Sabrina is 23 and living under a bridge in Seattle. Sabrina and an old boyfriend hitchhiked to Seattle to spend a few weeks. Those weeks have now turned into four years of homelessness.
Sabrina says she has been on her own since she was 16. She left her hometown to explore the world, yet like so many other kids these days, she fell into the addiction of heroin.
If you’ve been following me for a bit, you’ve probably heard me talk about heroin being the perfect drug to forget the pain of homelessness. Cheap, easy to get, and the effects help you forget all the pain! Trouble is, heroin is extremely addictive, and in a very short time a person goes from getting high to needing a fix to ‘maintain’. Without the fix a heroin addict gets violently sick. For reference, Cameron gave a very honest and candid interview about addictions that you can watch here.
There is a lot more research about homelessness and it’s causes these days, and that’s a good thing. For years, I have been asking people far smarter than I am to start researching how many homeless youth end up chronically homeless as adults. I would gather, because of socioeconomic and physiological reasons, a lot of homeless kids stay homeless, which to me, is a very serious crisis.
Last week I was in Portland and I met a few young kids all addicted to heroin. Many of them still had their youthful appearance, but you could tell the drugs and the street life were quickly taking a toll.
At 23 Sabrina still has a long and fruitful life in front of her, but being very real, our socially would rather lock up a drug addict them help them get back to a normal life. We really need to work on helping homeless youth get the support they need before they end up using hard drugs for any length of time. Sabrina’s story breaks my heart, and knowing there are thousands upon thousands of other youth out there in the same situation wrecks me!
