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Colorado Gives Day is Next Week!

In this season of giving, your support provides affordable housing for previously unhoused community members like Zita.

Zita grew up in Denver, went to West High School and onto business school. She worked in financial services industry for a large banking company for many years and raised her son and daughter as a single parent. In 2009 the financial crisis hit. She lost her job and could not find another one. Her young adult daughter became severely addicted to drugs. Social Services threatened to remove her children and asked Zita to take on their care. But by that time Zita had lost her apartment and was living out of her car. As much as she wanted to foster the children she could not as she didn’t even have a home.

Then her own mother died of cancer. Zita spiraled down, became suicidal, spent time in the hospital and finally was released to stay in emergency shelters. And then Zita found St. Francis Center. Zita says that she had “ALWAYS thought that I didn’t need anybody. When I came to SFC… I found out how much I needed community. I allowed myself to receive the care I needed and in turn I could take care of others.”

Zita got medical help through SFC and eventually engaged in mental health treatment as well. She learned that she could fight her severe depression, anxiety, and suicidal feelings with therapy, medication and self‐care. She continues to see her mental health care providers and take her medication today. In 2020 Zita contracted COVID while in a shelter and was hospitalized, ended up with oxygen dependent COPD and was told that she needed a hip replacement but could not have one until she had a permanent living situation. Zita was sent from the hospital to one of the hotel rooms the city had rented as protective response to people in very compromised health.

While Zita waited for housing she did two very important things: She used her time to reconcile with her daughter who was now in recovery and she used her financial skills to save every penny she could with the dream of finally getting an apartment of her own where she could get her hip replaced, sew, paint and make a home for herself and have her children visit. She was referred to SFC for housing in the summer of 2021 and we began the work of collecting documents and applying for a housing voucher. After six months of working with Zita, we were finally able to get her into her new apartment. She told me the day she moved in “ this is my second chance…I can finally get my new hip, and I can feel the creative juices starting to flow…..I wonder what I can create? “

Donate today to support individuals like Zita.

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Our mailing address is:
2323 Curtis Street 
Denver, CO 80205

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