Before They Stopped Asking

We like to believe that help is there when people need it.

We tell people to reach out.

Ask for help. Build a support network. Talk to somebody. Go to your church. Contact social services. Lean on your community.

I've heard all of those things.

I've also lived long enough to know there is an enormous difference between help existing and help actually being accessible when your life falls apart.

I've been through periods when I was doing well. I've worked, run a business, supported myself, and participated in communities.

I've also been homeless.

One of the things you learn when your life goes badly wrong is who is actually there when you have nothing to offer them.

Sometimes the answer is painful.

When life changes faster than the system does

I remember one period when several things in my life collapsed together.

A relationship ended. My business was gone. My living situation changed. Emotionally, I wasn't handling any of it particularly well.

I needed help.

So I did what we're constantly told people should do.

I went looking for it.

I remember going to apply for government assistance at around eight in the morning. The lineup was enormous.

I waited.

And waited.

By around three in the afternoon, they essentially told those of us remaining that they were done for the day.

Come back tomorrow.

So I did.

I came back and spent another day waiting.

When I finally got through, there was a possibility I would be denied because I had earned too much money earlier in the year.

That made sense according to a calculation.

It made absolutely no sense according to the circumstances of my life at that moment.

I wasn't hungry six months earlier.

I needed help now.

I remember becoming frustrated and asking the worker something along the lines of:

What am I supposed to do then? Rob somebody? Steal?

I made another rhetorical remark that understandably sounded threatening to the worker. Security was called.

I didn't intend to threaten anyone, and today I can understand why my words were interpreted that way.

But I also remember what I was actually trying to express.

What exactly do we expect desperate people to do when every legitimate door we tell them to use has closed?

That doesn't justify stealing.

It doesn't justify robbery.

It doesn't excuse hurting somebody.

But surely we should be interested in what happens before those things occur.

People still need to eat after an application is denied.

Rent still exists.

Children still need food.

Desperation doesn't disappear because somebody doesn't meet an eligibility requirement.

"We'll pray for you"

I've experienced another version of this in religious communities.

I've been part of churches. I've known people in those communities who had considerable resources.

Then things went badly for me.

I reached out.

Sometimes the response was essentially:

We can't help you, but we'll pray for you.

Thank you.

I don't say that to mock prayer.

Prayer matters deeply to many people.

But I have carried a question from those experiences:

When does compassion become action?

If somebody is hungry and we have food, is prayer the end of our responsibility?

If someone is losing their housing and we're capable of helping somehow, is sympathy enough?

If somebody belongs to our congregation or community when they're doing well, what does belonging mean when their life falls apart?

And this isn't simply about churches.

Governments do it.

Businesses do it.

Workplaces do it.

Communities do it.

Families do it.

Friends do it.

We do it.

Because genuine need is inconvenient.

We see people after everything happened

Walk through almost any city and you'll see someone sitting against a building, sleeping in a doorway, or carrying everything they own.

Most people keep walking.

Some give them money.

Some avoid eye contact.

Businesses don't necessarily want them inside. Bathrooms become customers only. Security moves them along.

Then come the explanations.

They're addicts.

They're mentally ill.

They don't want help.

They made bad decisions.

Maybe some of those things are true.

But none of them tells us who that human being is.

I've been homeless.

That's one reason I have difficulty looking at somebody sitting on a sidewalk and believing that what I'm seeing tells me their entire story.

We see the person after everything happened.

We don't know who they were ten years earlier.

Maybe they worked.

Maybe they owned a business.

Maybe they raised children.

Maybe they were someone's supervisor.

Maybe they volunteered.

Maybe they sat beside you in church.

Maybe they were doing perfectly well until a relationship ended, an injury happened, a business collapsed, a job disappeared, somebody died, or several things went wrong at once.

We don't know how many friends stopped answering.

We don't know how many offices they visited.

We don't know how many applications they completed.

We don't know how many times they were told they didn't qualify.

