-Today, there are nearly 40,000 veterans who are homeless and 1.5 million veterans who are considered at risk due to poverty, lack of support, and substandard housing.

When you found yourself either homeless or on the brink of homelessness, what was that like?

-Homelessness for me was devastating.

It got to a point where life was miserable.

But due to the grace of God, things change.

One crack rock and you become homeless, 'cause once you get one, one is a thousand.

But one is too many, and a thousand ain't enough.

I've had a place where I was homeless and had a place to go to but too ashamed to go back because I know what I've been doing all night.

-You're couch-surfing from one house to another.

I got to be where I was suicidal.

Finally got to where I looked in the mirror and I didn't like who I was.

If I didn't stop and do something different, I was gonna be dead or either crippled.

-Mm.

-I knew I had to do something different.

-Being a permanent homeowner now, what is that like for you?

-It's a wonderful feeling to go and lay your head down and know you have a place permanently to put your head down.

It was just a blessing to know that I'm going to live in a house.

I don't have to worry about anybody knocking on that door or sending me a certified letter saying, "You got to go."

-Hi.

I'm Stacy Pearsall, retired Air Force combat photographer.

And today I'm sitting down with Joe Towles, Pat James-Booker, and Mike Coker, three veterans who have faced housing insecurity, overcame adversity, and decided to help other veterans through their own struggles after action.

-♪ There will be light ♪ ♪♪ ♪ There is a road ♪ ♪♪ ♪ Marching on ♪ ♪♪ ♪ Coming home ♪ ♪♪ [ Birds chirping ] Major funding for After Action is provided by the ETV Endowment of South Carolina, the proud partner of South Carolina ETV and South Carolina Public Radio, and by America's Vet Dogs.

-Joe, Pat, Mike, welcome to my farm.

Thank you so much for taking the time to come and chat with me today, and thank you for your service.

I want to start out talking a little bit about each of your history with the military.

How did you choose each of your respective branches of service?

Where are you from originally?

Talk to me a little bit about what job you did in the military.

Let's start over here, Mike.

-Okay.

The reason why I joined the military -- Either you get in trouble or you join the military.

So that was my excuse.

Back in the day, I was a kind of juvenile delinquent.

Stole a car.

The car belonged to a Supreme Court judge.

So... His sisters wouldn't tell on me and my cousin, so we went down and we joined the Marine Corps.

Either that or go to jail, so that's what I did.

[ Laughs ] After that, I became an amtrac repairman.

I don't know if you know what an amtrac is.

It goes from ship to shore with the grunts in the back.

Those vehicles -- amphibious assault vehicles -- that's what I repaired for my service.

♪♪ -After serving in the Marine Corps, Mike Coker found himself addicted to drugs, in trouble with the law, and homeless.

In 2012, Mike admitted himself into one of the VA's inpatient mental-health units, where he entered the VA's substance-abuse-and-recovery program.

While there, he learned that he had been self-medicating to mask the effects of PTSD.

Through perseverance and with incredible support, Mike graduated from temporary to permanent housing, full-time work, and years of sobriety.

-Did 12 months in Okinawa.

Then I went to Pendleton.

Then I was in Camp Lejeune, and I stayed there from '79 to '81.

I got twin girls that were born on that base, and I married my first wife on that base.

So, you know... it was an experience.

-How about you, Pat?

-I went into the military because my dad was in the military.

USMC was my dad.

Marine.

Love him till the day.

I'm the oldest of four, but for a long time, everybody thought I was an only child, because when my dad went out, I went with him.

I could say "calisthenics" before I knew what gym was, because we never called it gym.

What is "gym"?

So when I went down to take the ASVAB test, of course me and my dad went together.

So when you walk into the recruiter's office, you know, everybody gets up.

They're trying to talk over each other.

So my dad said, "Everybody sit down except the Air Force."

"No, sir.

Let us give our chance to say the opportunity," you know, whatever branch has for women.

He said, "I told you to sit down.

My daughter is Air Force minimum height requirement," which is 5'2".

"She can't go in anything else.

She's not tall enough."

So like I said, even as an adult in the military, people that don't know me and my dad introduced me, that was how he did it.

"This is my daughter" -- not my name.

"This is my daughter.

She's five-foot-two, minimum height requirement.

She's in the Air Force."

-After serving eight years in the Air Force, Pat James-Booker worked as a nurse for 20 years until she suffered two strokes, which forced her into early retirement.

In another downward turn, her landlord decided not to renew her lease, and she couldn't find another affordable place, leaving her with the prospect of homelessness.

