Hi! My name is Ragna Cook, and I am here to ask for a helping hand. During the month of October 2021, my teenage son, Trace, was kicked out of the home where he lived with his adoptive mother. We've welcomed him back into our home on a permanent basis, but it hasn't been without its problems.

We were up for a renewal of our lease in August 2022, and Trace was living with us with, as far as we knew, no problems. But when the lease renewal came up, it said unless he was on disability, he wouldn't be able to stay with us. My son is autistic and developmentally stunted from time in foster care and living with an adoptive mother who did nothing to prepare him for adulthood. He's only going to be able to live by himself if he gets into transitional housing, something that would be easier to enter if he hadn't been adopted.

On September 8th, 2022, we were told our lease would not be renewed and we needed to be out by November 1st, 2022. We were also told our rent was going up in September and October to $1,420 a month. It's not legal but we're really left with no choice. We've continued to look into transitional housing for my son but we'd rather just have him stay with us and get on disability (we've contacted an attorney to help with all of that business and we started the application last week), but that means we need to support him still as we wait, and apartments are expensive in Southern California.

We're trying to raise money to move, including getting first and last month's rent together, security deposits, application fees and moving services (both my mother and I are disabled physically and my son is showing symptoms of psoriatic arthritis). We haven't found housing yet but myself and my friends are actively looking on our behalf.

(Ignore the time the fundraiser's been open...I had an older one and edited it because I couldn't remember how to create a new one from scratch).