Chapter 17: Needing to Find Work and an Income

July 2006.

I was 40 years old and had spent the past two years fighting to survive—homeless, betrayed, falsely accused, and now branded as a criminal. The Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) had funded my certification in Web Design, but what good was a skill set when I had no home, no stability, no future?

VR had determined, with my input, that a traditional job would be difficult for me. A home-based business was the plan. But without a home, how was I supposed to make it work?

It felt like another cruel joke—handing me a tool with no way to use it.

Forced to Rewrite Reality

My VR counselor encouraged me to "handle" my conviction when searching for work. But what he really meant was:

"You need to act like you’re guilty and that you want another chance in life."

He didn’t say it outright, but her meaning was clear. I was expected to craft a version of reality where I played the role society had assigned me—the ex-convict, the felon, the man who had supposedly committed a violent crime.

They wanted me to participate in my own erasure.

I couldn’t do it.

I had already lost my freedom, my reputation, my career, my dignity—but I refused to surrender my truth.

I know that the advice matched the way many people think about the justice system. They assume that one would not plead guilty if they didn’t commit a crime. However, every aspect of the plea deal and how I was supposed to respond to the judge were pre-arranged outside my involvement.

Guilt had never been made concrete and real when I seemed to plead guilty in front of the judge. I literally lacked the ability to summon up air to vocalize my truth.

A Chance at Stability

Desperation forced me into meetings with community agencies—groups funded to address homelessness and poverty. It was at one of these meetings that I met Vanessa, a representative from the local mental health center.

She listened. She saw how deep the injustice ran.

And she did something no one else had done—she tried to help.

She got me connected to a housing program called Shelter Plus Care—a lifeline for those who had been homeless for at least two years and had a disability diagnosis. Normally, people wait years for a Section 8 voucher. I had applied but knew approval was a distant dream.

Yet, within weeks of the infamous plea deal my lawyer had forced on me, I was approved.

Approved for housing.
 

Approved to live like a person again.

I moved into an apartment in Carrboro, a small town next to Chapel Hill. It wasn’t much, but it was mine.

Even now, in 2025, I still rent that same place. The rent has never gone up. It has become my only form of permanence in a life that has been anything but stable.

But back then, I was terrified.

Would my criminal record destroy this fragile new beginning? I was referring to my housing situation.

"Don’t mention it," my job coach told me.

For once, I listened.

I had been handed a miracle, and I wasn’t going to let them take it away.

Declared Disabled by the Federal Government

With nowhere else to turn, I applied for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI).

I had hired a disability lawyer, knowing that every case gets denied the first two times—not because people aren’t disabled, but because the system is designed to make them fight for it. Lawyers profit off the appeal process, taking 30% of the backpay when the case is finally approved.

It was another system rigged against the vulnerable, but I had no choice.

The application was backdated to 2003, but the case finally came before a judge in 2006, around the time I moved into my new home. My lawyer argued my case based on Major Depressive Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorder.

He wasn’t wrong.

But he left out the biggest truth—I wasn’t just depressed, I was traumatized.

I had been victimized multiple times—first by Ana, then by the police, then by the courts, and finally by a world that refused to believe me.

PTSD would be added to my medical records later, but by then, the damage was done.

The federal government ruled that I was 100% disabled.

100% unable to work.
100% discarded by society.

The financial payout came in—around $30,000—a lump sum for the years I had already suffered. After that, I would receive a monthly check slightly above the federal poverty level.

It was survival money, not a future.

No amount of money could undo what had happened.

A Life I Never Imagined

I was 40 years old.

I had two degrees. I had built a life, a career, a purpose—only to watch it all be ripped away in an instant.

I never imagined a future where I would be branded a criminal.
Where I would be classified as disabled.
Where I would be forced to live under the weight of a lie I could never erase.

I had been given a roof over my head, but I was still trapped.

Still fighting ghosts I couldn’t outrun.

Still chained to a past I didn’t choose.

I told myself I would keep going, that I would find a new way forward.

But even with a home, even with a check arriving every month, even with the semblance of stability, the truth remained:

I had already lost everything that ever mattered.

And I had no idea how to get it back.