Thanks to a partnership between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Veterans Affairs, she secured an apartment for a year before inheriting a house from her late Army stepfather.

-My military experience... was wonderful.

I was stationed in California -- in Southern California... Greece, and Germany.

I worked in what's called Power Pro.

Those are the ones you see with the big trucks hauling the generators around, which supplies power.

So we go wherever everything is, because you're gonna need power.

So the other side of my job was barrier maintenance.

If anybody has ever seen "Top Gun," which I know everybody in the world has, the person where they show on the plane looks like a big J and on the ground looks like a big rubber band and they go through it -- That's to slow the plane down so that it can stop.

That is to save the life of the pilot and also the plane itself, if it can be.

I did that on land, okay?

Air Force does it on land.

Navy does it on a ship.

I served eight years in the Air Force.

And of course I had my job, but I wanted to become a nurse.

And at that time, they didn't allow me to cross-train into nursing.

So at that time, eight years, I got out, and I went to nursing school.

And I've been a nurse for 25 years.

-That's awesome.

How about you, Joe?

-In 1967, was accepted to the University of South Carolina.

So my mom was gonna have to borrow money.

Student loans were kind of, like, not a thing back then -- not that I knew of.

And so my brother-in-law was in the Air Force, and he said, "Well, you got the GI Bill, and you can go to school on down after you finish."

So I said, "Well, we'll do it."

So I went into the Air Force August 16, 1968.

Lackland Air Force Base, basic training, Keesler Air Force Base was the training for my electronic-warfare job.

And Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in Goldsboro, North Carolina, was my first duty station.

-After leaving the Air Force in 1972, Vietnam veteran Joe Towle spent years fueling a drinking habit, which graduated to hard drugs.

By 2003, Joe was fighting a drug addiction that led to losing jobs, relationships, money, and housing.

After reaching rock bottom, he contemplated suicide, and he eventually turned to the VA for help.

They provided housing, detox, and counseling support.

While achieving sobriety, Joe found God and returned to school on a mission to counsel fellow veterans like himself.

-October 14th or so, got an alert.

And we usually had drills, and we'd go through what we had to do for deployment.

But we'd never had a plane outside and didn't have the nurses at the last station.

So we go through this thinking it was a training.

We went around to the last station, and there were nurses in there giving everybody shots in their butts.

And we said, "Ruh-roh."

And so we went outside to the flight line.

They had a 141 that would take us.

And nobody knew where we were going.

It was like, you know... We landed in Alaska for fuel.

Didn't have air-to-air refueling.

It was a C-141A.

And so there, we got told that we were going to Korea.

And it was just like, "Korea?"

We didn't know nothing about Korea.

Took off from there.

Landed in Kunsan, Korea, and it was frigid.

They had five-foot snow banks on the side of the runway.

I think it was 20 degrees.

It was 60 degrees when we left North Carolina.

It was 20 degrees when we landed.

They had us in our bunny suits and everything.

That didn't work.

It was cold -- real cold.

But we worked on the F-4s.

We kept the F-4s in hangars.

One would be ready to go, in warm condition.

The rest of them outside were frozen.

If you touched them with your hand, it would actually stick to the airplane.

And we had trucks going around with heat guns, where they'd have to heat the panel up to get your hand off, because if you tried to pull it off, it'd pull your skin off.

So it was very critical that you wore your gloves.

But I worked on electronic equipment with little, teeny little things, and it was just... You know, you just had to be careful not to touch the panels.

So that was six months.

It was a TDY rotation.

Air force is good for their TDY.

It's 179 days.

Hundred and eighty days would be a PCS.

So 179 days, we would pack up our equipment, fly out.

A sister squadron would come in.

So we were one of the three squadrons that would've been at the hot spot.

But we stayed there 180 days, three rotations.

Came back home.

I had gotten selected, somehow or another, to be a USAFSS, which is United States Air Force Security Service, and went down to Lackland Air Force Base to work on EC-47s.

And that was a Vietnam gooney bird.

It was a C-47 but had a Red Cross marquee on the side of it.

And we flew around, and it wasn't it Red Cross.

It was loaded up with electronic listening devices.

Well, the ECM pods were top secret, so I was probably the only top-secret airman around.

I was a sergeant at the time.

And they said, "Well, you can escort them."

So I escorted six pods, ECM pods, to Thailand.

Went back to Seymour Johnson, and I had like 90 days left.

And the 90 days was just working around my F-4s again, doing electronic countermeasures.

