Every homeless young person who comes into contact with Centrepoint has their own story to tell, their own particular needs and their own challenges: how to get through the week, how to cope next month, how to build a future.

A safe place to stay is only a part of what they need to get their lives back on track.

Here are just a few that were featured in a recent Guardian newspaper supplement, highlighting the difficulties faced by homeless young people today and their resulting positive outcomes.

Dominique is just 16 years old, but she’s lived through more pain and rejection than most of us will face in a lifetime. But she’s come out smiling. At times she’s unable to prevent the tears when she tells her story – but she brushes them aside and regains her composure within minutes.

Stephen’s story sounds extreme, but from our experience we know it is not. Stephen was rejected by his mother at the age of just 7 and ended up living in foster homes. At 16, he made the fateful decision to run away to London.

Leandra* is an ambitious eighteen-year-old, who has recently left Centrepoint Hillyard Street, in Brixton. The youngest of five children she first left home when she was placed in care at the age of three. She returned briefly to live with her mother, brother and sisters at the age of eleven, but her mother was rarely home and she clashed with her siblings. She permanently left home at twelve to live with a friend and her family.

At 8:59 this morning Alicia was arriving at work. She has just completed her probation period as an Accounts Payable Assistant for a small catering company.

Sam was dressed in her school uniform clutching her school bag when she arrived at our emergency hostel at Berwick Street, Soho. She looked younger than her 16 years and very vulnerable. But, although she was clearly exhausted and on the brink of tears, her determination was unshakeable: ‘I’d rather sleep on the streets than go home,’ she told us.