Voices Project

My name is Tiffani and I’m a grateful woman in sustained recovery from addiction. Growing up people always ask that one big question, “what do you want to be when you grow up?” Many kids answer “an astronaut”, a “movie star” or other endless possibilities. My will to do and become something more was the greatest strength I believe I ever had. Never knowing that the same will that pushed me to want to strive for much more would also be what would lead me to my demise. From the beginning, I always felt uncomfortable, less then, different than others....Read More

My brother Garrett and I grew up in a “nice” family. We were taught about having good morals and values, about the “golden rule” and that family was the most important thing. We looked like the perfect family from the outside, but on the inside we were very dysfunctional. My parents sheltered me, or tried to, from what was going on with my brother – that his heroin and opioid addiction wasn’t affecting our family. I was 16 when our father passed away, and my mother needed me to help her deal with my brother, as if I was supposed...Read More

My Name is Herb. And I’m a person in long-term recovery from addiction. The first time I used, it was alcohol and I was right around fifteen years old. I had no idea what was in store for me when I took my first drink. Addiction is a progressive disease, and mine was no different; within a few short years I experienced the bitter ends. I was addicted – not so much to one specific drug at first, but to altering my mood. I didn’t like the way I felt, I avoided discomfort, I used to cope. I used to...Read More

My name is Erin and I’m a woman in long-term recovery from addiction. My recovery date is February 21, 2010. The day that I started this journey, I had no intention of getting sober. I entered treatment to get everyone off my back and just take a break. I had a string of bad luck and just needed to figure out how to put things back together, not get sober. I now know that God was doing for me what I couldn’t do for myself and my “first step” experience or “surrender” had started a long time before I actually...Read More

My name is Ryan Riggs and I am a person in long-term recovery from addiction. What that means to me, is that I have not found it necessary to use any mood or mind-altering substances since April 20, 2015. This journey has been the most amazing experience that I have ever had, and it only continues to get better. My story, in large part, involves the criminal justice system.  As result of my addiction and lack of resources, I fell into a vicious cycle of drug use, incarceration, and dereliction. Nine overdoses and fifteen or more jail sentences later, I...Read More

It was my second day back in a rehab home that I was in just 4 months earlier. I couldn’t take my eyes off the clock as my mind raced at 100 miles per hour. Each minute felt like an hour and I wondered how I got myself into this situation again. With pretty much all hope lost I wondered if I even had enough strength to take another shot at recovery. Rehabs were becoming a very common occurrence in my life and I was completely sick of the same cycle, over-and-over again. In the previous fifteen months of my...Read More

In 2007, my world came to a screeching halt. I was 16 years deep into a decorated law enforcement career when alcohol dealt me a significant blow. Not only was I a SWAT team member at the time – but also a SWAT Instructor – as well as a basic recruit instructor. Over the course of those last 16 years, I experienced much success but now my career was on the line as result of a DUI crash. At that time, I didn’t know what recovery was. Or that it was even possible for a guy like me. Up to...Read More

Becoming a mother was one of the greatest joys I had ever experienced. Kyle was a vibrant, exuberant child with a larger-than-life personality from the day he was born. Our family was truly blessed. He was always the center of attention and became friends instantly with anyone he met. He had this thirst for life, until he was about 12 years old. That’s when things started to change and fracture our family unit until Kyle entered recovery in 2013. Kyle was always precocious and outgoing, it was his defining character trait. So when he started to isolate in middle school,...Read More

The mind is a powerful thing and recovery is possible. I can’t tell you how many times in my life I’ve been told that I can do anything that I put my mind to. It’s crazy to think that the one thing that could help me obtain anything is also the same thing that has kept me from living my life to its fullest. In my case, my mind eventually became dangerous. For 10 plus years, it told me that I couldn’t function without meth or alcohol. What’s scary is it didn’t start that way. At first, meth was the...Read More