Her line of credit covered her expenses for a while but when that ran out, she started to go into arrears on her rent. Still, she did not understand what was happening. Nor did she tell her friends.

"I was embarrassed," she said in an interview. "I didn't want to tell."

Even when she received an eviction notice and was summoned to a landlord-tenant board, she didn't contact ODSP or tell her friends. She attended the tribunal alone.

"It went over her head," Wheeler said. "No one suggested she should contact her worker at Community Living. That's the kicker for me.

"Well, I'm getting involved now."

Her landlord gave her the week to gather her belongings, but she cannot live there anymore. Sister Christine Leyser, who runs the Welcome In Drop-in Centre, has given her vouchers for a week at a motel in town but she now needs to find other accommodation.

"She fell through the cracks," Wheeler said. "She's out of the system. Now there's a five to eight year wait for housing and who knows how long it will take to get her back on ODSP."

Wheeler said Fuller owes about $8,000 in back rent and has started a crowdfunding campaign to help with that. Information and donations can be made at https://www.youcaring.com/wendy-fuller-488370.

Anthea Milliken, executive director of the Legal Clinic of Guelph and Wellington County, said stories like Fuller's are the reason the clinic is reaching out to agencies that serve people with disabilities and people who live in poverty.

"The goal is to prevent eviction and keep them housed," she said. "Once evicted it becomes much more challenging."

Milliken said the clinic offers legal advice to all tenants and assistance to those with subsidized housing.

She said being poor is far more complicated than most people realize.

"Things that seem easy are not easy when you don't have transportation, or a phone or an email address. And the system (social housing and income support) is challenging. There are a lot of rules and tripwires."

Milliken would not speak specifically about Fuller's case, but acknowledged it is not unusual.

"We see it a lot," she said. "Housing is lost because the subsidy is lost. The subsidy is lost because of paperwork. People should not lose their housing because of paperwork.

"When you loop back on a case, it's often missed paperwork at the root that just snowballed."

The legal clinic recently moved into space with the Guelph Community Health Centre on Wyndham Street, which also has a focus on low income families.

Milliken said the legal clinic is reaching out to non-profit housing providers to encourage them to refer tenants to the clinic before matters get out of hand.

Early intervention and alternative dispute resolution get better results than eviction and court action, she said.

"It is especially important for non-profit housing to take extra care and extra time," Milliken said. "Once clients are in crisis, everything just escalates."

Milliken said she advises social agencies to ask questions and get a picture of what their clients' lives are like. If the apartment is upside-down, if bills aren't paid, if the cupboard is bare, if health issues or mental health issues begin to surface, it may be time for a holistic look at the situation.

"We don't want to litigate these disputes," she said. "We'd rather work to find a solution."

She said clients have different levels of capacity and this must also be considered.

"The key is to connect people to resources. There's a really good community in Guelph and caring support people. We need to build a circle of support for these clients. But it's hard to change the system."

Wheeler said Guelph Community Living has said they could find Fuller a room in Holody Home, a group home for people with intellectual disabilities. But Fuller said she doesn't want to live in a group home, where she can't have her cats.

Fuller said she's learned a hard lesson: "To ask for help when I need it," she said. And Wheeler has offered to be her trustee and help with her household budget.

jshuttleworth@guelphmercury.com