Posted by A Lending Hand.
Last night was so busy on the streets of Dublin and so much talk of suicide it was scary 
We met one lad who has had one of the most tragic years in his life, in the last 8 months 3 of his family members committed suicide, he was left homeless after he couldn’t cope with the loss, lost his way and last night was talking about wanting to end it all!! After 30.mins of talking him down and breaking down his problems, he gave me a massive hug and said ” thanks for listening and wanting to help me, we never have anyone to break down our problems and help us sort them out “, he was such a lovely lad that lost his way and just needs guidance and some love to show him the right path in life 
We met our pal with his dog Mister (the sweetest Jack russel ) turns out he’s actually a lawyer, who fell on really hard times in life and this is where he’s at untill he can get back on his feet, he’s one of the lads that is camping outside the GPO at the min, they are trying to highlight their plight in Homelessness and the fact they sleep in tents because the hostels on offer are vile, with blood stained walls, unclean floors, dirty needles hanging around and the staff treated him and his dog like crap !!! So himself and a couple of his mates Said they were pitching there tents outside the building our leaders fought for our freedom in front of over 100 years ago !! So if you are in town and see them in the middle of O Connell Street, give them your support they are such lovely lads 
We met another lad we know absolutely years last night, he got his forever home finally after 18 years
on the streets , he was over the moon we jumped up and down and hugged him so tight , we are over the moon for him , we will be doing an appeal for him during the week to help him turn his house into a home with the rising costs of electricity we will be feeding him from our butchers account weekly to help him maintane his forever home
We came home with Nothing, we had 3 Full trolleys and a food trolley , we had lasanges , sambos , drinks , munchies (they love them) water , sleeping bags , tents , tracksuit bottoms and tops , t shirts , jumpers ,coats , socks, underwear and toiletries and we had nothing left and still had People looking for stuff
The situation is so desperate at the min , we have over 10,000 people that are displaced and Homeless due to many different reasons and complications mostly due to some sort of trauma or traumatic event that happened and nobody thought them coping skills to deal with life, we need serious investment in our mental health services, because a lot of people we met are self medicating because the help is just not available
Be kind to our homeless, they are someone’s child, they DIDNT CHOOSE to be Homeless life just dragged them down the wrong path
Thanks so much to everyone who supports our homeless pals every week , we and they would be absolutely lost without the support
Thanks to Monica for her fab lasanges , socks ,underwear, tracksuits , Runners, she spent over 500 euro on supplies for our homeless pals
Ashley for the drinks and crisps
Fiona for her fab homemade sambos
Noel and Ernie and everyone up north that supports us , the relief on everyone’s faces to get a sleeping bag or a tent last night was overwhelming, we met so many that wouldn’t stay in the hostels and were over the moon with the tent and sleeping bags
To everyone that supports us and our homeless pals thanks so much, if you think you can help in any way please send us a message , as volunteers we rely so much on the goodness of others to help our pals
Thanks to Agnes , Fiona and Pamela for coming last night ,I would be lost without you all
Keira and the A lending hand team 
Who Watches the Watchers? 