coming out here is a whole new set of problems. You know, a whole new set of drugs. So easy to get, you know, so readily available, so cheap. I mean, even when I got out here is that in Florida? Cod. Yes. I don't know people who aren't manufacturing methamphetamines at such high rates in Florida. And it's like very expensive in Florida, and I can't recall him ever using in Florida at all. In Florida, it was all about pills, because that was doctors are always readily giving out, you know, just giving them out so frequently and quickly. And you could pay a doctor in Florida, like 200 bucks and get a bunch of pills. Like it was nothing. You know what I mean? So here, it was a different thing. This mething just, it was a whole new ballgame for us.

Speaker 2 22:13

Did you know for you got out here that that he'd fall into? Yep. Was

COURTNEY 22:17

it a shock? No, I knew I knew. But I did know, by that time, that if I didn't get out here and rescue my husband, he was fucked. He was going to be dead. You know what I mean? Because he was already disappearing off the map for days at a time and not calling me and I was in another state. You know what I mean? And I have these three kids that missed their father and I couldn't, I couldn't stand it. The love of my life is out here. And you know, I there's no way I could stand it any longer. It was like six months that he was here when we weren't. And it's been a nightmare. It has ripped our family apart. Because it just totally changes the person. You know, I mean, like, it's totally changed him methods. headspin such a monster, the city, this amazing, beautiful city. All we could think about was getting out here and like hiking and living a better life and like having that kind of equality and, and giving it a place where she could just be herself and she wouldn't be judged. You know, and we came out here and it was boom, homelessness, boom, drug addiction, you know, just we were smacked with it. And there had to be one of us that was going to still be capable of being a parent and strong enough to overlook that shit. You know, the second that I got out here it was, I held on to them as tightly as I could, knowing that if I had them taken away, I may never get them back.

Rex Hohlbein 24:05

So imagine a cool, calm Pacific Northwest summer evening, at sea TAC International Airport, Courtney's there, her mother, three kids, and Wayne's brother all arrive in Seattle. There is this of course, deep worry for Wayne, that they are all sharing. But there's also this intense hope and anticipation that they felt one that anyone feels when they arrive in a new place, especially a new place. That would be their home.

COURTNEY 24:39

I can still remember the feeling of like walking outside the airport. You know and like being in the air. Just the way that it felt like the crisp coolness of the night air and in Seattle, you know and around 11 o'clock at night and just freezing like I can remember this shiver coming over me. But it was the best feeling. And the air just felt different smell different. You know, like I knew no matter what came against us like, this is a place for us to be like we definitely belonged in Washington. You know, and I can remember feeling that happiness. You know that elation at finally being someplace where I wasn't so hot, you know?

Rex Hohlbein 25:22

But you arrive at SeaTac. Do you know where you're going? I mean, do you have a is there a landing pad for you guys?

COURTNEY 25:28

At the time, we knew that our plans to stay with a family friend had fallen through by then. So they made plans for us to stay at saltwater River State Park which is in like Des Moines. So we all went to salt waters, they bark into a tent and do a tent, camping. The kids just thought we were on vacation. They didn't. They didn't know that we were homeless at that point. They didn't understand. And it was seven of us. You know, it was my at the time my mom was 61 years old and walked with a cane. And she'd been house bound for years and Florida. She'd never gone outside the house, except to go to doctor's appointments and shit. You know, stop the boat. Yes.

Unknown Speaker 26:24

I mean, what would she say saved me. I mean, 61 years old with a cane going into a tent.

COURTNEY 26:30

She didn't give a shit. As long as she was with us. We were that was our family and she wanted to be with the kids and she wanted to make sure that I was okay. You know, and she loved when like a son, you know, and she was scared for him.

Rex Hohlbein 26:45

Some of you might wonder why Courtney stayed with Wayne through all of this through all the crazy ups and downs. I asked her to help us better understand why she gathered up the family and rushed to Seattle without having a solid place to live and without Wayne having secured a job. Even worse, with Wayne again addicted to drugs.

