By Michele DeLuca
NIAGARA FALLS — She was too young to have children. She knows that now. But she loves them too much for regret. And it’s really not her past that concerns her. It’s her future and theirs which holds her attention now.
Brandi is a 25-year-old resident of Carolyn’s House in Niagara Falls. Her last name cannot be used to protect her privacy, but one important note can be shared. Her life may have been saved by the support network available to her at Carolyn’s House, a residence for woman who are homeless or abused or simply out of luck.
For Brandi, a mother of three, it was a matter of simply not being able to make life work out as it should. Things were bad with her children’s father, and after he moved out of their home, she couldn’t pay the rent. She and her young sons were evicted.
“I felt like the world was going to come crashing down on me,” the young woman said in a soft voice. “I just had it in my mind that I was never going to get nowhere.”
The difference between her and hundreds of other young men and women who are desperately struggling to find their way, is that Brandi had a giant safety net open up for her, and just when she felt as scared and alone as person could feel, she landed amidst the welcoming support of the people at Carolyn’s House.
Carolyn’s House provided her and her boys with a place to live, inside a lovely, four story brick building on 6th Street that was once used to house nursing students from the now-closed hospital across the street.
Today, the building still houses students, but they are students of life. They’re learning trades, parenting and coping skills, and ultimately how to navigate through a world that can seem impossibly confusing and even closed-off to young people who are not prepared.
At Carolyn’s House, Randi lives in a comfortable three bedroom apartment, where she will be allowed to remain as long as she is working toward her goals and participating in the programs offered to her.
Recently, surrounded by her sons, Hunter, 5, Glenn, 3, and Shane, 2 months, she talked about how her life has changed since she arrived at the house.
“At first, we were overwhelmed,” she remembered, of the day she walked into a little apartment furnished and decorated with a loving touch by Carolyn’s House volunteers. “But, now we all feel more secure and happy.”
She is training for a career in culinary arts, taking classes each day in the industrial kitchen in the building’s basement, while her sons are sent to colorful daycare rooms in a nearby wing. She is also participating in parenting classes in the evening, and finds comfort in a place filled with women and children, where something is always going on.
“I am never bored here,” Randi explained. “I just like the fact that there’s something for me to do here everyday.”
The support she receives from the community at Carolyn’s House has given Randi a new kind of confidence, and a chance to re-examine childhood dreams of being a photographer or a veterinarian.
“I’m taking it day by day,” she said. “First I want to get a job, and then get my own home.”’
Ultimately, she wants to reconcile with the children’s father, who is also working to improve himself through counseling.
“Their father is very much involved in their lives,” she noted, gesturing toward her baby in the nip-nap and her two little sons as they played nearby.
“He has a lot of potential and skills. He just doesn’t have the same opportunities that I do.”
Carolyn’s House director, Teresa Martinez, who was sitting nearby amusing the baby as Randi talked, said that a men’s version of Carolyn’s House would enhance the potential of the young family’s success. “If we had a male program, I think he would be in it and taking full advantage of it.”
In the meantime, Randi is fully engaged in the opportunities at the house. “I don’t feel as scared of the world,” she said quietly. “I’m more confident. I believe the future is going to be better.”
Contact Michele DeLuca at 693-1000, Ext. 157.
