That is Talk OF THE NATION. I'm Ari Shapiro in Washington. Winter's approaching, and it's getting cold. That makes the issue of homelessness extra pressing. The National Coalition for the Homeless estimates that 700 people on the streets die from hypothermia yearly in the U.S. So each day volunteers and outreach employees head out to encourage homeless folks to go to shelters. In lots of circumstances they refuse, and on this hour we'll explore why. We'll start with a visitor who was as soon as homeless himself and refused shelter, but we additionally need to hear from you. If you have been homeless, have you ever ever prevented shelter? Tell us your story. And you may as well join the conversation at our webpage. Later in the program, marijuana has been legal in Washington State for all of 12 hours now. So are the shelves naked in 7-Elevens throughout Seattle but? But first, coming in from the chilly. Th is data was done with the help of G SA Cont ent Generator DE MO!
David Pirtle joins us here in NPR Studio 3A. Welcome to the program. DAVID PIRTLE: Thank you. SHAPIRO: Tell us your story. How did you find yourself homeless? PIRTLE: Well, I turned homeless in 2004 on account of schizophrenia, untreated schizophrenia. It caused me to lose my job, and that i wound up on the street. SHAPIRO: And was schizophrenia part of your purpose for avoiding shelters? PIRTLE: A part of the reason was, you understand, the paranoia and the fear of giant teams of people who comes along with schizophrenia, however part of the explanation was, and I think that is extra typically the case with individuals, is that you just hear plenty of horrible things about shelters, that shelters are dangerous locations, that they're filled with medicine and drug dealers, that people will steal your sneakers, and there's bedbugs and body lice. And yeah, sadly lots of these issues are true. SHAPIRO: Those issues really happen.
SHAPIRO: Is there a wide range between the shelters which can be, you already know, safe and warm and sneakers clear and furnituresales.shop the shelters the place folks would fairly simply be on the street? PIRTLE: Oh yes, there's - I don't need to say that each one shelters are like that. There's lots of excellent shelters on this nation. But there are plenty of huge warehouses that are simply places the place we stick individuals at evening and sneakers we really haven't any regard for the way they reside there. SHAPIRO: What was it like for you on the worst nights, while you were not in a shelter? PIRTLE: Well, not being in a shelter during the coldest nights is simply, you realize, concern of not waking up within the morning. It's worry of freezing to demise. But you discover ways to adapt. You learn how to, you know, stuff newspapers in your clothing to keep heat. You study hypothermia vans that come by and go out blankets.
And I discovered it loads easier to deal with finally than the heat in the summer time. SHAPIRO: And when folks in these vans would come by and say come on in from the cold, you mentioned it was your schizophrenia, however knowing that you simply had this worry of not waking up in the morning, discuss the choice not to go with them to a warm place. PIRTLE: All I can say is that my fear of the unknown, of what is perhaps ready for me at that shelter, was worse than my concern of the identified threat, you understand, of staying out on the road. That was the place I was snug. And I feel people, we're creatures of habit. We get comfortable in essentially the most uncomfortable positions, and that just becomes house. SHAPIRO: And did you have got firsthand experiences within the shelter that made you think, no, this is not a spot I need to be? PIRTLE: I spent most of my time homeless out on the road.