I learned that going into a shelter and spending the night with strangers day after day in FEAR wears down the body's natural defenses and makes one vulnerable to sickness and mental breakdown. I learned that it is FEAR that often makes one compromise their own moral and ethical standards to survive. I stayed with 150 men plus women and children for 3 days on the floor of the gym in a Salvation Army. I slept next to a man with a knife. The only reason I knew he had a knife is because I watched him threaten to stab another man earlier in the day.
Fear changes one's personality and life choices.
Prolonged fear turns you into someone you don't like and don't want to be with. In Charleston, West Virginia I learned that the system of sheltering the homeless caters to the chronic and not the crisis. I felt treated like an alcoholic and a drug addict. I returned to the shelter and the staff implied that I was lying. I felt caught in the middle.