My name is Diva, and my boyfriend and I are in a dire domestic abuse situation in which we are being discriminated against and forced to work to the point of sickness and injury, and we are in desperate need of escape and safety.

We came to Michigan from Washington, on the west coast under the promise of safe harbor and an opportunity to recover from homelessness after fleeing our previous domestic violence situations, but the people we are staying with are not who they claimed to be, nor do the have any true desire to help us. They took advantage of our vulnerability, telling us all that would be expected of us was that we work towards financial and medical stability so we can eventually get our own place. However, after we arrived they started piling on more and more responsibilities that we are not capable of keeping up with, and we spent all of our savings on travel to get here, where we have nothing and no one.

They are forcing my boyfriend to do so much housework that he has injured both of his ankles and his back, and then they continued to abuse him as punishment for the injuries slowing him down. My boyfriend is supposed to be acting as my caregiver, but they won't allow him to focus on those responsibilities, so I am forced to function without proper care and consistently being abused any time my progress at work suffers as a result. I love my job, but they won't allow me to enjoy it or pursue it at my own pace.

Last night, on December 3rd 2024, I tried to set a boundary with them that they cannot expect my boyfriend to continue to work so hard to maintain their house at the cost of his own well-being or mine, reminding them that I was clinically dead in 2023 and still have not made a full recovery, and we were ordered an eviction notice as a result. We have been trying so hard to save up money to leave, but as soon as things started to pick up for me at work the deadline was moved up. I would need at least another 3 months to be properly prepared for this, and now we have until January 3rd.

As it is, we will not be prepared, and we are probably going to end up freezing on the snowy Michigan streets in the dead of winter if we can't get help. They have us isolated out here, cut off from resources, and we're doing our best to seek help, but I'm honestly terrified it isn't going to be enough. We have contacted Adult Protective Services, but we doubt they can help us relocate in time. Unfortunately, going through official means to receive aid when you are disabled takes more time than we have. We have created this GoFundMe in hopes we might be able to get the help that we need to achieve temporary housing where we can hopefully truly focus on recovery our health and finances.