What kinds of families get
help from
UsMoms Community Projects
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What Kind of Families get Help from UsMoms Community Projects?
We know that many people believe that only people on welfare join UsMoms Free Food Program. We
also know that many people believe that people on welfare are simply lazy people who choose to live
in poverty because they won’t work for a living like other tax payers do.
We don’t know what the percentage of the overall numbers of people is across the city, which are on
welfare that would fit this description. We don’t know if this is true about any significant numbers of
people who are not single parents, yet they get welfare. We read and hear various statistics, but we do
not know how valid and /or up to date the data really is. We don’t know how much of the news
stories that quote such statistics are biased either way and/or totally prejudiced.
We do know that it is rarely the truth about the single parents who are enrolled with UsMoms for
getting free food and self-reliance training. The few whom we thought this could apply to, have not
stayed with UsMoms. We believe it is because we have such a strong message about expecting every
parent who gets food or help from UsMoms to work towards becoming self-reliant or contribute by
volunteering. A majority of our parents volunteer or help with the programs in some capacity, or help
the other parents who are getting their self-reliance training.
UsMoms’ roster is made up of single fathers, single mothers, aunts, uncles and grandparents that are
the primary guardians and caregivers for children aged 0-19. A few parents are the primary caregiver
for other categories of dependents. Some of the parents are on welfare. Some are on disability or other
pensions. Some parents are working or going to school and do not have money for food after the pay
for rent and childcare. The fastest growing population in need of help are the "working poor" families
where two incomes cannot support both housing and food costs.
A significant number of our parents are in “transition” which means the parent (and often the children)
has been victimized by an abusive spousal partner. These transition families have had to leave
everything and everyone they know behind to seek safety and protection from a violently dangerous
spousal partner. These families are in hiding because the police and/or courts and/or other authorities
believe the threat of potential harm is enough to warrant these families being protected.
This means the parent has had to leave their home and their job or career. The children have been
taken out of their schools, neighbourhoods and communities. For most of these parents and children
they have had to disconnect from every person they have known and loved before they had to go into
hiding. This includes grandparents and other family, friends, (especially best friends) and anyone else
that the victimizer could use to track down the family in transition.
With the advancement of today’s technology, it is even harder for these families to remain hidden.
Computers are everywhere keeping records of some kind that can easily be accessed or hacked into.
We know families who can’t risk shopping in any store that has security cameras or surveillance
cameras of any kind. The children cannot go to any school that insists on getting the records from the
children’s previous school. The parents can’t use banks, bank cards, credit cards, membership cards,
retailer cards, etc. The parents and children have to assume or acquire new names. The family can
only use disposable cell phones. The families have to avoid traffic areas that maintain cameras for
traffic reports or other uses. This is only a sample of the places that have on-line surveillance or record
keeping that can be acquired by anyone with either enough money or enough skill.
UsMoms works with these parents and their children to ease their trauma and their losses. We provide
everything we can from toothbrushes to toys to furniture to clothing. We do our best to make sure
the families have everything they need to make their life safer and more secure. We work with these
parents to end the cycle of familial abuse. We provide the food every week in such a way as to not
require the parents to risk being seen or found. We work with the children in ways to where the
children learn they are cared for and safe when they are with anyone from UsMoms. We help the
parents to become self-reliant enough that poverty will not drive them back to the abusive spousal
partner or into another abusive situation.
We have single dads who have opted to be the main caregiver rather than have their child or children
enter the foster care system if the mother is not an option. We have single dads with large families
who are refugees from countries where the mother has disappeared, been killed or imprisoned. We
have single dads who have left their jobs to be stay at home parents when the mother has abandoned
the family.
It is much harder for the single dads to get the help and support they need because of our society’s
perception of men who do not work. Undereducated men or men without a trade have a difficult time
getting a job that can pay for childcare plus rent and food. Yet, the good news is that the courts are
awarding custodial care to more fathers as an alternative to automatically putting children into the
foster care system when the mother is not available to care for the children. UsMoms works with
these fathers in the same way we do with the mothers. The goal is two-fold. One teach effective
parenting skills and two help these fathers to find meaningful employment or training that will pay for
the costs of being a single parent.
As you can see, almost all of the personal stories of the families that get help from UsMoms are not the
typical story of a lazy person who won’t work. A small percentage of our families are from multi-
generational histories where parents and grandparents were on welfare. This type of history means it is
likely that there are more developmental issues because of chronic undernourishment and lack of
enough food. But, while it may take longer to reverse the effects of this history, it is possible to do it.
We have found these parents have to first learn that their parents did not know how to teach them to
be self-reliant because they had not been taught how to either. We focus the parents of these families
on making sure their children are not the next generation on welfare. This approach has been very
effective.
Once these parents learn the role of nutrition in determining the capacity for the parents and the
children to reach their greatest potential, we see dramatic changes in the parent’s belief systems. The
parents are very receptive to being taught proper nutrition, food preparation, storage and preservation.
Once these children are fed consistently for a few months, the children’s behaviour improves, their
attitude improves, and their coping capacity increases dramatically. Once the parents become fed well
enough they learn they are also better parents because their body is able to cope with more stress.
This experience paves the way for the parents to believe that it is possible for their children to make it
all the way out of poverty.
Food security becomes the important focus that has the greatest impact on the children’s capacity to
learn what they are taught in school today and elsewhere. The parents become very dedicated to
ensuring their children attend the Homegrown Heroes. It is very encouraging to see how responsive
and responsible the parents become once they learn that UsMoms will help them get enough food and
training into their household to make it possible for their children to learn and grow up to become
healthy contributing adults. Most of these parents build their self-reliance plans around getting their
children out of the cycles of their history first, which we heartily agree with.
UsMoms Community Projects
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