COURTNEY 27:07

It's such a complicated answer. Wayne's mom, she's she's an amazing lady. But she's also struggles with manic depression or, you know, bipolar, she's definitely got some stuff going on that she's been unmedicated for years for. And at the time, she was like, a massive drinker. As soon as Dan decided that he wanted to go as well, he wanted to come here as well. Wayne's brother, she lost it. And she like went off on several, like weeks of benders and calling the kids names and calling me names in front of them and just bullshit. It's felt dangerous. I didn't feel comfortable anymore, leaving my kids with her. That's the bottom line. And Danny was going to come out here with me too. So I was like, fuck it, we're gonna figure it out. My primary goal was to get us all back together because the separated we were all fucked. And that was the truth like so

Rex Hohlbein 28:13

basically. Basically, the plan was to wait till Wayne got work and housing. Yep. But then the plan changed because Wayne started diving and your mother in law.

COURTNEY 28:25

It was just unsafe was going it was it was a domestic violence nightmare. It just was bad. Yeah. And after, after the neighbors let their dog out on the kids and Aiden got bit by the dog. That was fucking it. That was the last straw. I didn't feel safe there in the state at all. And I certainly wasn't going to leave it behind. No way. At least if we were all here, we would all be together. And I had a serious competence. If we were all together, we would figure it out. Maybe it was a bad choice. And a lot of people had been, you know, kind of like, Why the hell did you do that? You know, like, why was that your choice? But to me, it was the only choice. I mean, seriously, I think people don't put themselves in other people's places enough. But the fact is, is that Wayne and I have been together since 2003. I was 25 years old when I got with him. And I married him a few years later and all my kids had been with him. I've spent he's my best friend. I spent my whole adult life with him. So no, I could not watch him disappear like that. It was like letting go of your whole life. You understand what I'm saying? Like as an adult. It would be like watching your wife just disappear and not running after her. I think people I think there are a lot of people out there that throw people away way too easily. They say, Oh, fuck that guy, you know, like, kick him to the curb, you know, get somebody new who will take care of your babies? No. You can't always just give up on the people who you entrusted your life to. Sometimes you have to walk through the fire with them. You know what I mean? And was it maybe was it a bad choice to have my kids have to watch that? Yes, yes, it was. It was traumatic for them. And I fucked up in that area. But there was nobody that could take care of my kids. I've spent since I was very young fighting for my own life. So, you know, this is my person, you know, well, he is my person, he is the person that I love that I feel like I'm meant to spend my life with, I've already spent almost 20 years of my life with them. So if I would fight for myself, I will fight for him. You know, in, I fight for my kids the same? Yeah. I think it's worth it. There have been many times that I've thought Fuck this like it this is gotta be enough. Like enough, this gotta be enough. But my father and my mother, my family in general, have, they would always be like, Are you sure? Make sure you're sure. Because this is a love of your life. This is the person that you have chosen to spend your life with. If you let go of them, that's that. That's the main issue. I can definitely live with that. Wayne, I've gone a year here and a year they're living on my own while he's been in prison. Okay, and I could live on my own. I'm a strong woman, I can make it on my own. I've made all of this pretty much on my own. But I choose to spend my wife with him. Because I can, I can always just feel this. This calmness between us like, everything is the same as it originally was. It's so difficult to answer. How you feel, how somebody makes you feel. If you can imagine falling in love, that original feeling you're with the person that you love. And it's the first time that you've, you kiss them or that you know that you love them and you kiss them. It sends a feeling through your body. It's almost like a shock wave things around you stop. There's a feeling that goes along with that the first time you make love to that person you there's a feeling when he kisses me, I still feel that feeling. You know, when he tells me, You know, when he says good morning, beautiful, I still have that feeling. You know, that initial happiness that butterflies dealing that giddy? I know that's the person I'm meant to be with feeling. You know? So why? Why would I separate myself from that? To go try to find some lawyer and a three piece suit in a Tesla, who, by the way, is not ever going to fall in love with me. I'm not going to go seeking out something that I already have. This life is so exceedingly short, and difficult and complicated. And I really believe for me. My wife is about these people. These four people. I don't have any regrets. If I regretted any moments that I have with Wayne, I wouldn't have these children. You know what I'm saying? I wouldn't have an Aiden, who's an amazingly gifted artist, and he's compassionate and empathetic and so amazing. You know, and I wouldn't have an Addy, who is, you know, articulate and, and bossy. And, you know, so matter of factly she knows who she is. Even though she's struggling right now and she's going through her own mental health issues. She is profound. And I wouldn't have an amazing little Athena. You know, I wouldn't have this extraordinary little girl who's tenacious and vibrant and just full of this unsign you know, like, why would you ever give any of that up even, even not being able to eat?

