Joel 

Hey everybody and Welcome to the Senior Reset podcast. We are talking resources, education solutions, entertainment, and training for the senior community and their families. 

We have a great lineup today specifically concerning our veterans. I have Theresa Miller and Nyla Cones with us, and they’re going to talk with us a little bit about service and support for veterans through the VA, and now They are involved with the nonprofit called The Journey Home, which helps find places for homeless vets to live, gives them transitional housing, and does a whole bunch of other stuff. 

I also have my co-host with me here, Nicole Farmer and we are going to jump right into this and let them tell you a little bit more about what they do, and then we’re going to dig into different services that veterans can tap into when working with the VA, and I know the VA… For a lot of US vets, I’m a veteran… It’s almost like a swear word. Nobody wants to work with the VA, but if you are brave enough or if you have the assistance of an awesome group like The Journey Home, you can get through the VA bureaucracy and get some incredible help to improve your quality of life. Teresa, how are you doing today?

Teresa 

I’m doing great. Thanks for having me on. I hope everybody out there is doing pretty well too.

Joel 

So, can you start just by telling us a little more about The Journey Home and what you guys do?

Teresa 

Sure, The Journey Home started in 2014, so we’ve been there for about 9 years. I have been with them since 2015, going in and working on The Journey Home since 2016. As a caseworker, we have three components to our journey home, one is the transitional facility, where we bring male homeless veterans in for about three to six months to work on housing and employment. If they need assisted living, if they need a senior home, not quite assisted living per se, but better senior living where they get a little bit of help up to a nursing home, if need be, depending on the veteran, then we have our outreach. 

So, one of the things that people don’t realize is that homeless veterans are hard to find, especially in rural areas. And since we’re in a rural area, we tend to go out and seek them out, try to bring them in and assist them. If that’s what they choose. We also work with people at risk of being homeless, and that pertains to anything across the board; whatever those veteran needs, we’re going to help them with that. The best that we can, we do a lot of transportation to appointments, medical appointments, and helping them with advocacy, understanding their resources, and things like that, and then, of course, we have the thrift store, which is just a small store where you know what a thrift store is. 

You can go shopping, and then that money comes back to you. Veterans and we help; we help them with birth certificates, you know, gas cards, little things like that. When we’re able to. So, when the funding is right there, that’s what we do on The Journey Home. And we’ve been successful with it. Nyla has been a big part of It too.

Joel 

Do you want to introduce yourself?

Nila 

Hi, I’m Nila. I’m the case worker on The Journey Home. I’ve been on The Journey Home for just a little over five years. Love can be challenging at times, but you know what it can’t be? I just enjoy being able to do everything that I can to help these gentlemen get back on their feet, get housing, and just be successful with their housing and employment. 

Joel 

So, Theresa, when it comes to homeless veterans, you said that they can be hard to find. But that’s not because there aren’t a lot of them, they’re hard to find because they could be anywhere. Can you talk a little bit about the homeless issues that we have in the veteran community?

Teresa 

I can’t give you statistics because the numbers are too high, I can’t quite remember them, and they’re not… The statistics that we have are based on what they call a pit count. So once a year, we go out and count the homeless. Well, if you’re a veteran and not just a veteran, some homeless people don’t want to be found, especially in rural areas. 

So, we have to seek them out. You know and bring them in if that’s what they choose. We don’t go out and drag them in. Don’t get me wrong; we’re not going to do that. I’m not going to grab them by the hand. But if they want to come in, we will find them. We do a lot of events, and we’ll join in on the stand-downs. We will do events around our community. A lot of our community partners, if they see a homeless individual, may appear to be a veteran. 

Don’t even stop and ask, and they will refer them to us. Homeless veterans—there are quite a few out there, and the problem, as I said, is that they’re very hard to find, and we’re almost there. It’s almost to the point where you think you’ve gotten as many as you can, and then you realize that you haven’t even touched on it yet. 

There are just so many, and that’s one of our goals, our mission is to end veteran homelessness. That’s our miss. And we do. I think we do a pretty good job of trying to stay on that mission and continue that mission. And I would love to be able to say we’ve closed it out, but we won’t, unfortunately.

Joel 

So, you said earlier that you also work with people who are at risk of being homeless. Who is someone who’s at risk of being homeless? What does that look like?

