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CHARLOTTE -- My Sister's House Transitional Living Center is celebrating its one year anniversary of changing women's lives. The organization transitions women from homelessness to living on their own. In the past year, eight women have completed the program. Twenty more are getting the help they need to get back on their feet.

"In spite of where I came from, what I've done, how I've messed up, I can go to my sisters house and they're going to love me," program director Iris Smalls Hubbard said about the feeling the center gives its residents.

Resident Shanna McKinney says My Sister's House is a place for second chances.

"I'm learning how to get across to the other side without being paralyzed and in fear," McKinney said.

That fear came after battling a life threatening illness, loosing her job and her home.

"I had trouble in the past making ends meet with $7 an hour," she said. "I couldn't pay rent and keep transportation and food. The basic needs."

They're circumstances many women in the center are familiar with. All are formerly self sufficient women who needed help after life dealt them a blow. The program gives them a place to stay and meals as they work to change their lives.

"We've just addressed the barriers that we saw that they come to us with one at a time. And prepare them to go out into the world, better than they came," Smalls Hubbard said.

One of the biggest barriers is education. Everyone in the program must have or obtain at least their GED.

"We don't do anything for them. We tell them how to do it. We show them the tools or what they need to do, who they need to contract and then we follow up a little bit," Smalls Hubbard said about the process. "Our goal is to get them to take charge of their lives and it's working."

McKinney has enrolled in Central Piedmont Community College and is studying computer technology.

"My goal hopefully is to become a network engineer," she said. "To be able to fix the city's network "

They're dreams that now give McKinney a lot more to smile about.

Donations to the program can be made at the following address:

My Sister's House
3301 Beatties Ford Road
Charlotte, NC 28216
(704) 391-6683