[Hpn] Venting

[Tyedye38@aol.com]

It seems that the stigma of being homeless follows you even after you obtain 
a place to live in normal society.  I really don't know where to begin with 
this, I am so very angry.  Night before last, my husband drank to excess.  
This led him to be on the "disorderly" side.  Memories of the past brought 
forth fear.  I called the local cops (which I rarely do, having little to no 
respect for their actions in the past), only to get a ride to a "safe house" 
for the night, until he sobered up.  Being new to the state of Rhode Island, 
I had no idea as to where I could go, finances would not let me rent a motel 
room and I don't have a vehicle to go with, that is why I was calling. The 
police arrived and took my husband to jail.  They charged him with domestic 
violence (as he had tossed the phone to me earlier, it struck my leg, leaving 
no mark) and disorderly conduct.  The next morning, he was to be arraigned at 
9:00AM.  I was there at that time.  He was not brought into court until 
2:00pm.  The first thing that I did was to talk to the court advocates 
(domestic violence ladies) about having the no contact order vacated.  I 
explained the situation, telling them that it is rare for my husband to do 
this.  It is a once in a blue moon thing.  At the end of the day, my husband 
had been both arraigned and sentenced, charged with disorderly conduct, the 
domestic violence charges dropped.  He was placed on 6 months of formal 
probation, fined $188., ordered to attend alcohol abuse classes as well as 
domestic violence classes (to be paid for out of our pockets).  When they 
released my husband and we got home, even more anger set in.  My husband 
showed me bruises, cuts and scrapes that are all over his body.  I asked him 
how this happened.  He said that one of the booking cops, told him that one 
of his fingerprints were smudged and he threw him up against the bars, the 
wall and slammed him onto the concrete floor.  When the cops pulled up his 
records, his military records came up as well.  The cop told him that he was 
just another one of these vietnam vets who go around blaming everyone and 
everything on being  a vietnam vet.  My husband has long hair, a mustache and 
a beard.  They were calling him Charlie Manson.  They asked if he had any 
health problems.  He told them about having Hepatitis C.  They immediately 
put on gloves and started yelling to everyone around that he was contaigous.  
They treated him even rougher after that.  They told him that they "know" 
that he is dealing heroin out of our apartment and that they had him marked 
and would be watching his every move.  I am so angry!  I wanted to go and 
talk to someone, to have something done about the way that they were physical 
with him.  He was charged with domestic violence.....yet, he never hurt 
me.....here they were hurting him terribly, phyically and mentally.  My 
husband won't allow me to do anything about this, as he thinks that it will 
only make the local cops worse towards him.  It is looking like our only 
option at this point, is to sell what we have (which isn't much, a few 
household items only) and become homeless once more.  Find another state to 
move to where we are not known.  The fact of us being homeless for six years 
was brought up.  The fact that we both have hepatitis C, was brought up and 
associated with being homeless---what do they think?  That ALL the homeless 
people are infected with the hepatitis C virus?  That we spread it just by 
regular physical contact?  Truth be known (and who knows anyway for sure, I 
think we are never really given the truth about these type of diseases 
anyway, HIV, all the hepatitis, etc.), my husband had colon cancer and had to 
have blood transfusions---this happening a year or so before we became 
homeless for the first time!  And what about the vietnam vets?  Most of them 
do have hepatitis C, stemming from active duty.  There is talk (from one of 
the vet websites, cannot remember the name of it now, but, could find it 
again), that the immunizations that the vets received, could have been the 
cause of it.  The immunization "gun", was used repeatedly, going down the 
line of soldiers.  This is beleived to have spread the virus.  All of that 
aside.  What are people to do?  Once homeless, always homeless?  To us, it 
seems the best choice.  We cannot "fit" into a normal society at all.  We are 
more comfortable on the street, where really, the most you have to worry 
about (for us, anyway), is finding a safe place to sleep and your next mean.  
I would appreciate any feedback on this subject, as I am beside myself with 
anxiety from it all.  I really don't want to break up my home, yet, I do not 
want to be bothered from cops or people with attitudes.  Why can't people 
just live and let live?                               ~tyedye~