{"id":244,"date":"2026-04-16T15:18:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T15:18:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/?p=244"},"modified":"2026-04-16T15:18:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T15:18:57","slug":"lebanon-man-resets-life-at-fresh-start-after-years-of-struggling-with-homelessness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/?p=244","title":{"rendered":"Lebanon man resets life at FRESH Start after years of struggling with homelessness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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For one week before Anthony arrived at FRESH Start Emergency Shelter & Resource Center, he was homeless and sleeping under a bridge.\u201cTo be honest, I was used to it,\u201d he said during an interview in June.For nearly a decade, Anthony lived doubled up with relatives, couch surfed at friend\u2019s homes, or found himself living on the street.\u200bFor periods of his life, Anthony lacked a sense of belonging and community. Spending years in the foster care system, bouncing around from home to home didn\u2019t leave much time to make friends or forge deep relationships.\u00a0<\/div>
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\u201cIt felt horrible,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s the best way for me to put it. Because it\u2019s like, ok well, my mom and dad didn\u2019t want me, so why don\u2019t these people want me?\u201dAnthony did eventually get adopted and experienced stability in his new family.\u201cAfter I got adopted, it sort of settled down because my mom is the most wonderful person in the world,\u201d he said. \u201cShe has always been my rock and someone I could always go to, even now.\u201dBut the nagging sense of loneliness and abandonment in his early years took a toll.When he was 20 years old, he moved out and started out on his own.For the next decade, Anthony found himself in a cycle of employment, unemployment, transient living, homelessness, alcoholism and drug use.\u201cPretty much the streets are all I know,\u201d he said.When he was 23, he entered the long-term men\u2019s program at Lebanon Rescue Mission, which helped him maintain sobriety from hard drugs, then entered HOPES (the former shelter name of FRESH Start) at LCCM.At HOPES, staff helped him find employment and provided the stability he needed so he could reset his finances and start over.He found a room and was soon discharged. He was making money, but soon he fell back into old habits and his money was going toward alcohol.\u201cIt was not a fun road,\u201d he said.The cycle continued for the next six years, which brought him to FRESH Start in May.\u201cThe staff are really keeping me encouraged to keep going and to work every day. They are helping me with budgeting,\u201d he said. \u201cI always have good laughs with all of them, but they are really there for me when I feel upset or when I feel anger\u2026it just feels nice to express how I actually feel about things \u2026they give me good advice, too.\u201dThough he has fears about the future, he is hopeful and is trying to change his circumstances with the guidance and support of LCCM staff.\u200bBecause he doesn\u2019t have to worry about where he will sleep or when he will eat next, now he can focus on other things, such as working toward obtaining his driver\u2019s license, working full-time and looking for a room to rent. Eventually he wants to own his own home and start his own business.\u200b\u201cThis is a great place for anybody that\u2019s really wanting the help and is actually willing to work themselves, for themselves, to really want to change. It\u2019s definitely helped me change a lot \u2013 mentally, physically and spiritually,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat more could a person want who\u2019s really wanting to change?\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For one week before Anthony arrived at FRESH Start Emergency Shelter & Resource Center, he was homeless and sleeping under a bridge. \u201cTo be honest, I was used to it,\u201d he said during an interview in June. For nearly a decade, Anthony lived doubled up with relatives, couch surfed at friend\u2019s homes, or found himself […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":245,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=244"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/heuristic-yonath.40-160-33-16.plesk.page\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}