How to help Alpha House and others during holidays

St. Petersburg, Florida - Julia Langan has every right to be sad and bitter.

Life has certainly dealt a difficult hand to her recently. It actually started off perfectly last December. She met a man she loved, got married and got pregnant.

Then, everything fell apart.

Julia was laid off from her job at a warehouse. Unable to make the rent, she lost her home. Without her husband in the picture anymore, Julia was on her own. She didn't have any family or close relatives nearby.

She found herself sleeping on friends' couches and nearly sleeping on the street.

"I spent a lot of time freaked out and weeping. You don't know where you're going to sleep at night at be warm," Julia said.

She began calling around to different organizations and transitional living homes. She was desperate and scared to death for herself and her unborn child.

Life couldn't get much worse.

Just when she was at her wit's end, she found Alpha House, a quaint, college dorm-like facility in St. Petersburg with walls painted a cheerful yellow color and rooms filled with other mothers like her. She was met with open arms and open hearts.

She was home.

"Thank God for Alpha House, I literally do every time I go to church... thank God it's here," Julia says, smiling cheerfully while holding her two and a half month old son, Devlin.

The program was created with a strange twist of fate. Back in 1979, a woman in need, pregnant and alone, called a number for help.

The strange thing is, it was the wrong number, and it saved her life.

She called the Deeb family in Pinellas County by accident. They picked up the phone, heard her story, took her in and talked about how they could help her and others like her.

Alpha House was born.

Julia's life is totally different today, thanks to Alpha House and the women who work there. They have given her a roof over her head, with a bed and bathroom, plus toys and supplies for her son. They also help her get to doctor's appointments, which are frequent since little Devlin was born with Down's Syndrome.

Right now, 19 women live at Alpha House, and many have stories like Julia's.

Case manager Audrey Ashoff says, "Sometimes, yeah, you do want to cry, sometimes I'm on my way home, I might shed a tear or just think about their life and what i can do to make it better for them."

Alpha House survives off of grants and donations. But, in a bad economy, donations are down this year. In fact, only six packages of diapers remain in what the staff calls the "Kindness Closet", a place where donations from the public are stored.

The women need things like diapers and wipes for their babies, plus toiletries and sanitary items for themselves.

Ashoff says, many items that are needed are things that most people take for granted" a clean comforter, a book, a hair dryer or a powder compact. " It may not mean a lot to you and me, but to them, it's the world," she says.

As for Julia, she is going to USF in January and wants to work with special education cases, giving back to those who gave to her.

To learn more about Alpha House and the wish lists for the women who live there, click here.

Other charities that need help are Hillsborough House of Hope, which does the same type of work as Alpha House, only this location is in Tampa. To learn more about their efforts, click here.

St. Vincent de Paul is also always looking for volunteers and a helping hand. To learn more about them, click here.

If you have a chartiy that you want to work with, but are not sure if it is legitimate, or if you want to know where the money is going in a charity of your choice, click here.