Family Support Program: From Resident to Manager
“Chicago House provided me with a great base for my personal life as well as my professional life.”
For Evany Turk, walking into a fully furnished apartment in Chicago House’s Family Support Program (FSP) was a dream come true. Evany arrived at Chicago House as a young mother of two, living with HIV and relying on public transit and emergency rooms for shelter. She’d previously been staying with family but was asked to leave after her family members discovered her HIV status.
Before she secured an apartment through FSP, she had no idea what support was available to her. Through this supportive environment provided for her and other families impacted by HIV, Chicago House immediately connected her with the resources she’d lacked; including medical care and a therapist, which proved essential to healing the traumas she’d experienced. Her children attended the Bridges after-school program, receiving tutoring and support alongside other children whose families and struggles mirrored their own.
Evany later joined the staff at Chicago House, running a medical adherence program to assist individuals living with HIV to maintain an undetectable viral load. After several years spent working for other agencies and launching her own nonprofit consulting company, Heartworks, she has returned to Chicago House as the Family Support Program & Independent Living Program Manager.
When asked about FSP’s greatest strength, and why its model of wraparound support works, Evany attributes the success of the program to the amount of support provided to residents by the staff: “Although getting housed brings you some level of peace and a good space, there are still a lot of emotional things that you’ve been through that you need to work out. The only way you’re able to trust someone to let them help you, a lot of times, is if you have somebody to say, ‘I’m here for you. I’m here to help you with whatever it is you need help with and I’m going to continue to check in on you to make sure you’re okay.’”
“I rediscovered happiness at Chicago House,” Evany reflects today. “I’m very grateful for learning and knowing happiness here.”
To read more about Evany’s journey in her own words, visit her recent blog post for the Positive Women’s Network: Black Girls Living with HIV and their Dreams by Evany Turk