Final month, I started making ready to grow to be unhoused. I've been sharing my journey on TikTok to debunk misconceptions about homelessness.

• Saphire Callisto and their spouse had been unhoused in April after falling behind on lease. 
• Callisto has been utilizing TikTok to take viewers with them as they moved out right into a resort. 
• That is the story of how Callisto is utilizing TikTok to make a distinction, as advised to Charissa Cheong.

This as-told-to essay is predicated on a dialog with 21-year-old Saphire Callisto, and it has been edited for size and readability.

For the previous three weeks, my spouse and I’ve been residing in resort rooms. 

We obtained an eviction discover final month and needed to transfer out of our condo in Chicago Metropolitan Space, Illinois. My spouse stopped working a couple of years in the past due to a foul flare-up with their incapacity, and we have been counting on my unstable earnings as a nanny since then. Ultimately, we discovered ourselves in a spot the place we had been struggling a lot financially that we might not afford lease.

Once we realized we had been going to be unhoused, I made a decision to doc the preparations we had been making on TikTok, as I already had an account the place I shared life updates on the time. I started giving brief explanations about our scenario in a sequence I known as “Getting ready to be homeless.” 

I needed to indicate viewers what the expertise of being unhoused seems like from the angle of a 21-year-old who’s coping with it. I felt that there have been quite a lot of misconceptions and stereotypes about how an individual like me would find yourself on this scenario that I needed to problem. 

I needed to indicate that homelessness does not occur in a single day, though I needed to be susceptible to take action 

I believe that for some folks, their concept of being made homeless is that your stuff will get thrown out on the road sooner or later and you do not see it coming, however for us, the method did not occur in a single day, and we had a couple of weeks to organize and work out our subsequent steps. 

In my movies in regards to the preparation course of, I defined to my viewers that I used to be on the lookout for storage models to maintain our stuff, in addition to a brand new condo extra inside our price range that we would ultimately be capable to transfer into. 

I shared this as a result of I needed to indicate folks in susceptible monetary conditions that while you’re ready, you may make higher and safer decisions. As a result of I sat down and weighed my choices up, and since I knew the eviction was coming, I used to be in a position to save cash to have the ability to afford to reside in a resort, for instance. 

Residing out of a resort has been emotionally draining, however I needed to indicate that though it may be exhausting, you possibly can nonetheless make one of the best of your circumstances, which is why I began filming a sequence about being unhoused as soon as the preparation stage was over, displaying folks our residing scenario and explaining a bit about our emotions throughout this time. 

Folks on TikTok have been actually supportive, and have mentioned they recognize me being trustworthy about my scenario and are considerably shocked by how constructive my tone is in quite a lot of my posts. 

I see myself as a really constructive particular person and have been attempting to deal with being unhoused as a chance to study and develop, however on the similar time, this has been a brilliant susceptible time for me. I have been letting folks see the toughest a part of my life to this point, and never lots of people on social media actually try this. 

I’ve had a tough time realizing that when you place one thing on the market on the web, it is out of your fingers and you’ll’t management the response, however I am hoping it is going to be price it. 

My hope is that these TikToks will problem many widespread misconceptions about homelessness 

Sadly, I believe lots of people assume that should you’re unhoused, you are unemployed, otherwise you do quite a lot of medication, otherwise you’re lazy. 

I work as a nanny Monday by Friday and typically do weekend shifts if I’ve to, however even when that wasn’t the case, I nonetheless do not suppose I, or anybody, must be with no dwelling. 

Folks typically suppose it is very easy to search out housing however I believe it is exceedingly troublesome to make minimal wage and afford a one-bedroom condo in plenty of locations on this nation. The extent of competitors for housing has gone up massively lately, and it typically looks like you must be the right particular person to search out an condo. 

The fact is that many Individuals are only one medical invoice or missed paycheck away from being unhoused, and I actually hope my video sequence exhibits that as a society, we’d like to consider our housing scenario, as a result of if this will occur to somebody like me, it might fairly probably occur to anybody. 

It is approach simpler to say that individuals who do not have houses are dangerous individuals who made dangerous decisions. However I am attempting to indicate them that I am not a foul particular person, I do not make dangerous decisions — and this occurred to me anyway. 

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