December 15, HuffPost Impact kicked off its 12 Days, 12 Cities, 12 Families series, highlighting Americans who have persevered to overcome incredible challenges and the nonprofits that helped change their lives. From Los Angeles to Detroit, Seattle to New Orleans, we are bringing you the inspiring stories of 12 families across the country. Check back on HuffPost Impact every day until December 26 for a new story and we’ll give you the tools to make a difference for a family and the nonprofit organization that’s committed to improving their community.

Day One: Jail Release Just The Start Of One Man’s Road To Redemption

After serving two and a half years in jail for possession, Norris Cooper had a decision to make. It was December of last year, Christmas was right around the corner, and all Cooper wanted to do was go home and celebrate the holiday with his family. But coming home also meant going back to his old westside Chicago neighborhood, his old friends and his old ways.

“I had to make the decision to do something I had never done before,” the 48-year-old explained. “Change my lifestyle, do something different that would work this time.”

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Two: Katrina Survivor And Family Close To Having Home Rebuilt

Jennifer Lanier lived a modest, but pleasant life in St. Bernard Parish, adjacent to the Lower 9th Ward in New Orleans. She had a steady job with benefits as a waitress, and was able to provide for her three children, Zillah, Lillian and Isabella. They hesitantly took advice to evacuate their home in New Orleans the day before Katrina hit. She believed that her and her family would be able to return within a few days, so they traveled the 60 miles to Carriere, Mississippi, where they stayed with her brother.

Within a matter of days, Jennifer realized that her family had lost everything.

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Three: One Month Away From Homelessness: L.A. Mom Keeps Hope Alive

When you ask her where she’ll be in a year, she says, “I see myself inside a three to four bedroom apartment, fully furnished. I see myself cooking for lots of people, like I used to.”
Before she can get there though, Seals has some more immediate problems. After moving out of the Salvation Army shelter, she was able to use housing vouchers to move into a motel in Santa Monica that cut down her commute to Chrysalis and let her kids stay in the charter school system they had attended previously. But at the end of December, the vouchers will expire, leaving her family homeless once again.

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Four: For Some Soldiers, The Homefront Is An Even Tougher Battle

During his tour of duty in Iraq, Harris was working a night patrol from Camp Rawah in Al Anbar province, about 125 miles northwest of Baghdad. He recalls that night:

“I was vehicle commander for the light armored vehicles and we were just doing a basic patrol. Neither me or my driver saw a ditch and we hit the ditch going at about, I would say, 25-30 mph and my head — the hatch and my helmet flew off and I just remember my head going forward and hitting the top of the vehicle.”

This was an injury that seemed, for a time, relatively harmless. Indeed, after a vehicle crash in a war zone, escaping with one’s life must be considered a victory. In Edward’s case, the ramifications took time to reveal themselves.

Read the full story on Impact

Day Five: After Escaping Nursing Home, Michelle Dunlap Looks Forward To Bright Future

Michelle Dunlap never thought she’d be in that situation. In her mid-20s, she found herself living in Atlanta and stuck in a rehabilitation center with dozens of senior citizens, many of whom wouldn’t speak to her and had trouble understanding her.

Michelle has cerebral palsy and she’s been in a wheelchair since she was two years old. When she speaks, you can tell she has a disability, but she’s sharp, intelligent and fluid. Almost everyone who meets her assumes that there’s something wrong with her brain, that they shouldn’t talk to her.

“When people look at me, they stop in their tracks,” she told me. “They see me like there’s a wall in front of me. All they see is the chair. They don’t see the face or the person in the chair.”

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Six: Fraud, Cancer, House Collapse: Adversity Inspires Philly Mom To Pay It Forward

Lasheild Myers is able to laugh a little now when she describes the first event in 1997 that changed her life.

“I came home one night from a 16-hour double shift working in a nursing home and the front of my house was on the ground,” Myers described. “I was walking down the street and I got to where my house should be and only the door was standing, with the rest of it open like a dollhouse.”

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Seven: Fire Steals Possessions, Job, Security From Single Mother Of 6 Kids

Ayala’s family got their only break when one of the children’s teachers caught word of their situation. The teacher was the wife of Giovanny Diaz, a board member with House of Amos, an affiliate of The Houston Food Bank. The Houston Food Bank feeds 80,000 people each week and works with 400 hunger relief agencies, like the House of Amos, in south Texas.

“When we realized the situation about the fire, we asked individuals to help her out,” Diaz explained. “I took her to House of Amos and showed her how she was able to get some emergency pantry food. I introduced her to some of the board members. From that point, she was able to get Christmas toys, a Christmas tree, emergency food and some clothing.”

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Eight: ‘They Save Lives, They Save Families’

“They had to take me out with the jaws of life. I was pinned in the car. I had broken a couple of bones in my leg and my hand.” Ron Harris was in a car accident in 2005. A trip to the hospital was the last thing he needed, already having been diagnosed with diabetes in 2000. Though he had health insurance at the time, his injuries forced him to leave his job as a security officer, and his health coverage soon ended.

“I was in the hospital — but when I came out I didn’t know where else to turn to,” Ron said. “It was so hard to get help, so I looked and found the Arlington Free Clinic.”

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Nine: Abused Mother Seeks Education, Independence For Her Two Children

Now that Fatima was growing up and she had another newborn son, Lucia decided to finally seek help. At Homeless Prenatal Program in San Francisco, she found people who understood and were able to help her take control of her life. Lucia’s case manager there was vital to helping her make the decision to leave her husband. She’s also spent considerable time in domestic violence support groups, and she’s met others who share similar experiences.

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Ten: Teen Gets A Leg Up With Extreme Sports Mentorship

Isabel’s family is poor and they do what they can to take care of each other. She doesn’t really remember a time when she wasn’t helping to raise her little sister or doing chores for her grandmother next door. When her older sister wants a night out or needs to run errands during the day, Isabel goes across the street and watches the 18-year-old’s new baby. She has to do all her homework at school because her family can’t afford to buy her a computer. But when she’s home, living on the same street as her entire family makes it nearly impossible for Isabel to have time to herself. So when a classmate of hers said she was going to an information session for a youth program that could get her out of her downtown L.A. neighborhood a few times a month, she went along for an interview.

Read the full story on Impact.

Day Eleven: When Tragedy Strikes, Detroit Man Turns To Art, Kindness

In 2007, he approached an old neighbor who had grown up with his brothers. Tyree Guyton had become a bit of a neighborhood celebrity for his wild Heildelberg Project, a two-block area of Detroit’s East Side that he has painted, repurposed and renewed into a living community art project. While many Heidelberg residents remain in their original houses, the area has also attracted thousands of art lovers who wander the street and picnic in empty lots filled with sculptures.

“When I had a few hardships, I went to him to ask if i could do anything to help to make some money so i could eat,” Snead explained. He knew he could do just about any kind of handiwork Guyton asked him to do and the idea of working on the giant art project intrigued him. He was a bit of an artist himself — carving canes and jewelry out of wood, and making candles back when he had a home to keep the equipment in. He needed a job, but he also wanted to be a part of an art project that actively prevented his beloved neighborhood from being consigned to the annals of American history.

Read the full story on Impact.

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