-Mm.

-So I finished up August 15, 1972.

-Mike, was Japan that cold?

-Oh, no.

Scuba diving.

Snorkeling.

It was beautiful there.

Should've stayed there.

A lot of people stayed there.

Addiction was bad there, too.

It was something that... And the drugstores -- An American citizen wasn't allowed to enter the drugstore because they sold certain type of drugs in there.

And if you got caught, you'd get in trouble.

So yeah, I found myself in many ditches waking up drunk.

[ Chuckles softly ] It was terrible.

-Well, let's drill down on that a little bit.

Your options were jail or the Marines.

-Right.

-Did the Marines turn you around?

It sounds like you still got yourself in a little bit of heat.

-Oh, Lord.

It was more drinking and coming back from being out in town in just enough time to change your clothes and run PT.

And you've been out all night, and you can tell who was drinking and drugging when you're running, because you can smell them, you know?

It... The drugs didn't -- You know, it just enticed me even more, because people will go on leave and come back from Chicago, Indiana, wherever, and bring their drugs from their area to the base, and everybody would party.

People had 151 in their wall lockers and stuff like that.

So it was a drinking party.

A lot of the people in there were alcoholics and druggies.

You know, they didn't have no big thing about drugs and alcohol, you know?

Used to get drunk all the time.

I had two DUIs while I was in the military.

So that should tell you right there that drinking was not, you know -- It was a choice of life.

That's all we did -- drink, get drunk, go snorkeling.

-Was that a lot of military culture during that time?

'Cause I know, like, when I was a young enlisted person, there was a big-time drinking culture, almost to the point of binge drinking.

And that was perfectly acceptable.

Nobody really waved me off of that kind of behavior.

You know, for a young woman overseas, there are things you don't necessarily think about, you know, when you're inebriated.

-If you didn't drink, people didn't socialize with you too much.

That was it.

Maintenance platoon was a druggie platoon, to be honest with you.

But we still had a job to do.

We worked on vehicles.

-Do you think that's where your addictions kind of manifested?

-It'd grown.

Put it like that.

-Mm.

-They'd grown, 'cause when I was a teenager, I did stuff like that too.

You know, 14, 15 years old, I was smoking opium.

You know, black-tar opium.

I was growing up like that, so, you know... -So, Joe, you kind of had a similar situation, that you had a drinking substance-use disorder kind of going into the military and the military kind of fed that addiction a little bit.

-Amped it up.

Yeah.

My mom was an alcoholic.

My dad died when I was 10.

I had my first blackout; I was 12 years old.

Continued to drink little bits all during my adolescence, more as I got into high school.

Military was definitely lots of beer.

Lots of beer.

It was just beer, beer, beer.

The... I guess the time I spent in just amplified my addiction.

It certainly didn't help.

I never got in any kind of trouble, but I drank.

We drank.

You know, we had cases of beer in the dorms.

We drank till we passed out.

It was like binge drinking was what it was.

It wasn't just to have a good time.

We drank to get drunk.

So yeah, the military fed my addiction.

I mean, I was an addict, alcoholic, going in.

I think I was probably born an alcoholic.

You know, I don't remember a sober person.

You know, I don't.

I don't remember somebody who didn't drink.

They just -- Everybody drank.

-Well, the Air Force for me definitely was a -- When I was a young airman, it was a drinking culture.

And I remember -- You know, I enlisted really young, and I got stationed overseas when I was young.

And the idea of drinking alcohol, just the allure of it, wasn't there for me.

But for so many, when I got stationed overseas, there was this "Let's drink to get drunk," "Let's go party," "Let's go clubbing and drinking in excess."

So I can see how there is this "We're away from home for the first time.

We're overseas."

You don't want to be the odd man out.

You want to fit in.

-Right.

Your only family is your military family, and so you want to fit in.

So I can see how these things could lead to somebody who maybe has an addictive personality, especially if you come in with, you know, one that's already in place or you're on the fence with one or you're predisposed to having that.

That could be very, very dangerous.

That culture can be really, really hard and bleed over into their civilian lives.

Can you talk to me a little bit about what that transition was like for you after your four years and your eight years were up?

-Oh, my God.

That was the round bowl with the heroin.

And so I became a truck driver... 'cause I didn't know what was wrong with me at the time, the nightmares and stuff like that.

So being by myself made me comfortable, you know?

And I drove trucks for like 16 years, up and down from the East Coast, West Coast, not knowing that that truck was my crack house.

