SENIOR OUTREACH AND SUPPORT SERVICES
A Journey into Grace

“It’s wonderful to have somebody young and sincere come to your home and take the time to sit down and compare thoughts for the day,” says Larry, a St. Anthony Senior Outreach client.

“In the 1950s, alcohol was not looked upon as a disease—it was a disgrace,” says Larry, a Tenderloin senior. “My mother was a very sloppy alcoholic, and she died on a street corner in Brooklyn.” The family disintegrated, and he was left to survive on his own at 16.

Vowing he would never meet his mother’s fate, Larry made a good living in the restaurant business, traveled the world, and settled in San Francisco. But his own drinking problem gradually spiraled out of control. Larry was fired from his job, became increasingly isolated, and left his apartment only to buy more alcohol.

He eventually got both a counselor and a doctor at North of Market Senior Services, a Tenderloin agency. His doctor discovered that he had high blood pressure and diabetes, and had also suffered a stroke.

Grounded in Honesty
As he started addressing these health issues, the staff at North of Market referred Larry to St. Anthony Foundation for help with his finances. Reluctantly, he met a case manager, Barbara, who helped him manage his money and sign up for government benefits. Over time, they cultivated a working relationship grounded in honesty. “She saw right through me,” he says. “And all of a sudden I had to start stripping away this phoniness. I told her about Brooklyn, about my mother dying, and everything else.”

Larry meets with St. Anthony spiritual outreach worker Marie once a week in his apartment.

In addition to meeting once a month with Barbara, Larry also started receiving weekly visits from a St. Anthony Foundation spiritual outreach worker, who met with him to talk about his mother’s death and lifelong feelings of guilt and shame.

After many months, Larry grew to trust his network of counselors and doctors at St. Anthony’s and North of Market. Although they were committed to continuing the relationship whether or not he continued to drink, they also wanted him to understand the consequences of his actions. Because he had never been homeless and had money in his pocket, Larry said he still didn’t think he had a drinking problem. “My counselors said, ‘Forget where you’ve been—this is where you’re going. You will sleep in doorways, you will eat out of garbage pails, you will smoke cigarette butts off the street, because this is what the disease does to you.’”

Yet by knowing that his housing was guaranteed, Larry says he became free to come to a decision about his drinking in his own time. “My foundation was put down because Barbara gave me the security that I was not going to lose this apartment. So that started sinking in. And by building that foundation, it started giving me an insight on, well, do I want to be sober? What’s in it for me? Or do I want to keep on drinking? St. Anthony’s would always be there to make sure you got your check, but what happens when you can’t get off the couch?”

Feeling Whole
Larry eventually found his own answers to these questions, deciding to get sober about three years ago. “I know now, after well over 50 years of drinking, I’d probably want to be sober—because it’s so much clearer. There’s so little to worry about.”

Although his initial case manager and spiritual outreach worker have both moved on, he has forged relationships with new staff. Marie, his present spiritual outreach worker, visits him each Tuesday. Marie and her colleagues are experienced in both Eastern and Western traditions of spirituality, and provide a healing presence through deep listening to isolated Tenderloin seniors’ life stories. Depending on a senior’s wishes, counselors can also share readings, meditation, art activities, and healing rituals.

“It’s wonderful to have somebody young and sincere come to your home and take the time to sit down and compare thoughts for the day,” Larry says. “She’ll say something, but leave it open for you to make a decision.

“We talk about the feeling of being whole. She was here yesterday, and I was talking about my 65th birthday. I said, I don’t have a fear of dying, and I also have no fear of living. And she said, ‘That’s a really profound statement. How did you come to it?’ I said because I know my Higher Power has taken me from this to that, and I’m here now, so why should I fear the unknown?”

For more information about how you can get involved with St. Anthony Foundation’s programs for seniors, call (415) 241-2600 or click here.

If you would like to be added to the St. Anthony Spirit newsletter mailing list, please call (415) 592-2738 or e-mail info@stanthonysf.org.

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