Marlo and her children

This is the homeless you don't see but need to see. I met Marlo in a weekly rate hotel in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The whole family, two adults and four children, live in a small hotel room.

Marlo says there are days she does not even want to wake up, but her kids keep her going. From hotel to hotel then shelter to hotel and back. Families with low and no income get caught in a vicious cycle of nonstop crisis.

One thing Marlo says in this interview I hope you hear loud and clear. She is trying to potty train her youngest kids early because diapers are so expensive. My friend Lisa who founded Help a Mother Out [http://www.helpamotherout.org] educated me on how social assistance doesn't pay for diapers. Later when I started working with homeless families I saw first-hand how badly low-income families need diapers. Marlo mentions she was almost arrested for panhandling trying to get diapers for her children. Please support your local diaper bank and the Diaper Act [http://www.helpamotherout.org/diaperact]


Special thanks to Joy Junction [http://www.joyjunction.org]



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Nonprofits & Activism

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• Albuquerque
• New Mexico
• homeless
• families
• homelessness
• invisiblepeople tv
• invisible people
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[elainebmack]

Where is the father?

[firebluenew]

how can we as a people reach out to these people and help them?

[halfofsixteen]

Also, weekly rates are quite cheaper than daily rates. It's very easy for us to pretend we are perfect and have incredibly amazing solutions to everyone's problems, but the reality is that we hardly know anything about others. Especially if we refuse to listen to them. We are conditioned into thinking that we can speak for other people, but it is really our low self esteem and hatred that speaks. Who's to judge the minor decisions of a woman's life who's in abject poverty? Really.

[halfofsixteen]

I find it so incredibly tragic, and telling of our society, that so many of us frequently dismiss the suffering of people who are homeless. It happens tragically over and over again to many types of people. It shows your own narcissistic ego when you choose to write ignorantly blind comments. When you dismiss someone's experience you negate intimacy and connections with others period. I find it literally heart-breaking the utter disconnect people have towards suffering.

[meezergurl]

@meezergurl - also - where I live - there are so many charities and supports - no one would ever find themselves having to panhandle for diapers. Well unless they bought other things instead.

[meezergurl]

@InvisiMan2006 - you're right. I agree. I just know from working in a shelter for so many years that things add up and defeat people. Having alot of kids and being homeless is huge. food. diapers. no supports. things become overwhelming and some people just cease to cope. Thank God we have better support systems in place in Canada - at least it sounds that way. Single mothers get mother's allowance which while is not great wealth it sounds alot more than in the US system.

[InvisiMan2006]

@meezergurl With all due respect, this is a minor inconvenience. She cant afford regular diapers and cloth is a cheap and viable solution. Perhaps we need to swollow our pride and egos sometimes - sure beats homelessness.

[meezergurl]

@InvisiMan2006 - everytime a kid wets the cloth diapers soak up - they would have wall to wall diapers hanging all over the hotel room and would need drying racks. I know cloth is cheaper in one sense but I sure would hate to have to live that way.

[InvisiMan2006]

@meezergurl Are you comparing the cost of diapers to a load of laundry? She could wash them in the tub if need be... she would still save huge amounts of money either way.

[meezergurl]

@InvisiMan2006 - but then her laundry bill goes up.