Because that's what it turned out to be.

I got sent to prison.

I started selling it.

Went to Mississippi.

I spent two years in Parchman State Penitentiary for embezzlement, you know, and... I guess if I would've got help when I was in the military, probably I might have slowed down.

But I guess -- Time will take time for you to learn to stop.

But a big transition from the military, doing the same thing, into a civilian life -- drinking, drugging.

Yeah.

Life could have been better.

-My after-military thing was, you know, till 1984 was just wide open.

Wide slap open.

It was just crazy.

Crazy.

Um, '84, my family convinced me to go to treatment.

And so I went to treatment and came out the smartest addict in the world.

I knew all about addiction.

But I knew that "Oh, yeah.

I can do this.

So I'll just do beer and no hard liquor."

And I was only gonna do cocaine on the weekends, you know?

So I said, "Yeah.

That'll work."

I knew I had a problem.

Just always I would stop the next time.

You know, "Just one more.

We'll stop next month."

And that never happened.

-Pat, talk to me a little bit about your nursing career and what happened in those ensuing years.

-My oldest daughter was born at a little more than seven months.

I was pregnant, and I fell down a flight of stairs.

And the reason why I'm saying that -- because she was the first one in Southern California who had the first NICU, who touched those little babies.

Ayanna weighed 3 pounds, 13 ounces.

But when I see how well they took care of my baby, I decided that I wanted to do the same thing.

-Mm.

-So like I said, I couldn't do it in the Air Force, which was fine.

I got out and went to nursing school.

I did work at the VA -- VA Veteran's -- while I was in nursing school.

However, when I graduated, I went to peds.

And that's what made me have a closeness with them.

-You said peds, like as in pediatrics?

-Yes.

Pediatric nurse.

Yes.

And I take all the babies.

-I want to talk to each of you a little bit, if you can share with me... Each of you have your own stories of housing insecurity.

What led up to it?

And since we're already talking to you, Pat, talk to me a little bit about what led up to those circumstances.

And talk to me how you found yourself in that situation.

-My issue was not the money.

I was retired.

But where I lived, the owner decided not to renew our leases once the virus, if you will -- when they could start moving people and putting people out and all this other stuff.

My thing wasn't nonpayment.

They were paid in full.

But they decided not to renew the leases because they wanted to charge more rent.

So I had 60 days to find someplace else to live.

So, when I didn't find anywhere, I came back to my dad's -- my honorary dad, my second dad -- and stayed with him.

So he was like, "Stay here till you find something else in Delaware and then just go back."

So when I was talking about it -- 'cause nobody knew that I was homeless -- because I volunteer there, I did everything that I would normally do.

And they were like, "What do you mean, you're homeless?

What?

What?

What?"

And the perception of the homeless -- I'm dirty.

I'm unkempt.

I'm sleeping on the street or in my car.

Whatever.

No.

I'm washed.

I'm bathed.

I look good.

Got a car.

All of these things.

So people just assume that when you are homeless, you did something or something's wrong, when actually it wasn't.

It was circumstance.

I didn't find anywhere to live.

So I went there, and I said, "I'm here to get information about being a homeless veteran."

Even at the VA, the lady looked at me.

And I ain't all that pretty.

You know what I'm saying?

But she looked at me, and she said, "But you said homeless."

Yes, I'm talking about myself, not a friend.

I'm talking about me.

She said the same thing -- "You don't look homeless."

Again, what does homeless look like?

They can look like anyone.

You never know someone's circumstance on becoming homeless.

But no matter how people think you look, good or bad, you're still a homeless.

So, what are you going to do for me?

So, with that being said, they had just started the program for the females a year before.

Do you know how many homeless females there are?

And then I'm tired -- No, I'm angry when I hear the phrase "You're a female."

"You're a veteran, yeah.

But you're a woman.

Women aren't homeless.

They have boyfriends.

They have husbands."

Whatever, whatever.

You never know what makes them homeless.

-Are you insinuating that women veterans have a male to rely on?

Is that what you're getting at?

-That's what they think, though.

-That's what they're projecting?

-Right.

It's always been there.

Always been there.

But nobody would recognize it.

So now, for me, long story short, I went and told them I was staying with my dad in Philly but I'm registered in Delaware.

I want to stay in Delaware.

"Okay.

You have to leave your dad's house."

I don't have anywhere to go.

My dad said I can stay until I find something.

They said, "We understand what you're saying, but what we are saying -- To get into the program, you have to be homeless, which means you have to actually move out of your dad's house and then we'll sign you up for the program, and then you go forward from there."

