Martha’s Providence Recovery Story

Thank you Martha for sharing your story. Please visit us on the web if you know someone needing affordable women only Christ based recovery.

Transcript
My name is Martha and I’m from Massachusetts.

I was drinking for 31 years and on top of that taking pills. I had a lot of hurt happen to me in my younger years, and I started drinking at like 13 or 14. But really at age 16 to cope I drank every day. I always thought I had it under control. My live was complete chaos. My addiction had completely taken over my life. I ended up in a homeless shelter with absolutely nothing. No contact with my family, no contact with my kids. To say that I was at rock bottom is stating a fact that I didn’t think I would ever end up there. When I was at my lowest, when I was sitting in that homeless shelter, I felt like there was no hope left. That I was just going to fade away to nothing.

We all trick ourselves. We all say I got this. It’s under control. It didn’t fool anyone. My family had to let me hit that rock-bottom before I’d accept help. In coming here, I realized that that’s the best gift God ever gave me and that my family ever gave me, was letting me be there and letting me realize that I was going nowhere, and to give me hope in my life and to give me love in my life.  And I’ve talked to my family and my sister said that the hardest thing she ever did was leaving me sitting in that homeless shelter and not go home to her house where she could have taken me in because she had plenty of room. I had to realize that I was going to die if I continued doing what I was doing.

It was about a month in after I accepted Christ and my thinking started to clear up. All the fog was gone from the alcohol. And I realized that as long as I trusted in God, as long as I gave the purpose to my steps that he put in me, I was going to have a much better life with my family, with my family here, with God.

I wasn’t saved before I came here and I got saved about a month after getting here, and the peace that God has placed on my heart and in my mind has been incredible. I never thought I could feel that peace. They showed me a better way to deal with my problems then turning to a substance or turning to a person. God guides my steps and I ended up staying here, relocating here, working here… which has been amazing!

With my family I have a better relationship than I ever had. My youngest child… The worst of my addiction was through her whole life. So now we’re reconnecting and able to talk, spend time together. I was able to give my dad the peace he needed in his last year before he passed away, knowing that I was clean and sober and working here and in a safe place.

I can’t do this on my own, and coming here made me realize that… made me realize that I needed God to guide my steps. I needed to turn to God instead of turning to something else. And if I had gone to a secular program, I’d be back out there using, or I’d be dead.
We looked at other places and it was like $30,000 minimum, and my family just didn’t have that money. I believe the fact that it’s all women and that it’s Christian is what makes this program work. How you feel comfortable, you feel safe, sharing what has gone on in your life, and what made you turn to alcohol and drugs or whatever your addiction is. If I had been in a secular program it probably would have been coed and I would not have been able to release what I’d kept pent-up for so long.

Now I feel that I’m listening more to what God wants me to do, and that by working here and being a house mom and being able to help the other women… is my passion and I feel like God placed that in my heart. My mess is something that God has turned around to help. I had no self-esteem. I had a horrible self-image of myself. And seeing it through God’s eyes, and that he makes us in his image, has made me look at myself differently… has made me feel like I am special and that I matter and that I’m loved. And I didn’t feel that before.