Benevolent Life Change

Benevolent life change is an organisation founded by a person who has experienced homelessness and it's a system. Selina our founder spent 3 years in homeless accommodation as a result of her experience, Benevolent Life Change was formed. 

In 2017 our founder presented her self homeless at Manchester City Council where she was placed in a bed & breakfast for 7 days, this place was below one-star accommodation and from that point, she decided that something had to change.  From there she was transferred to a 33-bed women hostel where she meant women who had been in and out of homelessness for many years and their children had become apart of the system they had been generated from. Our found asked herself why had these women become excepting of this life and not wanting more for themself. From that, she came up with the idea that maybe seeing something that polar opposite to their lives would be the gamechanger.

Our founder did some research on women, like her self, in hostels and found that most had come through the care system, what was also found was that when your child is taken into care you are left to grieve that child with no help or assistance just made to feel as though you have done wrong, which granted maybe the cast. What happened after that is those girls then go out and find themselves in relationships that are unhealthy because they are searching for love and attention and exceptant from someone, but just not getting it in the right places. It is then found that these young women go on to have multiple pregnancies leading to more trauma and more children in care repeating the cycle.

She asked herself what would need to happen for these women to change their cycle? after coming off cruise ships and see a lot of the world in 9 months and understanding that manchester was just a small dot on the map, she realised that it would be a holiday a change of scenery, just like that benevolent life change was created. The only thing that changed about the concept was the age of the women we were going to help. Our founder thought that if most of these women came from the care system and their children the same, then it would make sense to work with young women between the age of 16-18 years old, as prevention is better than cure.

From that very first idea, we have built a two-year program called "Broken crayon still colour" that houses young women in cohorts of 6 in a sorority house where they get an alternative education, they get to travel and see the world and they get to learn about money and how to save for their future home and self furnish it. We at Benevolent life change believe that "You can't be what you can't see" and we are here to make a change in these women life that is long-lasting.

The Benevolent life change is not just a sticking plaster, we want these women to see themselves differently.