Teresa 

Just about anything. If you have a veteran who’s struggling to get to their doctor’s appointments and you know they’re not healthy at all, you know they could become homeless. I mean, if they’re paying out the Yang Yang for their medication, as we know, medication is costly, and the closest doctor is to them, don’t take VA, and the VA they haven’t connected with for them to pay for it. Then you’re looking at, you know, medicine over Home. 

Anyone can lose their house at any given moment, and that’s how we see it. So, getting them to their appointments and connecting them with resources that they didn’t know existed or that they thought they couldn’t get That’s what we do. And we say at risk because, you know, like I said, you know, you can wake up one day and your house will be gone. You just heard that everybody’s at risk of losing their housing.

Joel 

So, what area do you guys operate out of?

Teresa 

So, we are based in Winchester, Indiana. So, it’s a very rural community. We are also in Collier County and Florida, and they do our outreach down there as well. We don’t have a facility, but they are working hard with the veterans there in Collier County. And we’re trying to expand another facility into Richmond. And so right now, in Indiana and Florida, we’d love to expand anywhere and everywhere because, well, we want to get those. We want to get those veterans off the streets and into housing and give them a purpose. You know that the suicide rate for veterans is 17 to 22 per day. Which is 17 to 22 too many, and now they’re looking at it even being doubled because they’re wondering if the overdoses and the accidental deaths aren’t a suicide as well. 

So, you’re looking at maybe up to 44 a day. Which is extremely sad. It’s just mind-boggling. You know, it’s a huge number. And so, if we can bring these guys in, give them purpose, help them find work, help them find a house, and give them the resources that they need, that’s one less person. That’s in that statistic. And I’m passionate about that.

Joel 

Yeah, we haven’t talked about it yet in this podcast, but the suicide situation in the veteran community is terrible. 

And you know, I can understand what the Pills too, because the military does like to oversubscribe to a lot of different things to try to help the soldiers get through their day-to-day. You know, so you know, I’d like to kind of drill down a little bit and start with the homeless veterans. 

So, can you walk me through this this is for people who may be listening to this if you know people who are veterans who interact with people who are veterans who are homeless, or at risk? You know, I want to flush this out so that you understand what resources might be out there through the VA. Can you walk me through your process and that of other nonprofits? I mean, The Journey Home is doing a great job, and the more places they are in, the better. 

But there are some other nonprofits. If there are areas that they’re not in yet, that might be able to help with some of this stuff. So, can you just walk me through how you find someone who’s a homeless veteran? What can the VA help provide for that veteran that you, you know, facilitate with?

Teresa 

OK, so I want I want everyone to know that we’re based in Winchester, but we don’t care where you come from. If you pick up the phone and call us, we’re going to try to connect you. We don’t care if it’s California if it’s Kentucky, or, you know, Connecticut anywhere. We’re going to try to find those resources for you. 

If you’re in Indiana, it’s a little bit easier if you’re homeless to get you to us. But so, one of the things is that you have to be in VA School, and we all know that you either have to have a service connection or you can’t be over-indebted, which blows my mind. Yet I spent two years on active duty. And you have to have an honorable discharge in general, other than honorable, I think. And an honorable discharge. I believe those are the discharges that will come into our facility. Now I don’t care if you are honorable or dishonorable. I’m going to help you anyway, OK? And so is Nyla. 

So, if you’re homeless, the first thing I’m going to have to ask you to do is get a hold of the homeless team at the VA, because that’s important. And if not, then we will connect you to that team. If you have and you don’t feel like you’re getting what you need, then we will work with the VA to get that help.

Joel 

Now, if someone’s out there who knows a homeless veteran, can they have can they reach out to I’ve never heard of this homeless team at the VA. Can they reach out to the homeless team and have the homeless team contact them?

Teresa 

Yes, yes. 

So, each homeless team has case managers that should be out there, and they are—at least ours are—and they’re really good about what they do. They will go out and meet with that veteran. Talk to that veteran and see what that veteran may need. 

It may not be that they need to be in transition; it may be that they need to be in a drug and alcohol facility. It could imply that they require something. You know, maybe just a hotel for a couple of nights because they might be getting a house. You know, they’re just in between, or something like that. 

