I’m a single mum – I gave up my four kids because I couldn’t afford them anymore & I’m desperate to find a good home
A DESPERATE mum has admitted to giving up four of her seven children because she “just couldn’t afford them” anymore.
Hebriella George from New South Wales, Australia, had to give up four of her kids while living in a mould-covered, rat-infested house.
Her house was riddled with mould and rats and she says she’s been unable to give her kids “the home they deserve” while struggling financially during her ten year wait for public housing.
Hebriella is just one in 160,000 people in Australia on the waiting list for public housing and has expressed her heartbreak for not being able to provide her kids with a proper home to live in.
“I had to give four of my children up because I just couldn’t afford them anymore,” she explained.
“There are days that I don’t even know what to put on the table to feed them.
“It makes me break down that I can’t give my kids the home they deserve”.
The mum of seven claims to have applied for over 60 properties but has not been successful in her attempts to relocate.
After a decade of waiting for a suitable home, she became so desperate that she was forced to rent a mould-covered, rat-infested house where she paid £250 a week rent.
She initially thought she had got lucky with the property as no one else was going to apply to live there.
“I knew looking at the picture that no one was going to apply for that home because I wouldn’t have done it myself if I wasn’t desperate, but I was,” she told Australian TV show, The Project.
The dingy home left the distressed mum no choice but to throw away piles of her belongings because the house was in such a run down state and she needed the space.
Hebriella’s only other option would have been to live in her car which was impossible while still raising three kids.
Four of her children now live with their dad, who Hebriella says is in a better financial position.
The mould and the rats became unbearable for the hopeless mum and she was heartbroken when it began affecting her children’s health.
“My 11-month-old boy has gone to the hospital twice for respiratory issues. Is it going to take a death in my family for the government to look at my kids and me?” she said.
In New South Wales, homelessness is rife with around 220,000 considered homeless according to Mark Degotardi, CEO of Community Housing Industry Association.