Unknown Speaker 35:10

I'm shaking because I haven't eaten today. As long as they are okay, that is it. That is it's worth every bit of it, every second of it.

Rex Hohlbein 35:28

Now, during the time, Courtney and her family were living in a tent at the saltwater River State Park in Des Moines, Washington, a friend was helping the family with transportation, getting groceries, picking up this and that. And, very importantly, taking Courtney to the methadone clinic in Bellevue where she received treatments, they were quickly running out of money. And because of the Park location, it was harder and harder for them to get around. They needed to quickly rethink the situation.

COURTNEY 36:01

When we came here, we had to like $1,000. You know what I mean? Like, I'm not sure how long I thought that shit was gonna last, but it didn't last long. And by that time, we were just slapped bass broke, and we needed to get someplace where we could make some way headway, you know, it's in some direction. So we went to tensity. Three, and we were there for less than a month, we had our share of issues there. By that point, everybody knew we were homeless. By that point. Both Audi and Aiden, they knew they, I'd say, by the time that we had been at at the camping for like two weeks, Aiden had had enough of that shit. You know what I mean? He was like, Mom, really? What is going on? You know, like, where are we going from here? And when are we going to like be inside, you know, like, and I couldn't produce that shit. I couldn't produce it fast enough. At the time, I had SSI. You know, my SSI money. My mom had SSI. So that's what we survived on, you know, for a couple months, but not so well. And we ended up at Greenlight park or Woodland Park or whatever. And we were in a tent, you know, on the side of a picnic area, you know, one of those closure thing is, and so we stayed there for a while. It was a couple it was it. It was only a couple of weeks, but it felt like a very long time. And we would have to get the kids to go to sleep at like eight o'clock at night. I would read to them. And then we would have to get up at like four o'clock in the morning and put it all down. Because the park rangers would come and tell us if I see you, you know, if we keep seeing you camping out here, then we're gonna call CPS. So I automatically had that feeling that I could have my kids taken. And then I we started panhandling. I said this is fucked. We can't stay out like this anymore. And it was day to day feeding the kids like day to day, like, would we have money tomorrow to feed them or not? You know what I mean? So I said, we're, we're just going to walk until we find a good intersection. And we're staying there until we make enough money to go into a motel first time in your life. Yes, I've never done it before. I couldn't even bring myself to do it. It took me months, you know, two months almost, to do it. Because I felt so wrong about it. I just felt so wrong about putting my kids out there. I didn't have anywhere to put them. I couldn't I couldn't leave three kids with my mom alone so that I could go Panhandle with my husband, you know what I mean? So, we would all be out there, all of us sitting on the side of the road, with all our shit, you know, and it was the horrible feeling. Just, it was this hopeless, helpless, just worst feeling of my life, having to take money from people. You know, just having that expect other people to give me their hard earned money to take care of my family. I felt like the biggest piece of shit. You know what I mean? And then I have my kids there with me too. It was horrifying. They asked me questions about it. Oh, yeah. Constantly, you know, like, why are we doing this? You know, is this right? Are we going to go to jail? Are you going to be taken away? You know, when are we going to eat? Just everything you can think of Mommy, when are we going to be in a bed? You know, stuff like that. Just all the questions you can think that a child or human being of any kind any age could ask about why the hell we were sitting on the side of the road, you know, begging for money so that we could get food you know, and sometimes People bring us literal, you know, bags of food and stuff. I didn't give a shit what the what anybody would give me. But at that point, I had to think about feeding my kids. You know what I mean? People were really kind. Even the police, even the police would stop by. I can remember this one cop, I can't remember his name. But here's the first one to ever stop. And, and he asked, you know, do we have a home? What's going on? You know, we wanted all the details, you know, did we have any place we could go to? And we've been told that if we wanted to a shelter, we couldn't stay together, like Wayne would have to go into a men's shelter. And I would have to be with the kids by myself, you know, me and my mom would be with the kids. And then the guys would have to go into their separate shelter. And Wayne was like, No, we're not doing that. We're not separating again, we can't, we're not going to be separated again. He knew that I couldn't take care of them. Like that by myself, you know, especially with Athena being so little. Yeah. It was just too much. There was already shit going on with the kids. I could tell, you know, there's already this trauma manifesting. And all I could think was that, you know, I'm just talking them up even more, you know, like, how could I have done this? And how stupid was it for me to come out here with my kids, you know, but there was no way for me to go back either. Like, there was no way for me to just send them back. I knew whatever we did, we had to do it together. And we had to stay together. And I just I kept like, just telling myself, you praying to God, all the gods, whatever gods there were, if there was any, whatever, all of them. You know, like, Please give me the strength just to keep us all together. No matter what, at the end of the night, if we're all together, my kids are fed. You know, we'll be alright. As long as we're together. And, and I've just held on to that.

