By Simon Byrnes, Lived Experience Coordinator, Yfoundations, and Jae
As the story of one young person shows, a safe and stable home is vital for genuine mental wellbeing.
Jae (she/they) was 21 years old when she first said it out loud: “I think this house is making me sicker.” Not in some poetic, metaphorical sense; she meant the actual walls—the mould creeping under the paint, the strangers walking past her door at night, the constant fear of being moved on again with a moment’s notice.
The house was supposed to be transitional accommodation, a step towards stability. But for Jae it was a trapdoor of stress. A place where the trauma didn’t stop—it multiplied.
Jae is queer, Latina, has a disability, and is brilliant. Jae is a student now, studying community services, a cat mum to two ‘demonic’ furballs, and a proud member of Yfoundations’ Youth Homelessness Representative Council. But before all that, they were a kid who loved school, spoke five languages, read over a thousand books, and dreamed about making the world better. Then the system got involved.
Family violence and disability collided. The care system was supposed to help. Instead, it labelled Jae ‘complex’, ‘high risk’ and ‘problematic’. As her housing options became precarious, her mental health tanked.
“I started questioning myself more, and all I wanted was to be heard,” she says. But being heard in a system that equates volume with aggression, and trauma with troublemaking, is not easy.
Like many young people in crisis, Jae ended up on the streets—sleeping in parks, begging friends for couches, weighing each day’s risks: was it safer to stay in a placement that felt unsafe or to take her chances in the open air? It’s a choice no one, let alone a teenager trying to survive, should have to make.
We talk a lot about trauma-informed practices in homelessness and mental health spaces. But if we’re honest, the trauma isn’t just what young people bring with them, it’s what interaction with the system continues to inflict. We ask young people to show resilience, to recover, to participate in programs that promise ‘empowerment’. But how can anyone heal in a home that harms them? How can a young person regulate their emotions when they’re sleeping with one eye open?
This is the part we keep getting wrong: housing and mental health are not separate issues. You can’t treat someone’s anxiety while they’re being shuffled through motels. You can’t help them work through PTSD while they’re living with 10 strangers and a broken door lock. You can’t build self-worth in environments that scream, “You don’t matter.”
We need a unified, trauma-informed approach to child and youth homelessness—one that puts the needs of people first, that understands good quality supported housing is intrinsic to good mental health.
And yet, that’s exactly what we ask of them. We create disjointed systems where mental health services sit over here and housing services sit over there. We fund short-term responses and call it care. We put children and young people into placements with no trauma-informed workers, no cultural safety, no choice—and then act surprised when they ‘act out’.
Jae has heard it all before. She’s been the ‘problem child’, the ‘non-compliant client’, the ‘difficult case’. But she doesn’t shy away from that label anymore.
“I am problematic,” she says. “Proudly. Because if I see something that isn’t working, I will call it out. I will fight for change. I won’t let bullshit slide.”
When Jae finally started to feel safe, it wasn’t because of a new therapy model or a government pilot program. It was because of one case manager—one adult who looked her in the eyes and said, “I hear you. What can I do to help?”
That moment shifted something. It didn’t solve everything, but it made healing possible. That’s what real care looks like. Not pity. Not ticking a box. Listening. Following through. Showing up.
“To young people: speak up. Don’t give up. To decision-makers: open your eyes. Turn on your listening ears. Give us a chance.”
From that moment, things actually happened. When Jae told him she wanted to change her name, he didn’t deflect or delay. He called her within the hour and said, “I’m not sure how to do it but let’s figure it out together.” That was his way—honest, consistent and proactive.
If she needed help, he responded either with a next step or a promise to walk alongside her. When she said she needed to bring her cat with her into supported accommodation because he was essential to her mental health, he listened and then he helped make it happen. Years later, they still have a professional relationship because when someone sees you not as a set of challenges but as a whole person, that kind of trust sticks.
Jae’s story is not an isolated one. It is tragically, painfully common. And for every young person who makes it out, there are hundreds still trapped in the churn—bouncing between couch surfing, crisis accommodation, emergency departments and youth justice. We’ve built a system that responds to symptoms, not causes. A system that medicalises trauma, pathologises grief, and criminalises survival.
We need to do better. And we know how.
We need a unified, trauma-informed approach to child and youth homelessness—one that puts the needs of people first, that understands good quality supported housing is intrinsic to good mental health. It means listening to and responding to the needs of young people. It means resourcing frontline workers and services properly, embedding cultural safety, and creating systems built on care, not compliance.
Because the truth is: you can’t have good mental health without a home—and you can’t have a home without good mental health. That’s what Jae’s story makes clear. Her voice cuts through policy and professional jargon. It reminds us that the solutions are not mysterious.
Coinciding with this year’s Youth Homelessness Matters Day (April 16), Jae’s message is simple and clear: “To young people: speak up. Don’t give up. To decision-makers: open your eyes. Turn on your listening ears. Give us a chance.”
If we don’t act now—if we keep turning our backs on kids in crisis—we’re not just failing them, we’re burning bridges for the coming generations.
“Our generation can barely live as it is,” says Jae. “What’s going to happen to the ones after us?”
That’s the real question. And the answer will depend on whether we’re willing to treat young people like people, not cases; whether we build systems that value care over compliance; whether we finally understand what they’ve known all along—you can’t have good mental health without a home.
This article first appeared in Parity magazine’s April 2025 edition, ‘The Future Starts Here: Reimagining a Modern Youth Homelessness Strategy for Victoria’. To hear more from brilliant young people like Jae, join us at the Victorian Youth Homelessness Assembly, April 29-30. Register here: chp.org.au/yha