So, they will assess, talk to them, and see what is. needed, and then. Excuse me, if they need a place like ours, then they will make a referral to us. We automatically do a pre-screen with that person, and then we will staff that person with the VA and amongst our staff and then determine whether they would fit our program. And there are very, very few that we have turned down. I mean, we could probably count it on our hands how many we’ve turned Down over the last… At least for me, the last seven years haven’t happened very often.

Joel 

If they get admitted into your program, and the VA, you know, covers their temporary housing with you. So, what happens next with them?

Teresa 

So, when they come in first, they don’t pay for anything while they’re there; everything is given to them, basically, and that’s so that if they do have an income, they can start saving to pay whatever bills they may have or, you know, just to have a little extra money in their pocket. And they come in, and we start with our intake packet, which is long. And then we start working on the individual recovery plan, which most people call a treatment plan. 

And then we just start from there with housing—you know, where do you want to live? I don’t tell people where to live. They’re adults. They can make that choice, and we don’t care where it is. If they come to Indiana and they want to go to California, we’ve helped people get there; we’ve helped them get to California; we’ve helped them get to Florida; we’ve helped them get to Tennessee, Kentucky, and Michigan; you know, it’s wherever they want to go; or they can stay right there in town with us, which we like it when they stay around, but we need to start working on that. 

You know what assistance they want, whether it’s a HUD, BASH, voucher, or supportive services for veterans and their families. If their income is within that guideline, if not, then we start looking at how they can save to make their first month’s rent and with one of my other coworkers, one of my staff, who actually does budgeting groups and so forth, to help them understand the money. You know, and stuff like that. 

And I mean, we’re talking older people, so they already know how to manage money. It’s just trying to remind them how to do that. And then those that want to work, we also hook them up with our local DevOps, which is a disabled Veterans outreach program, and they work through Work One, and then they work with them to get employment.

So, we’ve got an array of different people coming in and working with them regularly and just getting them set up. I will say that our facility has hired I can’t hire anymore, but I have hired most of my staff. Previous homeless veterans that have been in the facility Yeah, and it gives them a purpose and keeps them going. And, as I said, it keeps them around. Because we love our guys. So, we also work through another program, which is CSAP, which is a program with goodwill. For our senior individuals to help them get a job, get some job skills, and stuff.

Joel 

So, what happens if It’s like a family? You know, if there’s a family that’s dealing with homelessness,

Teresa 

So, with a family, what do we normally do? That’s a good question because it’s not very often we get that. So, with a family, we can’t take the family, and we’re all male, so we would give them a choice. You know, let’s get you in here, and if you can separate, let’s get your wife and children into another shelter, and we can work through all of that. If they don’t want to separate, I would automatically have them reach out to our local SVF program for supportive services for veterans and their families. I would automatically reach out to them to try to get them into a hotel room or to work with them to get them housed as quickly as possible.

Joel 

So, there’s like a network of nonprofits and service providers, and when you find a veteran that’s in need, if you don’t offer a service, you kind of branch out and start contacting these other nonprofits to see who can help.

Teresa 

Yeah, we’re, we’re. I’m not going to tell. I’m not going to tell somebody. No, I can’t help you. I mean, I’ll sit on the computer with them on the phone and do searches. I have to. And give them phone numbers, and I’ll even make those phone calls. I’m not going to let somebody go without getting some kind of assistance, and neither are any of my staff.

Joel 

Going back a little bit the “at the risk of homelessness group” So they have a place to live. They’re at risk of homelessness. They’ve lost their job, and they can’t find another one. And the mortgage is falling behind, you know, and with this one, I imagine you might have a much greater likelihood of finding families. What kind of product services are out there? Or how can the VA help in those situations?

Teresa 

So, the first thing that I would ask them is, well, I would hook the veteran up with our DevOps, the disabled veteran outreach program through work. I’d hook them up with them, but I would also talk to them about the Military Family Relief Fund that they could access. They could qualify for and that is a fund that allows a veteran to get up to $2,500 in their lifetime.

So, say their mortgage is $500; you know, I know that’s low, but $500 means they can fill out the paperwork. 

Yes, it’s a lot of paperwork. 