-And there's sheltered and unsheltered homelessness.

-Mm-hmm.

-Right.

-Right?

-Mm-hmm.

-Sheltered being, like, a long- term or short-term motel, hotel, couch-surfing friends or family.

-Mm-hmm.

-Right.

-I think you kind of touched on that, Pat, right?

It was that sort of mass generalization that homelessness is only defined as being on a street.

-Right.

-Mike, talk to me a little bit about how you became homeless in the first place.

-Oh.

Drugs and alcohol.

You just take one -- one crack rock and you become homeless, 'cause once you get one, one is a thousand.

But one is too many, and a thousand ain't enough.

I've had a place where I was homeless and had a place to go to but too ashamed to go back because I know what I've been doing all night.

So I got a car.

I sleep in my car, you know?

After I lost the car, I'm in Central Park, sleeping in Central Park.

Yeah.

And all it takes is that one.

I'm scared of that one.

You do that one hit, and it's all over.

All over.

You might as well just say you're homeless again, 'cause everything must go.

You'll have a yard sale, and everything must go.

You'll sell everything you got.

Remember that I can't just take one.

That I keep up front.

Or stay away from people, places, and things.

They don't mean me no good.

I don't need to be around them.

I started overcoming, and then I worked with the transitional housing.

And I see how the guys that leave, 60 days later, they come right back.

"What happened?"

"Oh, I met this girl, and I didn't know she smoked, and I took one hit."

And he's homeless again.

So, you know, I learned.

That's what kept me clean, watching them guys back and forth, back and forth.

I'd say to them, "All you're here right now is to take a break.

You're taking a break right now, because if you really wanted this, you'll stop, and you'll stay sober."

That's what I had to do, you know?

Really want it.

I'm tired of living like that.

-So, how did you find housing?

Like, how did you go from homeless to housing?

-I started in the ER.

When the police brought me upstairs -- took like six of them to bring me upstairs -- went to the psych ward.

Social worker came out.

"How are you doing?

You have a place?

"No.

I'm homeless.

So when I get discharged, if you discharge me, I'm gonna go back and do the same thing I'm doing.

I need somewhere to stay."

"Okay."

Next thing you know, I went to Vet Villa.

That's where I met Joe Towles.

CRSV, Vet Villa.

Next thing I know, I had a standard program to follow -- Go to treatment every day, learn about yourself every day, have a curfew every day -- structure that I didn't have, you know?

And that structure led me to be self-disciplined, and I remembered not to act off my feelings.

Take your time.

If somebody makes you mad, just...hold on a second.

All that didn't work before because I wasn't ready.

And this time, I was ready.

Ready to stop.

And I've learned.

I've seen people like Joe Towles dressing good, got a car, got money in your pocket.

Oh, man!

I'm staying with the winners.

You know what I mean?

Those are the winners.

They're trying to do something.

And trying to help an addict helped me too.

If I see somebody out there that's -- "Look.

Let me talk to you.

You know what you're doing wrong?"

Or, "You know what you need to do?"

Let me -- Follow what I'm doing, because if you want to get what I got, you got to do some things.

It just don't come by that.

You got to do some things.

You got to do some work.

-Now, the VA took steps to put you into programs and help you through sobriety.

What was that programming like?

-So, in order to stay in housing, you have to participate in their program.

Now, once you did so many days -- 60 days or whatever the case -- and you exhausted your -- how do you say?

-- your extensions or whatever, you do get housing through HUD-VASH.

HUD-VASH is a program.

It's like Section 8.

You get housing.

They ask you a bunch of questions.

And as you're staying at the transitional housing, you get a chance to go to the VA every day.

You do so many classes.

Then, if you want, you can participate as a CWT, which is Compensated Work Therapy program, where they'll pay you minimum wage to come to the VA and do EMS or whatever job they got for minimum wage.

It's not like earning wages.

It's a stipend or -- It's a stipend, and you just earn that until you get yourself back in the workforce.

You know what I mean?

Right now, today, I work for the federal government.

And I'm a convict.

You know what I'm saying?

I went to Parchman State Penitentiary.

I'm considered a convict.

But I was not in trouble so many years that the VA hired me anyway.

So, you know, bought a home, got married.

You know, thanks to Vet Villa and Charleston Vets, you know, working two jobs, I established my credit to be able to buy a home.

-Now, you mentioned having a really good mentor to look up to.

-Mm-hmm.

