Vernon Potts-The EDGE-Employment Counselor

Man Lost in Atlanta Finds His Way Home

names withheld for privacy

Mr. M is no stranger to the streets of Atlanta, for he has spent 10 years lost within the system in which he sought help. M came to our organization for the second time on April 16, 2008. After meeting with M I realized that there seemed to be some great deal of difficulty with him as he would often shift in conversations or stare endlessly into space. In one meeting when I was asking him about food stamps he told me that he had taken a trip to the local Atlanta DFACS office where he was spooked due to X-men being on the roof.

At times M seemed to be almost normal as if he had waken up for the first time and in those times our conversations pertained to him getting a job and becoming successful. Although I soon learned that M had greater issues to overcome within himself as he never made his appointments or attended our workshops. After speaking with Bobbie Slocumb over at the Café 458, I decided to send him to her in hopes that he would get his mental health in order and get the help that he needed. But that never happened for M because he never made his appointments.

However M did come in the other day and this day was different. Dr. Green and I were speaking of how we should handle M and how we felt that our services were not for M as he had not attended his workshops nor was he moving forward within our program. Dr. Green asked me to bring M into her office, so I did. After a brief meeting with M, Dr. Green realized that there were some problems and he needed help. As Dr. Green always does, she started thinking with her heart and asked M where his family was and if he had spoken with them. Something finally happened that started a chain of events that would lead M home, he gave us a name.

The name was that of L his uncle that lived in Alabama. After getting the name I began to search the internet for a L in Alabama and I found him. So I quickly returned to Dr. Green’s office where we made a call to the family. Dr. Green then spoke with M’s aunt and soon learned that they had been searching for him for 10 whole years, calling shelter after shelter in Alabama to no avail. Then M was able to speak with his family for the first time in 10 years, can you imagine the loss that not only he has felt but that of his family as well.

While speaking with his Aunt I gave them my office number and cell phone number in order for M’s brother to contact me. That evening he did, and he was so excited to learn that his brother was alive and wanted nothing more than to bring him home so they could take care of him. M’s brother explained to me that M did suffer from mental illness and needed to be back on his medication.

The trip was planned for Saturday the 17^th; this was the day M’s brother was to come to get his M. But where was M and would he be present when his brother arrived? I knew due to M’s condition and how he often missed appointments he may not show up or be hard to find. At our last meeting on the day he spoke with his family I told him to be sure to come back on Wednesday and Friday. To my surprise I did see M on Wednesday and I told him that his brother was coming to get him on Saturday. He stared at me with a blank gaze and I wondered if he really understood what I was saying. He told me he would come, although I could not say for certain that he would.

In life I feel that things outside of our human existence are often at play for the good of humankind. As the week was passing and I had not seen M, I became more discouraged as I began to call shelters and no one knew of him. Then out of the blue the phone call came form a Ms. Thompson at the Gateway Center. Ms. Thompson had contacted Dr. Green and asked that I call her, for she had decided to take M into there shelter. After speaking with Ms. Thompson, a case manager for Gateway, she agreed to bring M over on Saturday to reunite with his brother. But she didn’t have to, for M found his own way. Deep within his mind I am sure that he knew one thing, which he was finally going home.

A good ending to a man lost in Atlanta gives me hope as he has been reunited with his family. When M’s brother arrived he was in tears, some of sadness, but most of joy as he was happy to find his brother. In his own way, M lessoned the sadness of his brother with a quick word of humor, “you got fat” as he had not seen him in several years. Now many gaps have to be filled and a lot has changed since M has been missing. His grandmother that raised him is now deceased and his mother is in the hospital not doing well, as she too suffers from mental illness.

There are many lessons to be learned. Can we get so busy in life that we often forget what really matters? People are people regardless of the labels placed on them by society. When we place labels on people we often take away the human side of things and pass our own judgment of those that are different from ourselves. Different doesn’t mean bad, it’s just different, that’s all. I asked myself how an individual needing mental health assistance could bounce form shelter to shelter for ten years and not get the help that they needed. But I then realize the cold hard facts. We are in a business that is bombarded daily with paper work and heavy case loads that individuals can’t possibly get the full care that they need. Sadly, people can often fall through the cracks and their voices go unheard.

I spoke with M’s brother on Sunday and they where having a grill out for M with all the family present. M will be going into treatment for his mental illness on Monday and will be working soon with his uncle. I asked Christoph to print out a certificate of graduation from our program for M. M in many ways has graduated, as he has left the life of homelessness to join a loving family in which he can now get the help that he so desperately needs. Thanks to the Samaritan House M has now taken the steps to move forward within his own life and those are the steps worth taking.