Reasons to be Cheerful

One Thanksgiving, while most families gathered around dinner tables, Janina Estrada cruised the neighborhoods of Orange, California, searching for her 42-year-old son Jimmy Barela in the rain. For nearly two decades, he had cycled through schizophrenia, addiction, diabetes, homelessness and psychiatric crises. She knew his usual sleeping spot: behind the dumpster at Jack in t...

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With few jobs available, youth in the U.K. are taking their skills to market — literally. That’s

“My kids lost their dad in 2020,” says Ashlyn Stone. Her partner, Hayden Hansen, died on the way to the hospital after a car accident in Kaysville, Utah. 

Though she has two children, Stone says that no one, including those working for public agencies, reached out to offer support for her family. “We didn’t actually receive a lot of resources,” she says.

St...

Across the world, 18th birthdays are a time for celebration. But in India, an estimated 30,000 teens reach this threshold in childcare institutions (places that offer shelter and protection to vulnerable youth) every year, and age out of care to become “nobody’s responsibility,” as one person who works to support such teens put it. 

Girish Mehta and Anisha Sharma ...

This story was originally published by New Mexico Rivers Rising, an independent project dedicated to&nb...