-Happens to be sitting right across from you.

-Oh, yeah.

-So, back -- I guess it was probably 1998, I got introduced to crack cocaine.

Crack cocaine just took me down.

I became a nonexistent father.

I got them every other weekend.

I was divorced.

I got them every other weekend.

It didn't happen, because crack cocaine was happening.

And I was not gonna have my kids and doing crack.

I knew I couldn't do that.

And it was a weekend thing, and then it got to be a couple of times during the week, and then it was an everyday thing.

Got to be homeless, couch-surfing families, friends.

Crack cocaine got me to the point where I started stealing stuff from anybody I could.

You know, and the friends would see stuff missing, and they said, "Joe did that.

We're not gonna let him stay here anymore."

Well, the couch-surfing got less and less and less from friends.

So I started couch-surfing crack houses.

And that was not a good thing.

I got to the point where I just really didn't know what else to do.

I mean, I had exhausted everybody's patience, and, you know, I was -- I didn't like who I was.

Finally got to where I looked in the mirror, and I didn't like who I was, okay?

Finally got to the point to where I had a suicide plan.

Borrowed my brother's car.

My plan was that I was gonna drive into one of the oak trees on Highway 61.

They had some huge oak trees.

Well, I got the car.

I rolled the windows down.

Took the seat belt off and got up about 80 miles an hour and saw a tree coming, and I said, "I'm gonna do it."

But I chickened out.

Swerved the car, pulled off on the side of the road, and just started crying.

That was the trigger point to where I knew I had to do something different.

So the night of April 15th, I was taking a big hit of crack, and my right side all went completely numb, and I was falling on the couch.

But I felt at that time that God had told me that if I didn't stop and do something different, I was gonna be dead or either crippled.

-Mm.

-And I knew that.

Well, the next morning, I went down to the VA hospital and told them about my suicide plan and failure.

And they asked me what I was thinking.

I said, "Well, if I can't stop or I can't do it, I'll kill myself."

Next thing I know, I had two armed guards taking me up to 3A, into the rubber room.

I don't remember the first couple or two or three days.

So day four, probably, you get to get out of the rubber room.

And it's a rectangle at 3A.

And it's got a seating area in the middle with bookshelves all around, and you can watch TV.

So I went there, and I just felt -- I said, you know -- I was a Christian.

I knew who God was as a little kid.

I knew I needed to get back to that.

I knew that God was God and Jesus was somebody I needed to have in my life.

So I was looking around for a Bible.

And I didn't find one.

They didn't have a Bible there.

If they did, I didn't find it.

But I did find a Charles Stanley devotional -- small, little packet -- with 30 devotionals in it.

-Mm-hmm.

-Well, I opened that up, and I read the first devotional.

Midway through that, I found a prayer in the middle of the magazine, and it was the Savior Prayer.

So I remember reading that prayer and saying, "Amen," and looking around to see if something had changed.

If you're born again, something's got to be different.

Nothing was different.

And each day, I'd say the prayer, and then I'd look around and go, "It's not happening."

So I didn't know what I was doing wrong, what it was.

So I went to Vet Villa.

I was offered housing if I committed to go into outpatient treatment.

And at the time, you know, I just went, "This has got to be a God thing."

You know, here I'm homeless.

They offer me housing, and I'm getting a drug-treatment program.

So I went out to Vet Villa.

Took that -- I didn't start off good.

Took the magazine.

I stole the magazine from the VA.

The Charles Stanley -- I didn't start very good.

I was making meetings.

The thing is, the first three months, you're supposed to be doing 90 meetings in 90 days.

Well, I was making meetings out the, you know.

I think I made 140 meetings in the first 90 days.

I knew I needed it.

If I was in a meeting, there was nobody smoking a crack pipe.

Nobody was gonna be drinking.

So that was my safe place -- Vet Villa, meeting, VA.

So get back to the Savior Prayer.

Found a church that next week.

And went there -- I just went by myself, 'cause it was another one of these God things.

Found a church that was on a bus line.

So the first day I went there, I took that magazine with me.

I put it in my back pocket, and I went down to the pastor at the end of the church service, and I opened it up to that prayer.

And I said, "I've been saying this.

Is this a prayer -- Am I born again?"

He took it from me, and he looked at it and was reading it.

He looked over to me and looked it real close so he could see it.

And he said, "Did you say that prayer from your heart?"

And I said, "Yeah.

I've been saying it."

And he says, "You're done.

You're a child of God."

[ Voice breaking ] And I get tears thinking about it now.

