A North County nonprofit that provides homes to veterans opened a women's center in Escondido this year — a single-family home reserved for single veteran women with children.
Two veteran women, each with two children are the first to live in the home since it opened.
Rick Espitia, the president and executive director of Wounded Warrior Homes, said he's looking to expand the program.
"We're really happy ... with the success that we've had bringing these families along," Espitia said. "We want to get more houses."
Navy veteran Emely Coleman was at a crisis point this summer. The full-time nursing student needed to find a place for her and her two children, 8 and 10, to live.
She was close to quitting school to work full-time, she said.
She went to Veterans Affairs in San Diego to look for help. On a waiting room TV, she saw a news story about Wounded Warrior Homes and an interview with Espitia about the women's home.
"I waited about two days," she said. "I called 211 to get help with a caseworker there."
The caseworker, she said, sent her a link to another news story about Wounded Warrior Homes.
"I was like, 'this is it, this is destiny — I have to apply," Coleman said.
It's not just housing they're providing the residents, Espitia said. Wounded Warrior Homes offers a mental health program, a food pantry and military-to-civilian transition services. They also have a home for veteran men in Vista.
Soon, Espitia said, they'll add children's counseling. The idea is to take these burdens off the mother so she can focus on her education.
Coleman said the environment has been great for her kids. They have a peaceful place to live, she said.
They get along with her roommates young children, too, she said.
"It's chaos sometimes, but it's a peaceful chaos," Coleman said. "The giggles and the running around and ... we just stand there in the kitchen and look at them and just smile."
Coleman is about to graduate and has accepted a job in another state, where she said she and her kids can start over.
Wounded Warrior Homes is looking for another home to buy so they can help more veteran women, Espitia said.
They'll have an opening at the Escondido home early next year when Coleman and her family move on.
