- [Interviewer] Serenity, we're in San Diego,
you're homeless, you're 20 years old, you're pregnant,
you're out here.
And the reason they can't put you in a shelter is -
- Is 'cause I'm pregnant.
It's 'cause I'm pregnant and there's no bottom bunks.
- [Interviewer] Yeah. Tell me about it.
- I'm a liability to them. They think that..
Most people, they never have said it in any programs,
but a lot of people notice it, which they catch on.
We always catch on. We're not dumb.
We're homeless, but we're not stupid, we're not uneducated.
Like some of these people out here have degrees.
And it's just crazy how intelligent
and how hardworking some of these people truly are.
But we catch on, you know?
And they like, we see, they don't wanna take me
because I'm pregnant, because I'm a liability.
And if anything were to happen to me,
like that's on them and then because I'm pregnant,
it's more money out of their pockets, you know?
- [Interviewer] But what's gonna happen to you out here?
I mean, you told us that -
- Who knows? Who knows?
- [Interviewer] You went up to the police
and asked for help.
- And they still didn't do,
weren't able to help me at all whatsoever.
And it's been maybe about four to five weeks, maybe six now.
I don't really count anymore because it's just like,
it just frustrates me more if I think about it.
- [Interviewer] And you can't,
you're saying you're having trouble getting
to doctor's appointments?
- Yeah, I have not had an ultrasound
since I was about six weeks.
And the only reason I did have an ultrasound
was because I was having pain in my stomach
and I went to the emergency room.
I know I could probably try a lot harder to get that,
but at the same time, I have to make sure -
- [Interviewer] You gotta survive.
- Throughout the day that nobody's stealing my stuff.
Like for example, I just came back from Tijuana.
I visited my sister, my little sister and my stepmom.
And I was gone for maybe about four or five days.
And my neighbor, Mama Rachel, who's two tents down,
she wasn't here either to be able to watch my stuff.
Which if she's, if I'm not here, she usually does for me.
And vice versa, she wasn't here.
And I came back and all of my stuff was tossed up.
My whole tent is messed up.
It's ripped, literally, from the zipper.
I can't even close it. There's holes in the floor.
All my blankets are dirty.
All my clothes were thrown everywhere.
And some of my stuff is missing.
And my other neighbor on the other side
of me tried to blame the police on it.
And it's, I know it's not the police.
The police are not gonna come inside my tent like that.
I mean, as much as they do mess with us a lot,
and they really have some type of animosity towards us,
they're not just gonna do it for no reason.
'Cause they know how much trouble they can get in
with everything going on right now.
But that's why I can't do certain things
because I wanna make sure my stuff is okay,
or I wanna make sure that nobody goes in my stuff
and takes my personal belongings that I do have left,
you know?
And so, there's just little things like that
that people think that we can just drop everything
that we're doing to go and do something else.
And it's like, it's not that we don't want to.
It's just like we can't, we can't, we can't.
- [Interviewer] That's what prevents a lot of homeless -
- It's reality.
- [Interviewer] People from going to the doctor
and getting medical.
- It's reality.
They don't have people they trust to watch their stuff.
Or they, that's all they have left.
I mean, this is literally mostly everything
that you see out here with these people
is all that they have to their name.
- [Interviewer] And you are clean and sober.
- Mm hmm.
- [Interviewer] How does a 21 or 20-year-old,
pregnant woman, sober, survive out here?
- It's hard. It is.
Thankfully, my baby's father, he's a big support to me.
Even before I got pregnant.
Like our relationship is very, very,
it's the first healthy relationship I've ever been in.
And he's trying his best right now to save up
to get us, which we're trying, we're trying.
It's just really hard for me to leave San Diego.
But I think that's what I'm gonna have to do for right now.
Just until we can save up more money
because it's really expensive out here to live.
But we have, once the construction's done,
and TJ and the house that we're going to, our apartment,
we're gonna go out there.
But that's why we've been back and forth.
And so, but he supports me mostly.
I mean he's, it's hard for him to save out here,
because it's so expensive.
And I eat a lot. I eat a lot. I do, I eat a lot.
That's all I do. 95% of the day I'm eating.
- [Interviewer] Well, you're pregnant.
- Yeah, so.
- [Interviewer] And you're basically a teenager still.
- Yeah, so I'm still growing.
I mean like, and I'm still growing, you know?
- [Interviewer] Yeah, yeah.
- But that's one thing I know for sure is like,
I don't go hungry out here.
And that's, - [Interviewer] And you,
- Even if he wasn't supporting me
and we weren't working together to make sure
that we have food all the time, there is resources.
That's one thing that,
one thing that people can actually take advantage of
is showers and food.
Clothing, it's, eh, you know, I mean,
- [Interviewer] But no housing. No housing.
- No housing though. Yeah. It's crazy how that works.
- [Interviewer] And for you, no shelter,
'cause you're pregnant.
