Finding Strength
Jenn Williams survived a stroke, but she's spent years helping others navigate something harder: rebuilding after brain injury while managing substance use disorder. She knows recovery isn't a finish…
Topic
Peer Coaching
Peer recovery coaches and sponsors — people whose lived experience becomes someone else's lifeline. What the work looks like, and how it changes both sides.
22 stories
Empowering Recovery: Maine’s Recovery Coach Training Programs
A person in recovery sits across from someone who has walked a similar path, someone trained to listen without judgment and help navigate what comes next. Maine's recovery coach training programs are…
Radiant in Recovery – Danielle Ward
Danielle Ward is a recovery coach and certified yoga instructor with five years of sobriety. Her goal is to become a certified drug and alcohol counselor.
Harnessing Recovery Capital: A Strategic Approach to Well-being
Sarah knows where her next meal comes from and has a doctor's appointment scheduled. These basics once felt impossible. A recovery coach helped her see that stable housing, transportation, and trusted…
Recovery Coaches – Empowering the Recovery Journey with Empathy
A person in early recovery stares at an unfamiliar reflection, wondering if anyone truly understands the weight they carry. Recovery coaches enter that moment of isolation with something powerful: emp…
From Darkness to Light – Personal Stories of Recovery Coaches
Bill left emergency medical work after an injury searching for a new identity. As a recovery coach, he discovered something unexpected: purpose. Watching people emerge from substance use disorder and…
Recovery Coaches: The Healing Connection
A person wakes up one morning and knows something has to change. They ask for help, but treatment slots are weeks away. A recovery coach answers that call, meeting them where they are right now. These…
Recovery Coaches: Their Role in Recovery
Someone sits across from a recovery coach, uncertain where to begin. The coach listens, then offers a map. Recovery coaches meet people exactly where they are, removing obstacles, connecting them to c…
The Role of a Peer Recovery Coach
Audra hears it often: "I just don't know how to stay sober." Her answer comes from lived experience. As a peer recovery coach, she walks alongside people exploring recovery, building trust from day on…
Peer Recovery Coaching Making a Difference
A person in recovery in Maine becomes someone else's guide. Peer recovery coaches, trained to meet people where they are, are reshaping how communities respond to substance use disorder. Since 2018, n…
Josh Colwell
Josh Colwell is a husband, father, and Certified Recovery Support Worker at a treatment center in New Hampshire. Sober since October 2018, he works to make recovery easier to reach.
Power of Recovery Coaching
Someone in recovery walks into a room and meets a coach who's been where they are. That person knows the weight of it, the hope of it, the daily work of it. Recovery coaching, once rare in Maine, now…
Peer Recovery Coaches
A person in recovery sits across from someone who has walked the same painful path. The peer coach doesn't have a clinical degree, but they have something more: their own story of struggle and surviva…
Crystale Vega’s Journey
Crystale Vega has three years of sobriety. She works in peer support for local groups, holds a leadership role at Sophia's House, and serves on the board of Just Love Worldwide.
Stories Restoring Hope: Malerie Lockhart
Malerie Lockhart sits across from men in Maine's reentry center, helping them imagine life after incarceration. Once, she sold everything for a one-way ticket to Florida with two hundred dollars and a…
Maine Voices of Recovery – Rachelle Bell
Rachelle Bell sits across from incarcerated people in Maine's reentry centers, telling them the truth: the only difference between them and her is that she never got caught. Ten years sober after a de…
Ben Sawyer
Ben Sawyer is a certified recovery advisor, a career he loves. The former Marine and nurse is remarried and still goes to 12-step meetings. He tells newcomers that hope is here.
Intentional Peer Supports
Someone shares their story with a peer support specialist in a way they've never shared before. That moment of genuine connection, where trust builds without judgment or commands, is where healing beg…
Peer Recovery Coaching
Marcus sat across from his recovery coach, uncertain how to rebuild his life after treatment. His coach didn't tell him what to do. Instead, she asked questions that helped Marcus discover his own ans…
Eleanor Trask
Eleanor Trask is a Certified Recovery Coach, a mother and a student earning A's. Her daughter gave her a four-year medallion, and she loves who she is today.
Louis Grassi
Louis Grassi, 32, loves his work as a peer recovery coach. He has not looked back in five years, and he fills his days with work, writing, music, family and friends.
Sarah Siegel
Sarah Siegel helps her three children out the door on a school morning, then heads to her job as a recovery coach. Twelve years ago, she was homeless, moving between treatment programs and survival. H…