6:00 a.m. I woke up in the tent. The weather is starting to break. It’s getting warmer and I’m happy about this. I collected my stuff and headed off to work.
7:00 a.m. The Outreach team arrives at the Daybreak shelter. I get caught up on paperwork, and inform Michael, the man I met the day before, that we are willing to help him pay off his dues for his license. I also connected Michael to a social service provider in Lowell where he stays sometimes to help him with other services.
At 9am the Outreach team and Mitchell The treatment outreach worker stopped by to check on Jess and Pedro. They said that they have not been going to the clinic for their methadone. Jess and Pedro took Backpacks, cosmetics, socks, drinks, food, and some clothes from us.
9:30 am we stopped to check on Euriel, he did not respond so we drove back to the shelter to pick up Alaina, a mental health clinician that works for the detox that Mitchell works for. We proceeded to drive around, and we saw Lewis walking. We asked her if she wanted treatment, at first he was resistant and did not want to wait to go to treatment. Then he agreed to come with us and go to treatment since I told him we would drive him there. Michael called AdCare and they didn’t have a bed. They did an intake in case one became available. I called Jason at a detox in Worcester who secured a bed for me immediately. My Outreach partner and I then drove Lewis to the detox in Worcester which was an hour drive. I also did Lewis’s file in the homeless database and did the rapid rehousing referral for him.
When the outreach team arrived back at the shelter our day was done it was 3:00 p.m.It was a bit of a sad day, because this will be the last time that I do outreach with my current outreach partner. He will be moving on to a job working with children. He was a doctor in the Dominican Republic. Although he is highly educated, his English still needs a lot of work, but he will be well suited to teach children biology. Especially since the majority of children in the town I work speak Spanish and are bilingual.
I drove to my girlfriend’s apartment, and we spent the night together.