ABSTRACT
This chapter explores life as it is lived and experienced in the Men's Pavilion and in the Coalition's women's shelter, the Center for Women and Families. A small group of Pavilion and Center for Women and Families (CWF) clients participated in a series of focus groups to discuss why some choose to use the shelter while others do not. The realities of crime, disease, friendship, and camaraderie in the shelter are also explored. The chapter presents an accurate portrayal of what life in a homeless shelter entails and to determine whether, on balance, the shelters are places of risk or islands of respite for their inhabitants. The men were split on the question of whether there is a true "community" within the shelter walls. Shelter life is a struggle for all women and certainly for all women with children, whether there are husbands in the picture or not.
