Overcoming Employment Barriers: Celebrating Small Wins While Homeless

Overcoming Employment Barriers: Celebrating Small Wins While Homeless

This week’s been intense.

Yesterday, I worked a paid job for the first time in almost three years—15 hours straight at an Elections Canada poll. Just a one-day gig, but still. It felt good to be useful again. To earn. To feel like I wasn’t just surviving, but contributing something.

I’ve got a Christian business retreat coming up this weekend. After that, I’ll start hunting for temp work. The numbers are wild—just 20 hours a month at minimum wage could replace my Ontario Works income. Double that, and I quadruple it. But let’s be real: even with that, I still can’t afford a place of my own. Not even close to something where my kids could visit. Still, it’s something. Money coming in means I can start chipping away at debt. Maybe finally get a few basics I’ve had to live without for way too long.

I had high hopes for the Salvation Army—people said they used to offer clothing vouchers. Not anymore. Now it’s four racks of clothes tucked in the back of their shelter. Slim pickings, especially in my size. I have to wait two weeks just to try again, and even then, I doubt they’ll have much. I get it—people abused the system. But still… it sucks. I showed up hoping to be treated like a human being, and I left feeling invisible.

Employment Ontario was… complicated. The person I was supposed to meet emailed me after midnight. Sure, they had one of those “respect your hours” disclaimers, but I’ve marked them as important—so I got pinged. It messed with my head. We ended up talking by phone, which is rough when you have no private place to go. But I made it work. We talked about pivoting away from trucking. They got it. We looked into training options—school’s actually doable at $400 a semester. That gives me something to move toward.

Tonight, I’ve got a meeting at a Christian ministry I’ve been going to for a few weeks. I don’t name it here—anonymity still matters. Maybe one day that’ll change, but not yet.

The retreat this weekend is something I’m looking forward to. But I’m scared too. I’ll lose my bed at the shelter and go back on the waitlist Sunday. That’s the tradeoff for doing something good for myself—I come back and have nowhere to sleep. But I believe God will meet me there. I don’t know how yet, but I believe it.

It’s hard, yeah. But I’m still here. Still trying. Still showing up.

And for now, that’s enough.