Our latest feature in the Front + Center series with Ms. Magazine is here!
Javonica shared her story of having two kids of her own, being pregnant with her third, navigating the TANF program, and what is was like being selected for the Magnolia Mother’s Trust year long guaranteed income program.
“When I’m between jobs, it’s always been a struggle to make ends meet. For a while, I was getting about $100 a week in child support. I would also babysit when I could. My sister would send me money if my kids needed anything, but it was still hard. I tried to apply for TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) and went to the orientation, but they make you do community service to get it or just take whatever job they give you if you don’t already have one. And I would’ve maybe done that, but the administrator made it really clear that you were not allowed to miss any shifts and that they don’t care if you don’t have reliable transportation so again, not having a car kept me from being able to access it. And that if I missed a shift, that would also put my food stamps at risk, and I really couldn’t afford to lose those. So I just withdrew my TANF application.
I wish the people in charge of these systems would improve how they work, mainly in having some level of kindness when it comes to the people you have to deal with. They make you feel a certain kind of way when you apply for these programs. Even when I was working, I felt looked down on and demeaned with the way they talked to me—when really I feel like you should care about people if you’re in that line of work. And then they lose your paperwork, and you have to call and wait forever. I’m not even exaggerating, I’ve had to call 20 or 30 times to get through for food stamps before when they messed up my application. The only option to bypass that is to go in person, but again, I don’t have transportation to do that.”
We are forever grateful for our mothers stepping forward and sharing their stories with us in their own words. Thank you, Javonica, for your strength and for your honesty!