Unshakeable Positivity: Shakes and Her Journey Out of Homelessness
Shakes and her True North Quality Aftercare Case Manager, Suzzy (left).
At her home in Oroville, Sister Shakes has a sign in her front window that reads: “Have hope and be strong. Remember you are loved. Never give up.”
The sign is next to a photo of the Honeyrun Bridge before it was destroyed in the Camp Fire, which also destroyed her former home. On the opposite wall, a very special certificate with her name on it is hanging. It honors her completion of a mindfulness-based substance use disorder recovery class while she was a guest at the Torres Shelter in Chico.
“This is one of my greatest achievements in life,” she said, a smile on her face.
Shakes is celebrating one year in her new home after experiencing homelessness on the streets of Chico. True North Housing Alliance’s Street Outreach Team first contacted her at a local park, and that’s how she came to stay at the Torres Shelter.
These three items hanging in her new home are emblematic of Shakes as a person: a Camp Fire survivor who loves her community. A person who has survived many hardships and health challenges. Someone who has continued to have hope for the future and encourage others.
“I was walking in the darkness of the street, hoping the light would come soon. The possibility and reality of what I needed was clouded,” she said. “True North Housing Alliance kept me grounded.”
Born and raised in Chico and baptized at a local Catholic church, Shakes was a creative child, despite her unstable home life. She witnessed domestic violence and was diagnosed with multiple mental health conditions from a young age. Throughout her childhood and young adulthood, she experienced homelessness off and on.
Her faith and her music provided a comfort and solace to her. At 12 years old she taught herself how to play the guitar by watching musicians on MTV, studying how their fingers moved across their instruments and mimicking the movements.
“Music lives through me, and I live through music,” she said.
As an adult, Shakes settled in Paradise. She lived there for 16 years before she lost everything in the Camp Fire—her home, her job, and everything she owned.
“Five years later and it still feels like your house burned down yesterday,” she said.
Shakes moved many times and tried staying with family, but she struggled to find a stable, safe place to live and began living on the streets in a trailer. She started drinking again and relapsed after many years of sobriety.
“I didn’t know what to do,” she said.
While on the streets, Shakes, a 40-year-old woman, was beaten and feared for her life. She kept turning to her faith and trying to find ways to help other unhoused folks, making and sharing meals. She tried and struggled to regain her sobriety.
That was when she was contacted by the True North Housing Alliance Street Outreach Team. The Street Outreach Team goes to different parks and encampments in the community to help reach folks who are living unhoused and get them connected to resources to help end their homelessness.
“People are scared to trust. That’s the start of the transition out of it, and it’s hard because of how much they’ve lost,” Shakes said. But she saw that the True North Street Outreach Team “gave folks out there help,” she said, and that’s why she decided to take a chance and trust that they could help her.
The Street Outreach team helped transport Shakes and her belongings to the Torres Shelter. There, Shakes received support from her Case Manager Caitlin to break down her barriers to housing. She helped her access mental health care medication and therapy, enroll in the Torres Shelter’s substance use disorder mindfulness class, and create housing goals. Due to her health conditions, Shakes qualified for disability, and began saving for a place.
"Shakes was a very positive figure at the shelter,” her True North Quality Aftercare Case Manager Suzzy said.
Shakes added that she always tried her best to work on “giving others hope and inspiration” to keep working hard, especially when she had her own hard days.
Last summer, she moved to her new place in Oroville, supported by True North’s Rapid Rehousing Program, which provides financial assistance with things such as application fees and deposits to break down barriers to securing housing.
After she moved in, she also joined the Quality Aftercare Program with True North. As part of this program, Shakes received a case manager who comes to check in on her and help her navigate her first year on her own in her new place. The program helps folks establish new goals, form new community connections and hobbies, and build skills (such as in managing finances and budgeting), so that they are equipped to maintain their housing.
"It’s very important to have continued support during that transition from experiencing homelessness to being housed,” Suzzy said. “Finding a supportive community helps folks feel less isolated and improves their wellbeing.”
There is a tangible joy that radiates from Shakes when she shows a friend her new place. Just outside her home, she’s created a garden with succulents and hand-painted rocks. She’s made friends with her neighbors, and they love to walk to church together on Sundays and share meals together.
She’s joined a local Alcoholics Anonymous group and is approaching one year sober after her relapse. She loves to volunteer at a local nonprofit that provides services to unhoused folks in Oroville.
Shakes said she’s grateful that she has been able to live independently given the severity of her mental health conditions and challenges. She hopes that her story can inspire others who also face similar struggles and are living unhoused, she said.
“Though it has been a tough road for her because of her many health challenges, she always finds a way to keep a positive head on her shoulders,” Suzzy said.
In this chapter of her life, Shakes has realized that she doesn’t have to “be in the street mindset” anymore. That she can find comfort in the fact that she has a home and a community to help her, support her, and cheer her on.
“Last year when I was unhoused, it was, ‘Oh, I gotta get back to my tent, it’s raining!’ This winter I was looking at that beautiful rain bouncing off my trailer,” she said. “I wake up and walk around and I hug my trailer and say, ‘See, I told you! We made it.”’