The weight of the world went off my shoulders.

And it was... It's hard to... I mean, I presume other people know what I'm talking about.

But it just -- it just... And I live it today.

You know, I continue to live it.

And I know that God's got me.

I know that the father that I had missed all along was right there.

So I'm a follower of Jesus.

Like Mike was saying, the only way to keep what God has given me is by giving it away.

And so all of what He's given me, you know, the talents, the affordability, housing, sobriety, all of that -- the only way to keep it is by sharing it with others.

-Big-time supporters and mentors within our community, which I absolutely love and appreciate about all of you.

Community and support is so important during that time, especially when you're dealing with mental-health issues.

And isolation is really contradictory to mental-health...health.

So do you guys have any... any advice or things that got you through those times or what you used to advise?

And even you, Pat.

You're a mentor for many women who are dealing with homelessness.

-When you mentor, you can't be judge and jury.

You have to be a supporter no matter what they did, because that's not your role.

Your role is to help them and encourage them on the days that they call you at 3:00 and say, "I don't really want to talk to you.

Would you just stay on the phone?"

Or when you have that veteran that says, "Pat, you said if I need to go to the emergency room, you will meet me there."

"Yeah.

Do I need to call the ambulance too?

Or I just need to meet you there?"

Those are the things that we do as mentors.

And that's the thing I want people to understand.

Anybody can be a mentor.

Anybody.

But you have to be a mentor for what they need.

They don't need anybody to tell them, "Well, I wouldn't have done that."

"Oh, my goodness.

You did that?"

I don't need anybody to judge.

I need somebody to help me.

And I feel it's an honor to be a mentor because I know everybody can't do it.

And we're not superheroes, but we know individually what we have been through, and we also know what brought us through.

-So with that, I want to ask you this.

When somebody is driving down the road and they encounter a veteran or somebody who's on the side of the road who has a sign that says "Homeless veteran.

I need help.

I need support," you know, the easiest way is for somebody to put a $5 bill out, a $20 bill out.

But to me, I tend not to want to do that because I feel like I would just be maybe handing them off money to go and feed their addiction, whatever that addiction is.

What is usually the best approach to help support them?

Is it to... -I don't know that there is a right approach.

But my approach would be to -- I stop, okay?

I'll pull up to the parking lot or wherever, the closest place I can, and go and talk to him.

The resources that I know -- I make sure he knows about the resources.

Sometimes they are homeless and don't want the help.

But I'm not one to give them money.

I just know for me what I'd have done.

"Hop in the car.

Let's go get a sandwich."

Or I'll get him a sandwich and bring it back.

-And we can't assume that everyone has an addiction on the side of the road either, right?

-That's why you stop and you talk to them and see what they're about.

But watch your surroundings when you do approach them, 'cause you don't know what kind of situation it's got going on.

And all I can do for them is give them my experience, my strength, and hope if he's willing to listen.

-Well, but the person on the side of the road, whether he's a veteran or not, is in dire straits.

-Yeah.

-You know, homelessness is a thing.

Veteran homelessness, you know, that's my cup of tea.

But if you're homeless, I'm gonna help you also.

-Mm-hmm.

-So I don't -- You know, I don't try to figure out if it's a veteran or not.

If they're homeless, they're homeless.

I will talk to them about their service if they say they're a veteran.

But I'll stop.

If it's not a veteran that panhandling money on the side of the road, I'll stop for them, too.

-Yeah.

-Because they're no different.

They just didn't serve.

-I guess just for us, we have unique opportunities through different organizations, nonprofit organizations or the VA, that we have the ability to reach out to.

And, Pat, that leads me to you, because, you know, the resources for female veterans are a little bit more difficult because transitional housing is a lot more limited for women.

Can you talk to me a little bit about what led you to start your nonprofit for women veterans?

-My nonprofit is called Veterans in Between, and it stands for "Veterans Intermittent --" in the middle -- Between" being in the military and civilian life.

And a lot of females, unfortunately, fall into that category because they may have been married in the military, got divorced since they've been out.

Where's their housing?

They're not married anymore.

Where are they living?

Whatever it is, you need to be out.

Now you need somewhere to stay.

Where do I go?

And also, depending on your discharge of service, depends on if you can still go to homeless programs too.

-Mm-hmm.

-You have to have a certain discharge.

-The VA has changed.

You can have a dishonorable discharge and not have healthcare but still have housing.

-Okay.

-Right?

So they can go to CRC and be dishonorably discharged.