Paperwork… Send in some documentation, and they could get that taken care of, and then they would still have money. In that little account for them later down the road. Or they could get all of it at once. It just depends on what their needs are. I would ask them to go there, and then I would also depend on, them because if they’ve lost their job, then I would try to get supportive services for veterans and families involved as well. And those items, to me, are the crunchers; they’re the ones that are going to come in for financial needs to help them.

Joel 

So, when we’re looking at people, especially seniors, you know that this is a senior-focused podcast. So, when you have seniors that are coming into your facility or seniors at risk of homelessness and they’re struggling just with their activities of daily living, does the VA assist with that stuff as well?

Teresa 

That, you know, I can’t really… I am not sure, to be honest with you, because most of our seniors are in the House and those outside of the House are pretty set. But I would automatically try to set them up with a senior. To get them more active and getting out, if they have a person living with them, try to get them into some care by giving that person some caregiving rights, which the VA does. 

I do believe that there’s a program through the VA that assists with that. So then that way it makes it a little bit Dear, but as far as getting them out within the activities and so forth, I would try to find some senior, you know, easygoing stuff. Depending on the senior, some seniors are just robust, but for the ones that need more assistance, I would find different activities within that community. For them. And then, you know, if we’ve got the transportation and they’re close, it may be something that we can even take them to.

Joel 

Nicole, what does Signal Health Group do with seniors who are veterans and need help with activities of daily living?

Nicole 

Well, we will work if they already have their veterans’ benefits; if they have benefits in place, then we reach out to their case managers, and then case managers will do kind of what you guys would probably do too. They have to put in a referral request. 

The VA has recently changed how that works. It’s a two-step process to make sure that the person needs home care services. It’s a little more difficult to get skilled than for the non-skilled person who needs help with things like the activities of daily living, light housekeeping, and standby assistance with bathing. The VA typically allows around 11 to 15 hours a week for that, so we would go through their case manager, whomever they’re working with. They would put in a request and authorize Us.

Teresa 

And I’m sorry I misunderstood what you were asking, Joe. I’m sorry.

Nicole 

Based on their needs.

Joel 

Oh, it’s fine. I’m just trying to flush out all the stuff the VA can do for our veterans that they might not know about.

Nicole 

Now when I come across people in the community who do not already have their benefits lined up or are not even sure, but I know they’re veterans, I don’t always know where to start until I know about The Journey Home, like where to refer them, because the case managers that I have contacts with are great at getting them set up with what they need with service. 

Once the benefits are in place, the major hurdle is having someone walk them through the process who is familiar with the system. I’m familiar with how we provide those services. In half for the last time. 10 years once they’re proof of benefits. But when I run into them, they don’t have that yet or don’t even though they do. Out there, it’s good to have a service like this. Refer them to

Teresa 

So when that comes up, the first thing we’re going to ask is, you know, what benefits do you have? And then we’re going to start going from there and talking to them about whether they have made claims, you know, for their service, their veteran service claims, disability or pension, and those types of things. And then get trained to get them hooked up with their local VSO, or veteran service officer. Because that’s where the claims are set up. 

So if we have a young man, Who needs to go into a Senior Center but does not quite have the money to do that? We’re going to start looking at his AIDS and attendance depending on when he served, and we’re going to hook him up with the VSO to obtain that. 

Same with the VA pension or any kind of service-connected disability is your magic, man. And that man or woman is your VSO, your veteran service officer. And we would even call the veteran service officer and say, hey, I’ve got a young person here. I always call my people young. I’ve got a young person here who is needing some assistance. Can you reach out to them? I gave them your number, but you know. And then, this way, they can make that connection and start working on it. And then, are there any other benefits that they can get along the way?

Joel 

What do you think is the most important benefit that a veteran might have that’s facing difficulties, whether it’s old age or possible homelessness? What benefit from the VA do you think they’re eligible for? hey, I probably don’t know. That might be a tough question, but…

Teresa 

That is a tough, tough question.

Joel 

Because, I mean, almost everything we’ve talked about is news to me today, so

Teresa 

I don’t know if you agree with me on this, but don’t you think that it’s the military family Relief Fund that veterans don’t necessarily know about and that they’re all qualified for?

