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How Robert Lee Smith Reclaimed His Life
 Robert Lee Smith was cold and tired.
Losing his house had been hard. Scraping together the cash to get it back had been even harder. But now, though he was back inside, he was cold, thirsty, and in the dark.
In some ways this condition felt hardest of all.
Robert wished he could reactivate his utilities and find relief, but he had no cash and plenty of pride. His flimsy disability income covered nothing beyond his daily expenses, so for four months he bit his lip and went without.
As winter approached, however, and its cold began to seep through the walls and into his bones, he started to have second thoughts.
“I will ask for help,” Robert said to himself, “but only for some kerosene to heat my home. If I can just be warm, I can do without the rest.”
He inquired at a local church, and that church referred him to the Center. Sylvia, the Center’s case worker, immediately put him at his ease. Although he had asked only for kerosene assistance, through the course of conversation, Sylvia discovered that Robert needed much, much more.
“They helped me sign up for food stamps—I didn’t even know I could get food stamps,” Robert remembers.
The Center also assisted Robert with food, furniture, kerosene, electricity, and budgeting advice to help him reactivate his running water.
All of this came to fruition just in the nick of time, right before Robert had to go into the hospital to have surgery for cancer. Robert was astounded and grateful. After all, without his utilities, he wouldn’t have fared well during his recovery.
“I didn’t know places like this were here,” Robert says. “Places that help people like me. When the church first told me to go to the Center, I didn’t think they would help; I thought they would just put me off. But they did help, and if it hadn’t been for them, I don’t think I could have made it through the winter.”
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