Will not be available to nothing else except for housing.

-And it was because at the time they couldn't get anything and they didn't know where to go and what to do.

I just wanted to see them off the street, out of their cars, somebody's driveway, somebody's doorway because they were so fearful of going what used to be "home."

-Mm-hmm.

-You see what I'm saying?

You don't have to worry about "Where am I gonna lay my head today?

What am I gonna eat today?"

And I'm very proud of that because it at least gets them out of that situation, immediate situation, and then we can start to work on what needs to be done to put your life back together.

There was a female veteran that was so afraid to be in her living situation that she would rather live in the car.

It was winter.

We knew her, another veteran, because we see her at the VA.

Again, never knew she was homeless.

I would go to different meetings for moral support, be a supporter.

Not my issue, but I can be supportive of you.

What you need?

When I got the call... I'm not gonna cry.

[ Voice breaking ] And I got a call that told me that this veteran froze to death in her car... ...because that was where she used to sleep.

Think about whatever that lady wanted, that sleeping in the car was the good side of her situation, better than what she was.

You know how hard that had to be?

No.

I can't even imagine.

I don't want to imagine that something's so bad that you would rather sleep in the car in the winter than to be in wherever she came from -- warm, whatever it is.

But the car was her best alternative.

Are you kidding me?

But I'm glad now that female veterans are getting the services that they need -- also they earned.

-I know it was difficult to share your experiences with us, and I want to thank you for your vulnerability.

I want to ask -- What does it mean to be home?

-Peace of mind.

You know what I mean?

-Mm-hmm.

-Peace of mind that that chapter of my book is closed for now, you know?

And I hope to never reopen it again.

And I do not want to read that book over again, either, that chapter over again.

You know, that's the chapter I want to keep closed.

You know, I got a new chapter in life now, and it's doing great.

I'm about to retire in July and live the rest of my life, you know?

'Cause I should've been dead a long time ago.

-I'm glad you're not, though, Mike.

-Long time ago.

But God's grace, I'm still here.

-Home.

Went from homeless to homeful.

I'm grateful beyond any kind of means, you know, giving God all the glory.

You know, we have a truly blessed life.

You know, you go home.

I've got two cats -- got two rescue kitties -- and got a three-bedroom house, and each cat has their own bedroom.

And it's just joyful, you know?

Like I say, I'm homeful.

God has been good to me.

I remain grateful for God, the AA/NA community, VA hospital -- you know, all the people that have supported me.

You know, it's truly just beyond any kind of, really, description.

You know, just blessed.

Blessed.

-Mine is just a little different, but the results were still the same.

Amen.

-Mm-hmm.

-My dad -- honorary dad -- was my mother's second husband.

When they married, I was already in my 40s.

I already had, you know, grown kids.

But his name was Frank, and he was a wonderful husband to my mom.

He really was.

So when my mom passed away, he did good for a long time.

But when he needed someone to take care of him, I'm gonna say there was no one only because he never had biological kids.

And I thought it was an honor to be able to take care of him.

He was Army.

I'm Air Force.

Imagine that.

In the same room.

I open the curtains.

He closed it.

Okay, Dad.

We got to work this thing out.

So when I found out that he had left me -- I'm not gonna cry -- his house in Philly... -Mm.

-...it meant that I could move.

Even though I love Delaware.

Nothing wrong with the state.

But it gave me the opportunity that I didn't have to worry about the rent.

Although I paid mine.

You know what I'm saying?

I didn't have to worry about the landlord all of a sudden deciding, "Well, I'm not gonna renew your lease 'cause I'm gonna do something else," which is what made me homeless in the first place.

So it was just a blessing to know that I'm going to live in a house, no matter how long, but I don't have to worry about anybody knocking on that door or sending me a certified letter saying, "You got to go."

That's peace of mind.

But you don't have to worry about -- You don't have to worry -- that's the key word -- about where you're going to be able to stay.

-Mm-hmm.

-And that is the biggest thing.

"Where am I going to be able to lay my head and close my eyes and feel safe doing that?"

-I want to thank you for your vulnerability today.

It took a lot.

So thank you.

-An honor.

-I appreciate it.

-Mm-hmm.

-I...thank you for coming to my house.

-Thank you for having us.

-Thank you.

You're always welcome in my home.

We'll hopefully find homes for everybody who needs them at any time.

-Yeah.

-♪ There will be light ♪ ♪ There is a road ♪ ♪ Marching on ♪ ♪ Coming home ♪ ♪♪ ♪♪