C-SPAN Caller Breaks Down While Sharing Heartwrenching Story of Financial Trouble After Losing Her Job As a Nurse

 

A 57-year-old woman from Hardeeville, South Carolina broke down during a Friday call to C-SPAN’s Washington Journal in which she described facing homelessness after losing her job as a nurse in the coronavirus pandemic.

“Due to Covid-19, I couldn’t work, because I have underlying diseases. I have Sarcoidosis, I have Sickle Cell, and at that time, my sugar diabetes was a 10,” said the woman, who went by “Thea.” “And my doctor thought — and my insurance — thought it was time for me to leave that job for a little while.”

The woman explained that she had been a health-care worker for 33 years. “I’ve tried unemployment, tried to file for unemployment — at this point, I don’t even have insurance to take care of myself. I lived in my house for 25 years, and I don’t even have the money to take care of myself,” she said, before breaking down. “I got the papers from the doctor stating that I could go back to work, and they tell me they have no hours for me.

“So I’m just in really a rut. This morning, I’m getting up, and I’ve been looking for jobs, and just for some reason, I can’t get one in my field,” she said, noting that she had been working as a CNA in Hiltonhead, South Carolina. “For some reason, I just can’t get no help whatsoever. I got foreclosure on my house. I just paid off my car. And I just feel like in the next couple of months, I’ll be living in my car. I don’t want to depend on nobody because I’ve been taking care of myself for years, and my children. And I just think this is so awful.”

“I just needed somebody to hear me,” she told the host.

Subsequent callers offered support for the woman, with one offering to give her $1,000. Another man, “Michael,” offered a portion of his disability payments. “I just wanted to address the lady that called earlier,” he said. “I’m on Social Security disability, and I’m willing to give her whatever I can afford out of that check every month to get her back on her feet.”

It wasn’t clear whether C-SPAN was able to connect the callers with the woman.

Watch above via C-SPAN.

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