HOUSTON, Aug. 31 (Xinhua) -- For Susie Troxlar, a flood victim in Hitchcock along the Gulf Coast, it's hard enough to adjust to life at a public shelter. But it's even more traumatic because she can't locate her husband who was living at a nursing home when the storm hit.
"It's horrible. I don't know where he is," said Troxlar, 70. "He's got a son in Iraq. I told him (son) that as far as I know, your dad has been evacuated. I tried calling the nursing home but I can't get any answer. Of course, the power's probably out."
Tropical storm Harvey inundated Troxlar's home and damaged her car. "We have a half-acre (of land) and my whole yard looked like a lake."
Troxlar wasn't alone at the shelter at a former junior high school. In addition to the 60 or so other evacuees at the Hitchcock gymnasium, she had her three dogs with her.
Her next move, she said, is to try to get her life back on track.
"I've already rented an apartment. I already planned on moving anyways," she said. "The question is when I can get in. If I don't have a car, I can't go over there because I can't get around."
Troxlar's feeling of stress and unknown is shared by most of the victims in the shelter. With everything lost, they have to figure out what to do next as quickly as possible.
Scott West said he's grateful to be at a public shelter after Harvey destroyed his home in Hitchcock, but the uncertainty is a difficult pill to swallow.
"We have insurance for the car, but not for the house," said West, a pharmacy technician at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. "Now we're just trying to figure out where we're going to stay."
West said his car was destroyed by the floodwaters that deluged his Hitchcock neighborhood. His insurance company has approved his request for a rental car, but no vehicles are available in the aftermath of the storm.
West cares for his life partner, Stephen Bohnear, who suffers from lymphedema and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) that makes it difficult for him to breathe. Bohnear's brother, who lives with the couple, is partially paralyzed and has diabetes and other health problems.
"Dealing with the unknown is the tough part," he said. "You don't know what's next. You've lost everything. You're very thankful that you have your life. It's just trying to figure out where to go from here."
Mary Sullins peered out at the public shelter in Hitchcock. "I guess we're going to be homeless for a while," said Sullins, 52, who is wheelchair-bound and suffers from a litany of health problems.
Sullins said she's been on an emotional roller-coaster since the storm hit.
"I had a panic attack last night," she said. "What's keeping me going is my family and these wonderful people in Hitchcock and at the shelter. My family is safe, and that's the most important thing.
In Toney Burger Activity Center in Austin, flood victims have been living there for days since Hurricane Harvey made a landfall last Friday along the Gulf Coast.
The small town of Rockport was almost completely destroyed from gust and torrential rain. Since then they were evacuated to Austin, the capitol of Texas.
Sixteen years-old Richard Solis still remembers how desperate he was when the storm came.
"We tried to call the fire department, they didn't come to help, we called the police and they did nothing. It was horrible, the roof collapsed, corridors collapsed, everything there was like torn down to pieces."
Michele, in her 30s, feels frustrated or even angry when she called emergency agency asking for help. All the respond she had was to fill out application forms.
"It has been very stressful of doing this. They have a lot of donations here, just no information. We don't know how to start the process; we don't get any help to do that. All the things we've been told is to apply online from FEMA, and that's it."
"It's been very, very frustrating," Michele continued. "Do not know which direction to go. Not know how to start the process is the problem, it is very overwhelming. Nobody knows anything, or which way to go. Our world has turned upside down."
