As a teen in Sarasota, Candace Choate seethed in frustration toward her mother.
Abused for years as a child by a male friend of the family, Candace started therapy at the age of 12.
At that same time her mother became a single mom, supporting Candace and her two brothers by working two jobs.
To Candace, wrestling with her trauma, all she knew was that her mother was never home.
“I was going through the wringer, and my mom not being there – that was a lot,” Candace said.
Candace hated the times they had to move, when Candace and her brothers had to quickly gather their things to leave their home following another three-day eviction notice.
“How can you be a parent and not take care of the bills?” Candace would rage at her mom.
Time has given Candace a different perspective on her mother’s struggles.
“I obviously did not realize how hard it is being a single parent,” Candace said, “until I had to do it.”
Reaching rock bottom
By her early twenties, Candace was raising an infant – and often on her own – amid an on-again, off-again relationship with her daughter’s father.
Candace had studied accounting and worked various jobs.
But grappling with PTSD and low confidence linked to her past abuse, she struggled to juggle motherhood and a fledging career.
Throughout it all, Candace’s mother supported her through encouragement and by babysitting or slipping her extra cash.
Never was that support needed more than this spring, when Candace – now 29 – lost her job and her housing in the course of a week. “I thought that was rock bottom,” she said.
“I found out it could go a little deeper.”
Supportive mother
After her mother took in Candace and her daughter, Trinity, now 6, Candace spent the summer searching for jobs.
Panicked, she filled out one application after another – including for minimum-wage positions she knew could not sustain her.
Meanwhile her mother – working full time in the health department – spared no expense for her daughter and grandchild.
With Candace’s savings exhausted, her mother covered groceries and other bills in her Sarasota apartment – just as food and utility costs began soaring for thousands of area households in recent months.
“She fell behind on her bills, trying to take care of me and my daughter,” Candace said.
Pretty soon, that included the rent.
Candace cooked and helped out in the home but worried about maintaining a roof over her daughter’s and mother’s heads.
Many days she felt deflated, but her mother spurred her to continue trying.
After an agonizing number of letdowns, Candace finally got a flurry of job interviews.
One seemed particularly promising – as a Sarasota school district bus aide for special needs students.
For Candace, whose younger brother and daughter have been diagnosed with autism, the job was right up her alley. “I’ve been around special-needs kids,” she said. “I want to do that.”
When she got the offer to start this fall, it seemed at last things were looking up.
And then one day in September, Candace found a three-day eviction notice on the door.
The road back
“I broke down crying,” Candace says about the moment she shared the news with her mom.
“I felt like it was my fault. She wouldn’t have been in this position if I hadn’t been there.”
Once again her mother offered moral support.
“It’s OK,” Candace’s mom would tell her. “We’re going to figure it out.”
Candace jumped into action.
Unsure where to turn, Candace called Donna Love, who serves as the client resource director for the local nonprofit Mothers Helping Mothers.
In the past, Candace had done office work and child care for Mothers Helping Mothers, which helps families with children. Now she was a single mom in need of assistance herself.
“I called crying my eyes out,” Candace said. “I had no idea what I was going to do. I was just broken.”
When she reached Love, her mind was immediately put at ease.
Right away Love got Candace working on an application to Season of Sharing.
Within a week, the fund came through – staving off eviction for Candace, her mom and daughter.
Of the nearly $3,000 owed in back rent, Season of Sharing covered $1,950, while Mothers Helping Mothers paid $600 and Candace and her mom handled the rest.
For Love, the extreme stressors of rising costs of living that many single moms like Candace and other parents face are compounded by the deep emotional and psychological scars of past traumas.
For that reason, Love noted, it’s important that a community offer wrap-around support the way the Sarasota area has done with numerous regionwide trauma-informed healing, treatment and training programs for residents – as well as through nonprofit agencies.
“You do need to have the support of all the services,” Love said.
Adopting that approach, Love said, enables trauma survivors to find the help they need not only to pay an expense in an emergency, but to actually thrive.
Peace of mind
As Candace started her new job and her mother’s rent got back on track, she felt an enormous peace of mind. It has allowed her to focus on her family and her therapy – and to feel confident about the future.
Candace said it meant so much to “have a job again – and (to) have security that I’m OK and I can take care of my daughter.”
Candace plans to go back to school to become certified in medical billing and coding.
Eventually she hopes to move into a new place for her and Trinity.
Candace’s relationship with her mom is better than ever, and she has a newfound respect and appreciation for everything her mother went through as a single parent.
“She really did struggle and did everything possible to make sure my siblings and I could have everything we needed,” Candace said of her mother.
“I applaud my mom,” she said.
How to help
Season of Sharing, a program administered by the Community Foundation of Sarasota County, assists individuals and families in an emergency with rent, mortgage, transportation, utility and child care expenses in Sarasota, Manatee, DeSoto and Charlotte counties.
You can donate to Season of Sharing by going to cfsarasota.org or calling 941-556-2399.
You can also mail a check to Season of Sharing, Community Foundation of Sarasota County, 2635 Fruitville Road, Sarasota, FL 34237.
This story comes from a partnership between the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and the Community Foundation of Sarasota County. Saundra Amrhein covers the Season of Sharing campaign, along with issues surrounding housing, utilities, child care and transportation in the area. She can be reached at samrhein@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Season of Sharing, nonprofit help struggling single mom rise and thrive
Reporting by Saundra Amrhein, Sarasota Herald-Tribune / Sarasota Herald-Tribune
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