Rex Hohlbein 42:05

Courtney woke up every morning with a task of finding enough money for food and a motel room for the kids and her mother that night. It was this repeating cycle. That was exhausting. I

COURTNEY 42:18

can remember the first night that we ever got a motel room the very first night that we ever made enough money to get a motel room. We are walking up and down Aurora like 12 o'clock at night No shit, me and Wayne, my mother trying to find any, any place. Any place that would just let us up and down with the buses, you know, on and off of us. That's one the next place and no one would let us until we got to the Wallingford Inn. And that was the first motel that we ever stayed at. But it was like midnight, and we would have to check out the next morning and 11 o'clock in the morning. We still went in took the motel room just to give my mother and two kids a bed to sleep man. I can remember taking the big like comforter off the bed and putting it on the floor for Athena and like folding in half and putting her on the floor. And my mom and Addy laid in the bed and wait and I took a very long shower. Like to our shower, just sitting there just standing there talking in the shower for a couple hours, you know that we wouldn't have to be on the street. But by the next day, we were back on the street having to do it all over again. You know,

Rex Hohlbein 43:32

it definitely are you in? I mean, are you in survival mode? Oh, yeah. doesn't allow you to actually get a frame of reference. So yeah, what the fuck are we gonna do? Yep. Yeah, we're gonna move forward

COURTNEY 43:43

at that point. We're the first couple of months, it was all about survival. Like, our only goal was to get the fuck off the street. Even if it were just for a night here and there just, you know, we had narrowed it down. We wanted to make enough money panhandling to get off the street for like three nights a week, at least. So the kids could have a break. It was so much for them to always up and down with the tents and then sleeping on the ground and hard rocks and not being able to shower in an actual shower sometimes. It was just it was too much. It was exhausting for all of us. And I still had to go to the clinic in Bellevue every day. So I'd spend half my day going to and from Bellevue on the boss's methadone or the methadone, but I never stopped. I did it when I had you and Wayne would stay with my mom, you know, and he was still doing drugs at the time. Not quite as much like it was kind of spread out but I know that he was still doing drugs in that period of time,

Unknown Speaker 44:52

which meant he had siphoned off limited money very limited

COURTNEY 44:55

and and fine. He would have to wait he would have to Wait until I got back from Bellevue because he would never leave my mom alone. He never ever left her alone with the kids. You know, when I left and Danny and I had to go to Bellevue to to get the methadone, he always stayed with my mom the whole time. And he stayed true to that for a long, long time. And then I got to a point after we met Emily, and she introduced us to you. That was when I could start to really consider what the hell to do next. When I had a little bit of breath, and I didn't have to stand on a street corner anymore with my kids, in that in that period of time, that was like, earth shattering to us to meet you to have the opportunity to get a reprieve, you know, get a break.

Rex Hohlbein 45:51

I think the community donated enough for a couple of weeks. No pills. Yeah,

COURTNEY 45:56

it was a month. It was a month. It was like two weeks in one place in two weeks. And another but it felt like a very long time, you know, because it was a long time that we didn't have to Panhandle anymore.