Nila 

That, and the AIDS in attendance Sometimes those guys don’t know that they’re quiet; they’re like, what is that you know? And then you kind of break it down for them and say, oh, wow, I mean, you know, and that would be very helpful because we had a couple that ended up having to go into, like, a nursing home. 

And, you know, they only made, like, a little over $1000 a month. You know, and I’m well known in nursing—you know, assisted living. The cost of that is a whole lot more than what they can afford. And it takes about two to three months. Honestly, once they apply for AIDS and attend, it will be processed.

So, you know. If they can hang on long enough, or if they have the funds or a family member, sometimes they like to try to talk them into something, like getting a kind of loan, and then once the AIDS kicks in, they’ll get the money from the time that they came in that they could pay that loan. And be out of it. I don’t recommend that to any of the guys. I mean, for the one guy I’m referring to, his mother had passed away. 

So, he was fortunate enough to have some money to be able to help take care of that until AIDS and attendance kicked in. But I think as far as their insurance, that’s another thing. You know, going in and getting VA eligible, to be able to receive medical care through the VA is something that. A lot of them they don’t. They don’t know that you know that they’re entitled to that.

Joel 

Hey, Teresa Is, there, or do you run into a lot of veterans that are eligible for the VA but aren’t set up with them? Or do most veterans who are eligible already know?

Teresa 

Yes, we do. No, we’ve run into quite a few over the years, and we’ve gotten them eligible because to come into our facility, they have to be VA-eligible. So, we will run that, we will run their names, and so on. All that good stuff to get that taken care of. One of the things that we have found with the veterans and the community is, you know, the horror stories that the VA had a few years ago. And I say just a few, but you know, a few years ago.

Joel 

Well, they’re pretty bad horror stories, so

Teresa 

They don’t trust them. They don’t want to be involved with the VA. 

So, you know, we try to take our time with them and let them know. You know, we’re going to walk with you through this and try to get you to trust the VA, and we will even say, hey, you know, I’ve heard about this, doctor; some of our guys have had this doctor, and they’re fantastic. You know, try to build that trust up with them so that they have a better experience than what they’ve been told in the past. So, or they just don’t think that they’re eligible, but some of the guys think, you know, they’re just not eligible.

Joel 

So, if you are a veteran who’s struggling, or if you know a veteran who’s struggling if they aren’t set up with the VA currently, they could be eligible, which might be something worth looking into.

Teresa 

D214—that’s all you need. Say that again.

Nila 

It’s just filling out that tent. Is the 1010 easy? Yeah, that gets them… Gets their eligibility started to the point where they can receive medical care through the VA, and sometimes that’s all they need because they’re just overwhelmed. They have a lot of medical issues, but they don’t have the money to do it, or they might make more than what they can to qualify for Medicaid, and maybe not. I’m not old enough yet for Medicare, so I mean it’s…  

Teresa 

The one thing that people who are veterans, especially the newer veterans, know is that dental care is excruciatingly hard to get through the VA. And so, unless you’re 100%, you don’t get dental. So, and that’s sad. I think that everybody should be able to get dental care. Through the VA, but that is one thing that they don’t allow unless you’re 100%, except when you’re in our facility, where we have what we call a It’s an HHV, so it’s healthcare for homeless veterans contracted with the VA, and with that, as long as they’re there for 60 days, they get a treatment plan that will last a year for dental. Unless they’re 100%, that’s all they get.

Nila 

As long as they initiate it and get it started before, they leave our facility, they can continue that care once they leave.

Joel 

Well, that’s certainly a helpful benefit. Can you expound a little bit more on the AIDS in attendance? So, what does AIDS in attendance cover?

Nila 

Well, what I’ve experienced with it is that if they have to go into, say, assisted living or anything like that, it helps cover the cost. So, say an assisted living facility charges $2500 a month, and that determines It depends on what level of care you are at when you go in. So, we had won the AIDS and the 10s that COVID-19 cost $1000 a month. So, he only had to pay out of Pocket $600 a month, and that took care of his medications, his food, and the staff that would be there if they needed assistance. You know, basically for that. It helps cover the cost for veterans who cannot afford the whole cost of assisted living.

