Delphia’s Story
“I don’t want you to give me a handout. I want you to give me a hand up.”
Winter Walk believes that ending homelessness starts with ending stigma. Our mission is to uplift the voices of those who have experienced homelessness, breaking down negative images and stereotypes through storytelling and education. Our work is grounded in the belief that raising awareness through personal stories helps create lasting systemic change. By lifting these voices, we strive to foster understanding and create meaningful impact.
Delphia Bizzell, a member of Winter Walk’s Board of Directors, has generously offered to tell you her story here on our blog.
Life before becoming unhoused.
Before my husband and I lost our home. Life was particularly good. We had our own apartment and would visit my parents at their home. I was raised by both parents and had 2 brothers and a sister who passed away quite a few years before. I am the youngest, so I was spoiled, but taught the value of a dollar and being a good person. We were army brats. I grew up on army bases all over the country and spent most of my adolescence and young adulthood in the suburbs of Kentucky. I had a great education and graduated from college with 2 degrees and a Master’s. I met my husband in 1996, and we married in October 2000. I never dreamed my parents would one day be gone and would become unhoused. I was wrong. My father left this earth in January 2001 at 72 years old. He and my mother were married for 53 years. My parents’ home had 3 bedrooms, 1/2 baths, and a full basement on a corner lot with lots of land. It was too big for my mom to take care of alone because my brothers had moved out. So my husband and I gave up our apartment and moved in to help my mother, who was 70 years old and had some health problems which gradually got worse.
When we became homeless
My husband and I became homeless in April of 2017 when my mother died 15 years after my father. My father was the main breadwinner of the family. We lived mainly on his pension from 28 years in the military and 17 years as a civilian working at Fort Knox Army Armour School in Kentucky. During the 15 years after my father died, I served as my mother's caretaker as her health started to decline, and dementia set in. She was 86 when she passed and had lived in that home for 41 years. Terry(husband) and I tried to hang on to the home, but we weren't making a lot of money, and since my name was not on the lease, the bank eventually took possession of it. I was 54 and my husband was 58. We put what we had in storage and totally cleaned out my mom's house, a big job with no clue as to where he and I would go. I had 2 brothers, but neither of them had their own homes. One moved in with his daughter and husband, the other with his girlfriend, but there was no place for Terry and I. We couch surfed for 2 months with church members who really didn't want us there, and 2-4 months in a very impoverished area with low income. Between the 2 of us, we could not afford rent and were eventually evicted. We wound up on the streets of Kentucky in mid-winter. At the time, I needed an operation on my left leg due to severe arthritis, and Terry had an artificial left hip replacement. We weren't walking so good, so we needed a place to get out of the cold, so he wrote to his sister in Boston, and she sent for us to come stay with her.
Challenges faced while living unhoused
After only 9 days in Boston, his sister put us out. There was 24 inches of snow on the ground and -4 degrees with the wind. I didn’t know a street in Boston, and my husband hadn’t lived here in 24 years. We walked around the city for 2 weeks. Me with a walker, and Terry dragging his left leg because the cold was causing his hip to lock up. We slept in the Star Market doorway in the Fenway, but it was so cold anytime someone would open the door, the wind would rush in. Terry never slept to make sure I was safe. We made our way to Charlestown, to a cousin who said we could stay with her. 2 weeks on another snowy day and freezing temperatures, she put us out. We made our way back to the Bay Area, where we stayed in the Marriott lobby for about a week before hotel security told us we had to leave. Having nowhere to go, we made our way to Woods Mullen Women's Shelter and 112 Southampton Men's Inn. We wanted to stay together, but they told us there were no shelters in Boston for couples. For 25 years, we had been married and never separated before. So living apart, middle-aged, and shelters telling us it would be 5 years before we could be housed was very scary because these were wet shelters where anyone could come in drunk, high, mentally ill, with no help, trying to navigate the housing system, and never being homeless before. You are stripped of your dignity completely, and not knowing what is going to happen next or if things would ever get better in a city as large as Boston.
What Things Like Now
It has been 8 almost 9 years now since we were homeless. We have been blessed with housing for almost 7 years. A place to call home.
I had my left leg fixed and a wonderful job at Pine Street Inn, where I get to make a difference. My husband was able to work for a couple of years, ironically, in a place we used to sleep in the doorway of. He has all the help he needs for his hip replacement and disability income. We have a 1-year-old beagle and no longer need to ask anyone for a hand up; instead, we get to give that hand up every chance we get. We are happy and not worried.
What is different for us since experiencing life without housing?
We are. Our eyes are open as well as our hearts. There is a deeper contentment as well as an even stronger marriage. We understand that being unhoused is not a shameful thing, and it is also just a situation in time that gets better when you help others, listen to their stories, and instill hope, as Kennedy once said, “hope gives you faith and faith gives you strength and a strong person can not be put down.”
What is something you wish everyone knew about people experiencing homelessness?
Everyone deserves a home. No one grows up saying I want to be an addict, I want to be homeless, I want to be mentally ill. I don’t want you to give me a handout. I want you to give me a hand up. My situation can change. It is not a problem; it only becomes one when you act as though you don’t see me or don’t belong. I am You.