Rex Hohlbein 46:10

I remember meeting your mom a couple of times, but for some reason I remember most at the hotel down there in the south end, over the bridge there. And she was just sitting there with, you know, with the kids. And I didn't know, she seemed remarkable to me that she was weathering all of that. And

COURTNEY 46:30

she just focused on them. She just focused on them on being with them, and making sure that they knew that they had her, you know that they always had her. And they were always spared. And they were always clean. You know, I mean, she made sure that they were always, you know, I had to be the person that figured out how to get us housed. My mom always made sure that my kids had a story at bedtime. Even when we were when we had to, you know sleep in a tent or whatever, my mom would be sitting on the ground with one kid on this leg and one kid on that leg. You know what I mean? Just so that they had someplace to lay and somebody that made them feel safe and competent. So we were blessed to all be together.

Rex Hohlbein 47:19

Donations from the facing homelessness community allowed Courtney to keep her family in a motel for another month. That, quite frankly, was a lifesaver. During that time, Courtney was able to connect with nickelsville, which is a self managed Tent City. At that time, they were just off Dearborn at the edge of downtown Seattle. The camp was situated on a hillside and it rained nearly constantly their whole state. The conditions were horrible. I I visited a number of times and I remember the mud being everywhere. People slipping and sliding down the paths. There were trash piles. And with that, rats, lots of rats running scurrying here and there the whole the whole thing was a mess. But one of the big positives though, was that a caseworker connected them to the YWCA. And through that they received again, additional weeks of hotel stay, and we're connected to other services and resources. Courtney was beginning to get the lay of the land. She's smart, and was learning how the system was working, or I should probably say not working. Their next big step forward still through the why was transitional housing at the Windermere house on Capitol Hill, which was located right across the street from Garfield High School.

COURTNEY 48:43

There we moved into Windermere house, which is basically like an old Victorian house. The YWCA had split into four apartments. We did a nice job of renovating it all it was beautiful. It was four bedrooms with huge dining room huge like it had window seats and shit. It was huge. You know what I mean? It was huge this place and then you go up another flight of stairs and are two more bedrooms. It was a happy place. Yeah, but we all just bouncing off the walls. Yeah, um, there. It was briefly happy. We got there in March 2015. And, um, I was pregnant. If you remember. I was pregnant with Alaric. I just found out I was pregnant, like two months earlier. And then in May, that's when I lost the Alaric and then two weeks after that, my mom died. And then two weeks after my mom died, her mom died. And I was like spun. You know what I mean? Wayne was that was it when we got into transitional housing, his drug use escalated, because now he would find ways to make money his own money like he We had a place that was safe. So he felt like he could leave us there and go buck off doing whatever he was doing. So he would be gone for days sometime. But when she died, it, it turned him like he spun out. And instead of like being a part of our lives and all pulling together, he went further away, his way of coping, he couldn't like he felt like he lost his own mother. My mom was a mom to him for so many years, you know, and he just spun out, you know, and but I had to cope with all that stuff by myself, you know, my mom dying, and, you know, she was on life support, and her body was shutting down. I had to make the decisions, you know, like, I had to make the decision to agree to shut her off, to be there for all of that. And I don't remember any of that time, like I was actually in my body. It was like always outside of myself, you know, for all of that. I was in shock. You know what I mean? Like, that couldn't really have happened, I couldn't really have lost my mother. That was it. I was on my own. And then I had three kids, that didn't really get it. When Wayne found out that my mom died, he was like, I child, like he was in the he was in the closet. Like, I remember coming home and finding him in the closet, like on the ground, like in the fetal position, like bawling. Like he just couldn't cope with it at all. And he couldn't help me. You know, he couldn't help me through that. I needed him. Like, I really needed him to be there for me, but he never was, he wasn't there for any of it. He left and I didn't see him for weeks. So I spent all that time being a mom by myself, but then at the same time, having to worry about whether or not whether or not he was alive or dead, you know. So it was just me.

Unknown Speaker 52:05

A lot of the time. It was just me. But we made it work. The kids and it became a little unit, you know, just me and them.

