"I've heard from neighbors who are still around there that we've had looters," she said.

"What am I supposed to do right now? How do I deal with that?" she said. "I don't have electricity, so I cannot pump the water. It is just sitting there. Whether someone takes what we have ... I have no control over that. I have no control over any of it."

Hanley has been talking with her insurance company. But she said she hasn't been able to reach a real person with the Federal Emergency Management Agency yet.

"We have not been directly contacted, nor can we reach anyone when we call," she said.

FEMA has defended its response to people in need.

While Hanley struggles with the bureaucracy of post-disaster life, many others are receiving help from the Red Cross, which has opened 190 shelters along the Eastern Seaboard. The organization has hundreds of disaster workers on standby with emergency supplies.

'It's a humbling experience'

Katie Fairley, a Staten Islander who lives in New Dorp, one of the harder-hit areas, said she's seen people sleeping in their cars.

A 51-year-old vice president for finance at a health care facility, Fairley said lines for food and for gas are blocks long.

"Thank God, we have each other here," she said, insisting that Staten Islanders have been forgotten.

Another Staten Islander, Tara Saylor, spent her weekend volunteering to hand out clothing and food. The 25-year-old works at a Manhattan interior design showroom. She and her home on a hill in St. George escaped Sandy's wrath.

Helping people touched her deeply.

"I was almost crying when people are thanking me," she said. "(They were) throwing their family photos out in the middle of the street. It's a humbling experience. You really begin to appreciate what you have."

In the Long Island community of Floral Park, Kevin Cordova's family members tried cooking hot food to stay warm and wore their coats indoors. His house is uninhabitable, thanks to Sandy.

"There's really no amount of blankets that can stop you from being cold in 30-degree weather," the 28-year-old said. "We feel a little homeless right now. We have our house, but we can't really use it."

Teacher: 'I want them to tell their stories'

To the southwest in Red Bank, New Jersey, about a 90-minute drive from Floral Park, Chris Ippolito has been luckier than many folks. So far, he's only had to wrestle with sporadic power outages. But his mother-in-law's home was severely flooded.

Her historic house, more than 100 years old, sat a block from the ocean in Monmouth County.

Her family built it, and she spent her childhood there.

She left the house before Sandy hit, so she's physically all right. But she's devastated by the loss.