We don't know how many organizations referred them somewhere else.

We don't know how many people told them they would pray for them.

Most importantly:

We don't know how many times they asked for help before they stopped asking.

"Build a support network"

Then something strange happens if you manage to climb back out.

People tell you to build a support network.

And they're right.

Human beings need other human beings.

But there is a question I've found increasingly difficult to ignore:

Where was that support network when I actually needed support?

If people disappear when you're struggling but become interested again once you're functioning, what exactly is the relationship?

If a community welcomes you when you're contributing but has nothing for you when you collapse, what does membership in that community mean?

If you had to survive the worst part largely on your own, it shouldn't surprise anyone if you're more careful about whom you trust once you're standing again.

That doesn't have to become bitterness.

It can become discernment.

You learn the difference between knowing people and having community.

You learn that proximity isn't necessarily friendship.

You learn that membership isn't necessarily belonging.

And you learn that a support network that exists only while everyone is doing reasonably well isn't much of a safety net.

The accessibility problem nobody talks about

There is another contradiction in the way we've built many of our support systems.

Think about what we often require from somebody who needs help.

Understand the system.

Complete the paperwork.

Have identification.

Have an address.

Have a telephone.

Check your email.

Use the portal.

Remember your appointments.

Find transportation.

Explain your story.

Provide documentation.

Tell your story again.

Call another number.

Go somewhere else.

Wait.

Come back tomorrow.

Remain calm.

Advocate for yourself.

Don't miss the deadline.

Each requirement may sound perfectly reasonable.

But put them together and ask what kind of person is best equipped to navigate them.

Someone who is organized.

Stable.

Emotionally regulated.

Technologically capable.

Persistent.

Mobile.

Literate.

Connected.

Able to advocate effectively for themselves.

In other words, many support systems demand the greatest capacity from people at precisely the moment their capacity may be at its lowest.

That's something we should be talking about.

Support that requires substantial capacity to access isn't fully accessible support.

This is a leadership issue

I think this goes beyond homelessness or poverty.

It's about leadership.

We love comeback stories.

We celebrate the person who escaped homelessness.

We applaud the person celebrating years of recovery.

We admire the entrepreneur who lost everything and rebuilt.

We congratulate the employee who survived something terrible and returned stronger.

But where were we before the comeback?

Leadership shouldn't begin when somebody becomes inspirational again.

The harder test is when their trajectory is going the other direction.

When helping them isn't advantageous.

When they don't have anything to offer us.

When they're difficult.

When they're angry.

When they're ashamed.

When their life is messy.

When there is no photograph worth posting afterward.

Nobody can rescue everybody.

Governments have limits.

Churches have limits.

Businesses have limits.

Families have limits.

Individuals have limits.

That's reality.

But there is a considerable distance between we cannot solve everything and therefore this isn't our problem.

Maybe leadership begins somewhere inside that distance.

Maybe community isn't measured by how many people surround us while we're successful.

Maybe it's measured by how difficult it is to disappear when we're not.

And maybe before we look at someone who has reached the bottom and ask,

"What's wrong with them?"

we should ask,

"What happened to them?"

And then ask one more question:

Who did they ask before they stopped asking?

Because the person we encounter sleeping in a doorway, stealing food, struggling with addiction, losing their temper at a government counter, or simply disappearing from the communities where they once belonged didn't necessarily arrive there overnight.

We're seeing them after everything happened.

We didn't see every door that closed.

We didn't hear every unanswered call.

We weren't there for every waiting room, application, referral, or rejection.

Real community cannot exist only for people who are doing well.

Real leadership cannot simply applaud people who somehow make it back.

Sometimes leadership is noticing someone while they're still falling.

Sometimes it's asking what they actually need.

Sometimes it's opening a door before they've knocked on ten others.

And sometimes it is making sure that when another human being finally finds enough courage to say,

"I need help,"

we don't give them another reason to stop asking.