Joel 

So, it’s on the paper front. So, Teresa, we were chatting just for a few minutes before we went live here. You know, I was saying that you guys are pretty many heroes because, as far as, like, advocacy with the VA goes, it’s one thing to know the VA can do something. It’s another thing to get the VA should do something about the horror stories you talked about a few years ago. They are really bad, but there are more horror stories. Maybe not quite that bad that is being made every day, and it’s because, for a lot of different reasons, I don’t think I want to try to go until that here. But Long story short, there are a lot of veterans, so I would rather gouge out an eye than look at a VA. But the ones that need these Services need them, and can you just talk a little bit about what a nonprofit like yours does to help veterans navigate the VA system and get the help that they need?

Teresa 

If we have a veteran, we have a veteran in our community who doesn’t have transportation to his appointments. He didn’t trust the VA. He was done with him, and he was just finding out at the time that he had been diagnosed with cancer. 

So, we took him to an appointment at a local hospital, and he was not happy with that hospital, of course, he was not going to talk to the VA. He’s already had it with the VA, and so I called the VA, we talked, I did some advocacy for him, and I talked to them about oncology. and the best place for him. I recommended an oncology department locally. 

And so, they were willing to do that for him. And they hooked him up. Unfortunately, his cancer was a lot worse than we ever expected. And he has since passed. But he did very well. He outlived his expectations of what they gave him. And in this oncology department, he loved them. They were good to him, and he respected them. And the VA did pay for that. 

So that was very, very helpful, but that’s what we do. That’s us; we do that advocacy, and if our advocacy doesn’t, with them, we get a hold of the VA advocate. Every VA has a veteran advocate there and that’s when I start talking to them, and I stay on the phone with them. You know, for as long as I need to, or we just set up several calls, I will talk to them and bug them until they do what I need them to do, and they advocate for that better. And most of the advocates that I’ve dealt with are top-notch. 

They have no problem going in and saying that doctor what those veteran needs. Or that social worker. Anybody else the advocates that I’ve dealt with are pretty headstrong.

So, I like them and I recommend them all the time.

Joel 

I had no idea that the VA had advocates. It’s kind of like they know that their system needs a little help, so instead of maybe fixing some of the problems, they just Hired people to help stay on top of it. But yeah, that’s a good resource to know. You know, there are people at the VA that can, and I hope that our listeners can excuse my sarcasm. I’m a veteran who’s had a fair number of dealings with VA myself, so a little tongue, tongue-in-cheek Feelings are probably coming through on the recording, but yeah, yeah, it’s great. 

It’s because it seems like there are a lot of advocates out there; there’s the advocate at the VA, which you’ve mentioned a couple of times over the course of this, a veteran service organization. I think maybe you mentioned or…

Teresa 

You have. 

Joel 

I mentioned a couple of different advocacy organizations.

Teresa 

 You have quite a few. Just about any. If you know any organization out there that’s helping veterans, they are your advocates. At least I would hope that they would be, you know, everybody that we work with, every different program that we work with, that the supportive services for veterans and their families are top notch. They will advocate for them, for the veterans that they’re working with, even our HUD Vash case workers, who are case workers through the VA. They will advocate extremely hard for our veterans. You know, we do it; I think just about everybody does. We connect with our very good advocates. Yeah, they will fight for that veteran until they either can’t fight anymore and there’s nothing that they can do, or until they get their way. And we prefer to just keep fighting until we get our way.

Joel 

Yeah, that’s what you’ve got to do. So just I guess I want to try. I’m going to attempt to summarize here a little bit the services that might be available for veterans who are struggling and starting on the homeless side. 

There are organizations like yours that can help if you are a homeless veteran. You can find temporary housing for up to six. For a year, you can get additional help as far as getting dental work and stuff like that. Once you are in the program.

You can also get assistance with finding a job and putting together savings. There are a lot of resources that are available to you if you’re out there and you’re homeless or if you know someone homeless. 

There are a lot of resources that are available to you, and if you’ve never worked with the VA before, you may be eligible. You can just, you know, look into it, but there are resources out there, and if you are at risk of becoming homeless, there are programs out there to help you too. You mentioned a program where there’s a $ 2,500 fund that it seems you can tap into to help you temporarily with rent payments or something like that. There’s also another assistance with jobs and trying to find ways to get the revenue, or even, as you mentioned at one point, trying to help people with HUD.

