The Dallas 24 Hour Club uses holiday donations from the community to help residents work to mend fractured family relationships.
A closet inside the Dallas 24 Hour Club’s new Trevor’s Place center was filled with boxes of donations on Wednesday morning. A group of ‘elves’ gathered to open and sort them.
“The holidays are hard in recovery,” Dallas 24 Hour Club alumna Vanessa Woods said. ” Especially early recovery.”
Dallas 24 Hour Club, commonly called “The 2-4,” is a sober transitional living home with wrap-around services for people in drug or alcohol recovery who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of being unhoused.
“This isn’t the first place they come. It’s usually the last place,” Dallas 24 Hour Club Advocate Chair Tami Darlington said.
The Dallas 24 Hour Club sets up a toy market of donations for residents to ‘shop’ for their families for free.
“You know, sometimes they feel disconnected from their family. It’s just been a long time since they’ve been able to give a game, a toy, a basketball to their child, or their niece, or nephew. It allows them to come in and ‘shop’,” Darlington said.
“When I was in my early recovery, I think it was a challenge for my family to be very inviting around the holidays, and so I spent the holiday season last year at ‘The 2-4’,” Woods said. “I expected that to be very difficult, and depressing, and lonely. The people, and the programs, and the support that ‘The 2-4’ offered during that period, it ended up creating some really fond memories.”
Residents are included in the donations, getting stockings stuffed with donated essentials and gift certificates.
“I think it provides so much dignity and joy at a time that can seem not so happy,” Darlington said.
“It definitely pushes out that feeling of loneliness, and replaces it with a sense of being cared for, and a sense of community,” Woods said. “Hope. I think it gives a sense of hope.”
The 24 Hour Club has an Amazon Wish List for community donations. Donations are accepted through December 12th.