By Joe Martin, Street Roots
In 1985, Desiree Hellegers went to work at the Compass
Center in Seattle’s Pioneer Square. There she encountered an astonishing and
diverse array of women whose lives had been shattered. Poverty, unemployment,
underemployment, poor education, imprisonment, prostitution, childhood abuse,
spousal abuse, addictions, loss of family and friends, and physical and mental
illness had entangled and stunted these lives. Deep abiding troubles were
amplified by homelessness.
In her cogent introduction to “No Room of Her Own,”
Hellegers declares that “anyone who’s experienced homelessness can attest to
the fact that homelessness can, and does, cause mental illness and drive people
to drink. Lose your housing in the United States and you run the risk of losing
both your mind and your life.”
