Martha Mary Proctor, 52, who has been in homeless shelters most of her life, has a condition that makes it hard for her to find work. She has had 212 comas in her lifetime, which takes seven to nine months to rehabilitate from, she said. “Learn how to talk, walk, even how to wipe yourself again,” she said. “Lot of times it is hard to remember what hospice you’ve been at cause comas don’t leave you in good shape.” Proctor’s dad — who beat her mom so badly that a tumor in her head exploded — died when she was 10 years old. She had her six children taken from her, because she couldn’t afford health insurance. “At $3 or something an hour, I couldn’t afford health care. I was barely affording goddamn rent,” she said. “People say, ‘You’ve had a rough life.’ I say I’m still here.” Proctor, who was 20 when she started teaching herself to read, dropped out of eighth grade because someone in her foster home was raping her, she said. “Back when I got about 22 years old, I had the foster mother come up and try to call me to ask if she could apologize to me,” said Proctor, who recently found out she will be blind in 10 years. “I told her she needs to take it to her maker because I can’t do that.””This is the first time that I applied for disability in November. I got turned down. … It is going to be a while to figure out why they turned me down because if you look at me, I look like I’m physically able to do anything. I just can’t lie on that job application knowing how I might pass out and go into a coma.” – Martha Mary Proctor