Rex Hohlbein 52:23

While living in the Windermere house, Courtney's caseworker applied for what is called a family unification voucher through the Seattle Housing Authority, or what is more commonly known as a section eight voucher. She used that to move into the Denny Park Apartments run by the low income housing Institute. While the apartment was nice, with lots of space and natural light, including a view of the Space Needle, the drug dealing below on the street was not working for her. Not at all. It was stressing Courtney out big time. In 2018, Courtney and her family moved again, this time into the Greenwood neighborhood into another Lehigh building where they live today. This time though, the apartment was not a great fit very quickly. They had a long list of things not working for the family, including how suffocatingly Hot the place got in the summer. Courtney began her search again for a new home. She wanted a four bedroom home to rent. She believes it's not too much to dream for a place where each of her three children can have their own room and there is a small backyard space for a vegetable garden.

COURTNEY 53:39

We were awarded this voucher within a month. You know some people wait 510 years to get a voucher. One month, one month we had a voucher. But now we have a voucher but I can do nothing with it. finding housing on Section Eight should be really easy.

Unknown Speaker 54:04

It's not you would think because guaranteed income.

COURTNEY 54:07

It doesn't matter. People don't want to fuck with that. They don't want to they don't want to deal with government shit or war. You know, government checks. They don't want to mess with all the paperwork and inspections. They don't want to be a part of that. So I had to wait. I had to find a place that was low income already that worked with vouchers consistently, you know,

Rex Hohlbein 54:35

Courtney's frustration shows as she struggles to find a place that will accept the section eight voucher and her complicated family situation. The voucher comes with a limited time for her to find a place if she doesn't, she loses it

COURTNEY 54:49

on Zillow, you know you can message the landlord right? I will straight out message them and ask them do you accept section eight? Do you accept housing choices? vouchers just to make it sound nice, right? And they'll straight up say, No, we don't accept it. And I told my case manager, she said, you know, call the civil rights people I said, that's all I would do. I would spend my whole day doing, I've been rejected more times than you can even count. But I've been assured that we are fucked. We're never getting out of here anytime soon. You know, because for the past year and a half or more, you know, people going through this, the COVID situation knows this pandemic. They stopped paying their rent, because they could, yeah, and other I'm sorry, but there are a lot of people out there who just didn't pay their rent, it set off an entire cycle of bullshit for everyone. Because for somebody like myself who's got like a section eight voucher that could move into a nicer place, a bigger place that attina could finally have her own room or, or, you know, Wayne and I might actually have privacy where we can just lay in bed and watch a movie without a 10 year old, you know, five feet away from us, or I could kiss my husband without somebody watching me or, or something. Any, any privacy doesn't exist for us. So and then finding a place like that. Nobody wants to give anybody, especially nobody on Section Eight a place that they just can't trust it. And if you don't have a high credit score, forget, you know what I mean? Forget about it.

Rex Hohlbein 56:38

Seattle tenant laws prohibit landlords from discriminating against section eight vouchers or criminal history. And yet, Courtney has had hundreds of rejections and has all been given up hope and utilizing the voucher system, she feels stuck.

COURTNEY 56:54

I don't have any evictions. I have no criminal history at all myself, never been arrested, not for drugs, not for anything ever. Never even been inside a police station other than pick somebody up? You know what I mean? I've never I've had one speeding ticket in my life. In

Rex Hohlbein 57:11

other words, you don't present as a high risk? No, you wouldn't

COURTNEY 57:15

think about even when they meet me, you know, even when I talk to them and tell them my story, it's still sorry. You know, or immediately as soon as they find out that I have a voucher, magically, the place is already off the market, or it's been rented or somebody put an application in before you. You know, there's always some something to say that I'm not worthy, or, you know, like, it all has to do with the stigma surrounding the section eight voucher, unfortunately. So how do I fix that? How do I get to a point where I get the same as everyone else? It makes me feel like Seattle's a little hypocritical as I say, You know what I mean? Because I can remember when we first came here, it just felt so freeing and so comfortable and right, you know, for us to be here and people were there was no judgments and no class system. No worries, man. You know what I mean? When we came here, I was like, no worries, right? person I ever heard that. For real, like no worries everywhere I went, I'm looking around now, you know, six years, seven years later, almost. And that is such bullshit. That there's no worries, the city is so fucking full of worries. It is blind, if anything, you know what I mean? And it's so full of, you know, hatred and bigotry and, and greed. You know, just TOEFL greed, and sad to me.

