{"id":30284,"date":"2025-08-29T07:12:06","date_gmt":"2025-08-29T07:12:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/30284\/"},"modified":"2025-08-29T07:12:06","modified_gmt":"2025-08-29T07:12:06","slug":"i-just-need-a-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/30284\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I just need a home\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

A 45-year-old Dublin<\/a> woman with metastatic breast cancer<\/a> and sharing a bedroom in her parents\u2019 house with her two young children has said she has exhausted all options in seeking a suitable home. <\/p>\n

Sharon O\u2019Connor has been approved for the homeless<\/a> rate of Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) and has been on South Dublin County Council<\/a>\u2019s housing<\/a> list since 2017. Last year, she was approved for medical priority on that list.<\/p>\n

Despite this, the separated mother and her two children, Brian (11) and Aria (9), have been living intermittently in her parents\u2019 home in Blanchardstown, Dublin 15 since 2023, unable to secure suitable accommodation. <\/p>\n

In between stays in Blanchardstown, she and her children have couch-surfed at friends\u2019 houses. The children split their time between both parents.<\/p>\n

Two years of searching for private rental homes has yielded no results. No offer of housing has been forthcoming from the council, Ms O\u2019Connor says.<\/p>\n

Speaking with The Irish Times this week, Ms O\u2019Connor says she feels she has exhausted all options in trying to seek a suitable home. <\/p>\n

\u201cI feel like I\u2019m constantly fighting, trying to find ways [to find accommodation] … I just don\u2019t know what to do,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Her illness has added significant complications to her situation, she says. <\/p>\n

Ms O\u2019Connor was initially diagnosed with breast cancer in 2019. In October 2023, it was discovered that the cancer had metastasised, or spread. Ms O\u2019Connor says she will require hospital treatment for the rest of her life as a result.<\/p>\n

On occasions, she is too unwell to drive her children from Blanchardstown to school in Firhouse, in Dublin 24, she says. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been days where I\u2019ve had to decide between taking my anti-nausea or my anti-sickness medication, and driving the kids [to school], because that medication can make me woozy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her diagnosis also leaves her at greater risk of infection, she says. Sharing a bedroom with her children \u2013 Ms O\u2019Connor and her daughter in one bed, her son in another \u2013 is \u201ca lot less than ideal\u201d with a lowered immune system, she says. <\/p>\n

Recently, a combination of stress and illness arising from her cancer treatment and housing situation has prompted Ms O\u2019Connor to take prolonged sick leave from a charity she is employed at. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe stress of constantly chasing down, trying to chase the council, trying to get answers, trying to find private rentals, as well as trying to be Mammy, trying to cope with the side effects of my treatment, it all just became far too much,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n

Earlier this year, following a three-month stint couch-surfing at a friend\u2019s house, Ms O\u2019Connor considered seeking accommodation through emergency homelessness services.<\/p>\n

Reluctantly, Ms O\u2019Connor decided to move back to her parent\u2019s home. She says her children do not know they are homeless and wants to protect them from this.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m incredibly grateful that despite it being not ideal at all, for my parents, from their point of view, that we do have a roof over our heads. But it\u2019s not sustainable,\u201d Ms O\u2019Connor says.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just need a home. We need our own home,\u201d she adds. <\/p>\n

Ideally, Ms O\u2019Connor is seeking a home close to where her children are attending school in Firhouse. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe school is such a good support to the kids … It\u2019s the only piece of stability that they\u2019ve had the last few years. I\u2019m desperately trying to keep that for them,\u201d Ms O\u2019Connor says. <\/p>\n

She says she was slow to go public with her experience, for fear of her story being used by far-right agitators to fuel anti-immigration<\/a> sentiment. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat put me off going public for a while, because I don\u2019t want that to feed into it … There\u2019s a fault at Government level \u2013 the buck has to stop there, not anywhere else,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 45-year-old Dublin woman with metastatic breast cancer and sharing a bedroom in her parents\u2019 house with her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30285,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[9,10,110,52,18,13,14,6,24081,8752,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,24082,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-30284","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-cancer","11":"tag-dublin","12":"tag-eire","13":"tag-featured-news","14":"tag-featurednews","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-homeless-crisis","17":"tag-housing-crisis","18":"tag-ie","19":"tag-ireland","20":"tag-latest-news","21":"tag-latestnews","22":"tag-main-news","23":"tag-mainnews","24":"tag-news","25":"tag-south-dublin-county-council","26":"tag-top-stories","27":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}