Why Our Place has to stay open. When I was 15, I felt everybody hated me. I started taking painkillers and smoking a lot of pot. This all started because I lived at home and my mother used to be constantly verbally abusive and many times even physically. I was neglected of love period and used to always think of killing myself. I was really feeling I would never become happy. It was then that I was sent to Our Place. When I came there I felt so amazing that there were people that cared about me. I was actually treated like a human being. This came to me as a shock. At home, I felt like a slave I was scrubbing cabinets, ovens. I was constantly being overworked. I was taken out of school at 13 and I never had an education. Our Place provided education for me. If Our Place did not exist I could have and may very have killed myself. Our Place provided me happiness that I never felt in my life. If Our Place closed down, there could possibly be hundreds maybe thousands of kids ending up on drugs and in terrible situations. Suicide may possibly increase amongst kids too. At the end of the day, If Our Place gets shut down, or is allowed to close, hundreds of kids' lives will be affected and shut down as well. Please keep Our Place open for the sake of hundreds of others who are in similar positions.