I also did cocaine and by the last two years I was doing crack too. By the end of 5 years we had lost our home, lived day to day, and with other people. I still did not admit that I was an addict and told myself as we all do that I could stop anytime I wanted to. So I continued down that road of self-destruction.

I always thought or believed that because I wasn't "raised that way" that I couldn't be an addict. No way. How that addiction lies!!! The next 3 years were a nightmare. I moved into another apartment telling myself that I would stop using and I only used more.

I did anything I could or got other people to do it for me to get heroin. The heroin then told me that I could use cocaine and crack. I never really liked cocaine or crack but as long as I had my shot of heroin, it wouldn't hurt. Another lie.

My apartment was raided, twice, I went to jail quite a few times and still I didn't stop using. Each time there was always somebody to bail me out so I continued to use. By the last two years, I knew I was an addict but didn't know how to stop or even if I really wanted to stop. I had to have a bag of heroin just to start the day off.

From there I never knew where I was going to end up by the end of the day. I trusted no one but "heroin". By this time I had lost that apartment and moved in with another family. At least in my addiction, I thought they were my "family". But they were only out for what they could get.

But in my addiction I could not see that. I would leave home for days at a time. The addiction had taken over ever moment of my day, of my life. Finally I woke up in an abandoned building where all kinds of other addicts hung out. That's where I would disappear to for days because the so-called family I had, had tried to sexually abuse me and had mentally and verbally abused my children.

I always thought when I left home that I was going out to find some place, any place away from these people but it always turned out, I ended up getting high and not going back home until 2 or 3 days later. The day I woke up in this abandoned drug house everyone was sitting around planning on how they were going to get their next fix. Suddenly it was like there was no one else in that room. I looked up on the wall and there just as plain as day was a beautiful prayer. If you have ever been in any drug house you know there is nothing hanging on the walls! I had been in that room a hundred times and believe me I never saw that prayer.

The next thing I knew I was on my knees, crying and begging for forgiveness. Asking GOD to please help me out of this situation. I couldn't do it by myself anymore. I just wanted to die, but the only thing that kept me going were my three children. No one else in that room saw that prayer on the wall but me.

It was very cold, in the middle of a blizzard and the next thing I knew I was trying to find a quarter to make a phone call. I had to go about 2 blocks to the phone booth in the ice and snow. It was freezing. But I had to get to that phone. I called someone I had met three months prior and they were from NA. That was the first time I had even heard about NA.

This person came and got me in the middle of the night and took me to a recovery house where there were other recovering addicts. These people took me in and helped me to go and get my children. I didn't have any money, food, insurance to get into a program, nothing. They gave me food, a roof over my head, and took me to plenty of meetings for 2 months. I finally got insurance after almost 2 months and then all the rehabs were full.

Me and my children slept in one room in one bed for 2 months and then I had to leave because the recovery house was closing. I was terrified because I knew I would have to go right back to that insane house I was living in with five sex maniacs and alcoholics.

I would sit up all night and watch my children. I had two girls and one boy. I would sleep in the mornings after I knew they were in school. I was under their power again, because I had no where else to go. I had to fight for my life and the life of my children. Two months later I reunited with my husband and relapsed.

This time I lost everything, even my children. That was my rock bottom. Being without my children was like someone had snatched all the breath out of my body. I was just numb. At first, I just wanted to get high and just not wake up. But somehow, even through all of that I continued to pray and ask GOD to help me. I woke up one week after the children were gone and suddenly I knew exactly what I was going to do.

I didn't want to die, I wanted to live. I could remember when I hated to see the sun come up. Now I was driven my a force I can only call my higher power. It was a Sunday morning, and me and my husband got on a bus to PA. We had no money, no food no nothing. I had no idea what was going to happen next but I knew I had to get on that bus.

We lived in seperate shelters for a few weeks and then one day we were sitting on the steps of a church talking and a couple were going in the church. I asked them did they know anybody that had an apartment for rent. From that day on, we continued to be blessed. We had an apartment, a car that was given to us, my husband had a job all in a matter of two weeks! I just couldn't believe it. Then we started to work on getting the children but we had to have a 3 bedroom house.

For the first 6 months we could only see them every other weekend. It would break my heart every weekend when it was time for them to go back. Then I saw this beautiful house with 3 bedrooms on the most beautiful street I've ever seen. I asked GOD for that house. We are now living in that house to this day. It was given to us exactly one year to the day that we came to PA. Two weeks later my children came home for good.

It has been almost five years now and I thank and praise GOD each and everyday for the miracle of just being alive. Two years after moving here I was diagnosed with cancer but I survived that too. I still have a long way to go and many obstacles to overcome but my faith keeps me alive. I carried around a lot of pain for many years.

My mother died when I was 5, my great-grandmother when I was 13, my grandfather when I was 15, my grandmother when I was 16 and my great-aunt that raised me when I was 17. My father never came for me, never called, never sent a card all my life until just last Christmas and now I'm almost 40 years old. But learning to forgive is part of the healing process. We now have a wonderful relationship. I'm not saying that it is easy but if you just hold on to your faith, you can make it.

I never saw a rehab in my life. GOD is and will be my rehab!!! Thank you Lord for healing me, for putting my family back together, for filling my life with joy and happiness!!!