Rex Hohlbein 59:01

Despite all the struggle, Courtney still believes her family's future is in the Pacific Northwest, that her kids will flourish here that they belong here.

COURTNEY 59:11

Can you remember coming and just closing my eyes and breathing it all in you know, and, and feeling this deep? Just warm happiness? You know, at being here, and like looking out at like the fairies going across Puget Sound you know and feeling just this elation at finally being part of something full of nature and beauty and and history. You know, the shit was like, it was like a magical welcome Fairyland to me when we first got here, you know, and for years, I still see like, I don't have a bus window. I can still see Mount Rainier and I still get that feeling that just happiness to see, you know, Mount Rainier.

Rex Hohlbein 59:57

I asked Courtney what she He wants you the listener to be left with now that you know a little bit about her life journey,

COURTNEY 1:00:05

I wish I was put in an in a different position, I wish I had made different choices, you know, earlier on in my life and stay in high school and done, you know, created something bigger and, you know, um, for myself or my family, obviously, you know, I would have a full fridge forever, you know, but I don't know, I think that there's so much greed. And there are people that are suffering, and it's difficult to not become part of that, it really is difficult not to get pulled into that in one way or another. I mean, we all want those niceties. We do I mean, there aren't very many people out there that don't want to watch TV before they go to bed, or, you know, look something up on Google or, or microwave their food or whatever, you know, there. There are so many, so many things that we are lucky to have. And there are so many times where I feel like we would probably be so much better off without all of them. Without the internet without cars without you know, without all these things that have totally just ripped our planet, you know, to shreds, and not just the planet, but the people on it. Greed is definitely part of human nature. But at what point? Do we as a society want something better? Not just things, you know, because what would happen if there was, you know, something that wiped all this shit out? What would we do, then? You know, what, what kind of existence? Could we have? You know, would we be? Could we be a huge community? Really? Or would we be killing each other off for stuff? So, I don't know, I think I would, I would tell anybody to find something better. Find whatever is better for you your oasis. You know something better that makes you feel the best you that you can be. It's such short life. And it can all be taken away anytime, right? So make the most of it. Love, love the people that you love as much as you can love them. Hug them tighter. Let them know that you love that. And don't forget to give that shit to yourself.

Rex Hohlbein 1:02:52

Eight years ago, Courtney and her family were living in a tent in the park at night. And during the day flying assigned to make just enough money for food. And when they could a nice hotel stay through Courtney's constant efforts to keep the family together. They now have housing. Besides the story, Courtney shared about herself with all of us, one that is still unfolding. There are two other stories that exist out in the world about Courtney, one that is told by those that know nothing about her, most of which pulls from the negative stereotype that swirls around those experiencing homelessness. The other story is told by those that have had the opportunity to get to know her to witness her struggles, her strengths, and to feel the love that she has for her family. Those people no longer see her as a statistic in the homelessness crisis, but rather as a person as a human being. When you see someone struggling through homelessness, which story will you be telling us

Speaker 3 1:03:58

will live a life I'm proud of us won't be happy. As Ron provide for mine and take care of my family. I'm striving to live in peace and maybe get oh, live in like boss who got it under control.

Rex Hohlbein 1:04:14

You know me now is produced, written and edited by Tomas Vernadsky. And me, Rex Holbein. We would like to thank Courtney and her family for so very graciously sharing their story and allowing to get us to know them just a little bit more. We have a website at WWW dot you know me now.com Where you can see photos of Courtney, Wayne, Hattie, Aiden and Athena. As well as read other stories of folks we feel you should know. We also have a Facebook page where you can join in in the conversation as our good friend Dinkus my gang always reminds us if you aren't making one person smile a day. What are you doing?

Speaker 3 1:04:58

That's one level I'm proud of a swampy happy swamp profile from mine and take care of my family I'm just trying to live in peace and maybe get oh live in like a boss who got it under control