I spent three months in a domestic violence shelter last year, and it saved my life. But I only got there after waiting for a month, making call after call to a hotline and being told to wait. It wore me down, mentally and emotionally. This is still what hundreds of survivors of violence like myself experience in New York State, every day, looking for a safe place to stay — but it doesn’t have to be like this.

I was living with a girlfriend in Pennsylvania who had become violent towards me, and I knew I had to leave for my safety. I went back home to New York City, but I didn’t have anywhere to stay. I became street homeless, sleeping on the streets, in the subway, night after night. I was feeling so hopeless that I became suicidal.

I ended up in the hospital. There, a therapist told me about Safe Horizon’s 24-Hour Hotline, where I could ask for........

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