I (19M) am living in my close friend’s living room without any other residence to choose from and just want out, but I genuinely don’t know how to find a place to live in my situation.
Hi all. Please be gentle, that’s all I ask. I’ve gone through so much at this point and I really just want any semblance of a light at the end of the tunnel.
I will summarise because I don’t wanna leave you all slogging through a very long backstory:
-I have a VERY awful family. My mother was an extremely abusive alcohol that would severely emotionally abuse me, as well as physically abuse me, steal my medication to get high off of while I was sleeping, neglect all of my pets to death, starve me, medically neglect me (before moving out I hadn’t gotten a physical, seen the eye doctor (I’m legally blind), been to the dentist, or any other form of treatment behind UrgentCare for over six years at the minimum), and more.
-I have five other family members that I lived with but none are relevant. My mother assaulted my aunt and got us evicted which was why we initially moved out, and then the idiot didn’t pay rent at all at our new apartment and got us evicted again.
-By some unfathomable miracle, an extremely kind-hearted family that I played D&D with took me in right before becoming homeless myself, and I lived with them for the rest of the year; because of them, I have all of my legal documents and decent adulting skills.
-They had to end up moving as their jobs weren’t paying enough and they unfortunately could not bring me with them, as devastating as it was for them. The intention was never to stay with them but to instead move to Michigan with my friend (18F), where we’d try to get an apartment together so we could both escape our horrible lives and actually have a future. She’s amazing, and I genuinely was only able to make it this far because of her.
-My other friend drove me to Michigan where I currently am now, and while I was initially gonna go to a homeless shelter _somehow_ my other friend had a place for me to live, too.
-This friend is AMAZING and we weren’t initially very close but now he’s among my best friends I’ve ever had. However, this household doesn’t have room for me, and I literally sleep in the living room. There’s six other members of the household and they often times just walk in and start talking, either to me or to each other, and even when I’m trying to have alone time or be on-call with my friends they’ll initiate a conversation with me and get a little bit upset when I don’t wanna talk right now.
-On top of this, my friend’s sixteen year old sister is… kind of a lot. Suffering very much so from sixteen year old syndrome… She has an “I’m the smartest person in any room I’m in”-complex, never says “sorry”, “thank you” or “I love you” (the last one to her mother), tells her friends on Discord that her family’s abusing her, absolutely refuses to do anything around the house, claims to have disabilities that she’s been medically proven not to have to get _out_ of doing things around the house (usually I end up doing them on top of everything else I do), is extremely condescending and rude in almost every interaction, etc. I… don’t get along with people like this very well. I have a very, very bad fawn response and I’m extremely sensitive to people who are mean to me, _even if it’s a literal teenager_, and I also take it extremely personally when people, even just teenagers that’s expected to it, fake disabilities as it’s something I struggle with heavily myself.
-There’s other things; the general lack of privacy, the fact that the family is _very_ blunt (and I am… you know… extremely sensitive) a lot of the time and make a lot of semi-subtle comments about my detriment, the living room gets extremely hot in the summer and I’m VERY heat sensitive, etc. The biggest issue by far is that they literally _cannot_ properly afford to keep me here, and I’m causing a MASSIVE burden on every bill and paycheck, and I just don’t wanna keep doing that above everything else.
The kicker as to where I wanna go from here:
-I’d like to rent a place, preferably an apartment or a house (they’re pretty much equal price in the Detroit area), with my friend (18F, the one from earlier) and hopefully also my partner of four years (19M) whom is in a nearby state but cannot move just yet (but is willing to compromise).
-Working is an extreme challenge for me. I have a LOT of disabilities, namely autism, ADHD, dyscalculia, schizoaffective, PTSD, panic disorder and dependent personality disorder, as well as being legally blind, suffering from decent muscle atrophy (from starving) that prevents me from lifting more than thirty-ish pounds, a speech disorder that makes it pretty hard to hear what I’m saying a lot, and having extremely low stamina from something the doctors cannot really figure out yet (I’m a little bit bad at going to the doctors… I’m pretty bad about being dismissive of my own issues), and almost any one of these could easily prevent me from working. I really dread trying to work at all and I don’t think I can, but I’m lost as to what else I could do for money; especially given that SSI takes _forever_ to get back to you and it’s unlikely to even get accepted.
-My friend has a job (don’t exactly remember how much, but I think it’s about $15 - $18 an hour for about 35 to 40 hours a week) and my partner has a job too, that he’s willing to transfer to over here with.
-We have a collective roughly $4,500 in savings.
-The mentioned friend’s mother is willing to be a co-signer, her credit is really good; she has no evictions or anything on her record, and has consistently paid off everything well. Neither my friend nor partner nor me have a credit score.
-I am LGBTQ+, as well as autistic and physically disabled as I mentioned, if there are any resources there!
-Contacting my family is not an option; I’ve cut them all off.
-Contacting my _actual_ family is; they live close enough, being around the Rochester area after they moved and they _are_ willing to help me, though I don’t know with how much.
-Probably useless information that I’m just throwing out there, I’m on Blue Cross Complete government Medical, as well as have Food Benefits, I’m willing to do side hustles if I have to, I cannot drive but my friend and partner can, I’m _attempting_ to get into plasma donation but my veins keep being too small, I’m legally(?) homeless if that’s how that works? My Bridges account has me registered as that, and I am _not_ willing to do anything involving AI or sexual favours.