Help Mel and Josh regain their independence and feel safe.

Hi, my name is Mel.

As some of you may know, for a number of years now Josh & I have been struggling financially & reached the point where we need to put aside past pride & ask for help & explain how we got here.

Unfortunately, our previous employers left us in a state of limbo for many months during the covid pandemic because they would not make the decision as to whether they should just let us go or pay us furlough and wait out the lockdowns.

With the early panic at the start of the COVID nightmare, the help we could receive was incredibly sparse & we were left with no income but as we were still technically employed, the benefits we were able to claim were so little we were left unable to cover our expenses, which forced us to drain our savings & finally we reached the point had to take out a loan to cover the essentials like rent and food.

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Now, as we had moved house the literal day before the announcement of the lockdowns, a series of expensive home essentials also loomed alongside loan repayments & the snowballing began.

When we finally learned we were being made fully redundant & not going back to our old work, we began immediately looking elsewhere & landed ourselves alternative work so sorting our repayments was no problem, but the worst happened & we both caught COVID.

Along with our physical health, our mental health took a huge beating as you can imagine, Josh in particular began having consistent & brutal panic attacks almost daily – alongside his anxiety disorder & pre-existing depression he developed almost paralysing agoraphobia.

To the point even stepping outside to do things as mundane as putting our bins out would render him dizzy, unable to breathe & he would totally break down which is now an ongoing problem till this day.

We have slowly & painfully been able to manage things & improve by the skin of our teeth these last few years but, this past September, our landlord decided to serve us with a section 21 notice & throw us out.

(Which, fun fact, we then learned was so he could raise our rent by over 50%)

Josh’s Mum kindly took us in.

This has not been an ideal arrangement as this is not close to where my work and I have had to take trains, taxi's and beg for lifts in order to get to and from my job, but more prominently, has led to some friction with her significant other as he absolutely does not want us around in any capacity & as expected this has created an incredibly tense & uncomfortable living situation for everyone.

Things are slowly escalating as pressure builds & we are at a point we truly do not feel physically safe here, confining ourselves to a single room with all of our possessions & living day to day in a constant state of anxiety & fear of the “Get out” conversation, but we of course have no other options until our debts vanish & can let us breathe.

This is where we need help if we can get any at all.

We can afford to survive, to pay off our debt payments & slowly but surely whittle away at the growing interest but, assuming no significant change to our situation, will take us far into 2026 so also saving for our own place can’t even begin to happen until then.

What we are asking for is the chance to get ourselves out of here.

To be able to exist in our own space again

To be able to feel like people again.

Our mental health has been at the lowest it ever has, and we have exhausted all of the options and various agencies that claim to be able to help and this is our last hope really.

We would really appreciate any help however small that we can get as we desperately need to get out of this situation.

In an ideal world this money would go towards securing a deposit but even if that can’t happen it will at least go towards getting us out of here sooner rather than later.

Thank you for taking the time to read our story & we both truly appreciate it.