Down a small hill behind Cross Point Church, where three emergency shelters sit in a quiet line. The spaces are just temporary rooms meant for rest and a moment to breathe. But for Dillon Basford, his partner, Kaylee Mendicky, and their 1-year-old son, Kobe, those shelters offered something they hadn't felt in months: safety.
The family had lost their home after falling behind on payments for their trailer. The debt reached $11,000 far more than they could manage. When I first met them, they began sharing how they ended up here, recounting the setbacks, the choices and the desperation that brought them to this shelter. It was the first time during the workshop that I lowered my camera. Their story raw, detailed and heavy which I won't recount the details here, pulled me into the moment so deeply that I found myself crying alongside Kaylee.
What stayed with me was how fiercely they changed for their son. They had walked away from hard drugs, from destructive relationships and from the patterns that once defined their lives. They did it for Kobe, whose smile seemed to brighten the dim room where we talked.
"Everything I do, I do for the baby," Kaylee said
To get by, they relied on food delivery gigs, stretching every dollar to make it through each day.