So, it sounds like organizations like yours might also help them tap into other social safety net programs to help keep them in their homes, keep them gainfully employed, and move their lives forward instead of sliding backward.

And then kind of the third thing I wanted to maybe try to summarize is that once you’re older, once you’re a senior, or perhaps you’re disabled from your military service, there is assistance that can be out there for you. If you are at risk of being homeless or if you are homeless and you’re older, you can get monetary assistance towards getting into a nursing home or a senior facility. As far as housing goes and being able to cover the cost of that. There are also personal care assistants in-home care that can come in and help you with your activities of daily living that the VA will cover. 

Nicole had said something about it: maybe 10 to 12 hours a week, and they can help with cooking, cleaning, or even more severe stuff. You know, if the hygiene issues need help getting dressed, taking a shower, some of that, and some of that more intimate stuff. But if you need that assistance and it keeps you in your home, you can get help from the VA to cover that as well, so you know, did I miss anything? Theresa, do you think I missed any major programs?

Teresa 

I don’t, and I don’t believe so. Not off the top of my head. We do so much because we don’t just do. I mean, those are the main areas that we work with. But you know, if we can find other things, we try to bridge the veteran with the community. So, if there’s something new that comes out, of course, we’re going to try to connect. So no, as far as I know, I think you’ve covered just about everything.

Joel 

And then, of course, as you know, working through the VA to get all these benefits can be difficult, but you don’t have to do it alone. There are organizations like Journey Home. There’s an advocate at the VA that can help you, and there are other veterans service organizations that can help you navigate. The paperwork and help that help get you in contact with the people that you need to be in contact with to get them can be a little bit of work, but it can also be a big payoff in terms of either improving your quality of life if you need caregiving or moving your life forward if you are at risk of homelessness or currently homeless. 

So, I think that you know it, even if it is a bit of work. It sounds to me like you’re in those situations, it can be good. Worth it? And you’re not alone. There are people out there to help.

Teresa 

I like to think that we are the only facility out there like us, but there are other facilities. They’re not. They’re not as good as us…

Joel 

Well, there are no other facilities out there like that that are like yours, but there are some that are trying to make bad copies, you know. It’s similar. 

Teresa 

And so, I mean, you know, I don’t know how far this reaches, but you know. Whether it’s our facility or, if you’re in New York or you know Kentucky and you don’t want to come up this far to Indiana, you know, seek those out. Seek those out, and you know, if you’ve never been in them, just try them are the grant and per diem shelters and the healthcare for homeless veteran shelters. They’re not your typical shelter. 

So, seek those out and make sure that you know how to take advantage of every opportunity that is given to you. Veterans are given a lot of resources. But they’re not talking about those resources.

Joel 

Yeah, yeah, that’s the hardest thing. And it’s always talking to somebody else, somebody else, and somebody else. But the resources are out there, and that’s where I’m hoping we raised some awareness today. 

So, Theresa, if somebody wanted to get a hold of you guys on The Journey Home, either for assistance or perhaps if they wanted to donate because you are a nonprofit doing good work, how can they reach you?

Teresa 

They can give us a call at 765-595-8297. They can go to our website, which I believe is www.journeyhomevets.org, or they can hit us up on Facebook.

Joel 

All righties. Well, thank you for coming by. I think this has been a very enlightening conversation, and maybe there are some people out there that need to hear it.

Nicole 

Yeah. Thank you very much. It’s very good information.

Teresa 

Hey, not a problem. Thank you. Thank you for having us. I appreciate it. And you know, the more awareness we send out there, maybe that’s a little less veteran count that is homeless. You know, I want to get them.

Nicole 

Well, it’s good for them to know that someone’s out there. To help them navigate. Through the process, it is.

Teresa 

And I mean, like I said, I don’t care where you’re from. I don’t care where you’re sitting. If you need help, I’ll We’ll sit there and Google. We’ll sit there on the phone with you and Google and do some searches. And do whatever we can to help. That’s not for me and Nyla; it’s not a job. It’s kind of our passion. And that’s what we do for you; if we don’t do that, then I don’t even know. You know, I don’t know why I’m here.

Joel 

All right. Well, thank you, everybody. I appreciate you coming on.

Nicole 

We appreciate you.

Joel 

Take care. 

Nicole 

Thank you. Have a good day.