- And no shelter and that means no housing.
- But there's plenty of food.
- Yeah, I mean,
- [Interviewer] And there's showers.
- Mm hmm, showers and -
- [Interviewer] But I mean, what would you -
- The restroom even is like, for example, it's -
- [Interviewer] I just went, and they have the,
- If you don't have, if you don't have the
- [Interviewer] Yeah, no, you go ahead.
Go ahead.
- If the back gates are locked right here,
where the restrooms are at.
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
- But they used to be unlocked 24/7, the back gates.
- [Interviewer] Well,
they have the top of the doors cut off
in the bathroom stalls.
- It's, yeah. And they're not locked.
- [Interviewer] So there's no privacy.
- You have no privacy. People walk by and like, "Oh."
Like if you don't leave something,
even sometimes you can leave something on the stall door
while you're in there, like a sweater or something,
so people know.
They still walk by and like, "Well, oh, I'm sorry."
Like you see a jacket here, why are you gonna come up to my,
- [Interviewer] So -
- It's like being in jail!
- [Interviewer] Today was a homeless sweep.
- Yeah.
- [Interviewer] And you had to move all your stuff.
- Yeah.
- [Interviewer] And you're pregnant,
from one side of the street to the other side of the street.
- Yeah, thankfully the sun waited to come out to after,
but, that's one thing - - [Interviewer] Yeah.
- So let's wait for the trains -
And the cops know you're pregnant, you've asked for help.
- They don't care. They don't care.
They don't care at all.
That's just one thing for them to talk more shit about.
Excuse my language, but,
"Why are you out here on the streets if you're pregnant?"
Da da da.
Well, why don't you guys tell me to get off the streets
if I'm pregnant?
Like, why don't you guys do something more
to help women like me?
I'm 20, I'm 20 years. I'm not even 21 yet. I'm 20 years old.
I don't turn 21 until September.
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
- I'm technically still a baby.
I'm still trying to learn how to like,
- Yeah, you shouldn't be out here.
- Do things, you know, like this isn't, this is not,
like I said, it's not an ideal.
It's not an ideal life for a 20-year-old to live.
You know, it's not-
- [Interviewer] What would you want people
to know about homelessness if they don't,
these people walking by are driving and riding.
- We are not bad people. We are not. We're human.
We're human too.
And we deserve the same amount of respect
and the same amount of love and opportunities
that somebody who isn't in the streets.
- [Interviewer] Yeah. - Does have.
You know what I mean? We're human.
That's the number one thing I want people to know
is that we're human too.
We're not just objects or creatures.
Like I know it can be scary to see some,
sometimes like under the bridge, for example,
where we were all really located before.
Now when somebody walks under there
and I ask somebody who's not homeless,
"Does it look scary?
You're walking under there at three in the morning
when there's literally nobody, nothing around.
It's completely dark. It's super, like the freeway.
So cars are driving by, you can't hear anything.
If you were to scream, nobody would hear you.
Does it seem scary you're walking through the bridge
or underneath the bridge now that there's nobody there?
Or when there was people there
with their canopies and their lights?"
And the lady said, "You know what? It is more scary now."
And it's true, you know. But we're human.
We're human and we all have things we go through too.
And just because we're out here
doesn't make us less of a person.
So I just, I hope people realize that.
Like, when -
- [Interviewer] If you had three wishes, what would they be?
- Well, the first would be to be off the streets, for sure.
The second would be to,
I wanna help people.
That's what I wanna do.
I wanna go into like counseling
or like to help people, girls, like girls my age.
Like through sharing my testimony with them, you know?
'Cause I've been through a lot
and I know I love helping people and I don't, I mean,
I don't mean it like to get paid or anything.
I wanna do it because that's just -
- [Interviewer] You just wanna help people.
- Something I wanna do, yeah, like -
- [Interviewer] I was homeless 28 years ago.
- Oh, wow.
- [Interviewer] So you'll find your path.
- Yeah. God will always leave me. That's another thing.
My relationship with God is one thing that keeps me.
- [Interviewer] Yeah. - Going every day.
If it wasn't for Him, I wouldn't,
I would've probably lost my mind.
- [Interviewer] Third wish.
- My third wish would be,
I don't know.
Maybe just to have like better living situation.
Obviously, like to not be on the streets, but like,
even though I am on the streets,
since that's obviously not gonna be an option right now,
just like,
it sucks 'cause my tent got ripped up and all that.
Like, I don't know,
just to be more comfortable while I'm out here, I guess,
while I'm pregnant,
until I figure out what I'm gonna do or what's gonna happen.
- [Interviewer] Hopefully people will see this
and they'll get you in shelter and hopefully housing.
- Hopefully. - [Interviewer] So.
- Yeah, and I'm a former foster youth as well too,
so I qualify, but it's, they just -
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
Well, thank you very much for talking to me.
- Thank you so much.