Tough Questions

This week R.O.C. members were asked to share some of the tough questions they encounter while doing this work. These questions could come from clients, community members, or outreach workers themselves. There is no handbook full of answers on how to handle the situations that we encounter and the questions we are asked on a daily basis. So this leads us to doing our best to navigate and work alongside those experiencing homelessness to figure out the answers. When we don’t have the answers to these tough questions and others like them, we hope to still do the tough work of being able to answer “YES” to our client’s questions of “Will they show up again?”, “Do they care about me?”, “Can I be heard and listened to?”, and “Should I trust them?”

“How was your day at work?”

“How is work going?”

“Don’t you feel unsafe with those people?”

“Don’t you feel so good about that work?”

“Why would they have pets if they can’t even take care of themselves?”

When clients ask when my birthday is/what my zodiac sign is, it’s not hard to answer, but it’s a sure sign of an imminent tangent.

When anyone asks, “How’s so-and-so?” and the answer is: “Oh, um, they died.”

The dilemma of answering the question of whether or not to prioritize helping someone who is on the Sexual Offender Registry.

“Approximately how long will it take for me to get housed? Is there any way we can speed that process up for me? I’m not supposed to be out here.”

“Do you know of anywhere else that we can go? Because we can’t stay here anymore.” Or “Where are these people going to go?”

“What are you going to do about all these homeless people trashing this property?”

“Where am I at on the list for housing?”

Internally I am always asking, “How much time do I spend with this person before I move on to the next?”

“Why does someone like you care about someone like me?”

“Have I done enough?” or “Could I have done more for them?”