article courtesy of 9and10News
A shelter in Clare is giving pregnant women and young mothers in need — a place to call home.
Joshua’s House says their mission is to help women who are homeless or trying to leave a bad situation.
Battling a physically and emotionally unhealthy living situation….and 6 and a half months pregnant—Paisley Martin needed somewhere to turn.
“I watched horrible things happen unfold in front of me, I just had enough,” said Paisley Martin.
Thankfully — she found Joshua’s House.
“What we do is we take the women in and we love on them we let them know that they’re special,” said executive director Renee Jeffords. “And even if they feel like they’re in the lowest point where they’ve ever been in their life that it’s only up from there.”
Joshua’s House provides both soon-to-be and recent mothers in difficult situations — with a place to call home for a little while.
All the women staying are in similar situations — allowing to learn from one another — and begin healing together.
“I got to see how they dealt with their stress, I got to see how they worked about it to achieve a difference and work toward an outcome they wanted versus what could have possibly happened,” said Martin.
During their stay — bible study, and 20 other classes are available to them like cooking classes, and other life skills like budgeting.
“When you’re by yourself and you have nobody else that’s a difficult situation so we wanna equip them with all the knowledge and the skills we can do that when they go out they don’t feel defeated they go out feeling confident like they can do this,” said Jeffords.
But the most important take-away when trying to care for themselves and a new family…
“I was able to find my voice again, I was able to ya know build up my self-confidence again,” said Martin. “I wouldn’t have gotten to the place I am currently if it wasn’t for Joshua’s House.”
Paisley and her daughter Alessa left Joshua’s House about 7 months ago in February. Since then, she’s been able to land a job and buy a two bedroom townhome for her and her 9-month-old daughter to live in.
