the holidays she spent them homeless, shivering, and too terrified to sleep . . . Attempted suicide . . . And then there’s the time she blew up a bottle of acid while trying to make her own drugs. “I was so deep in my addiction; I didn’t go to a hospital for two days,” recalls Amy. By then, the acid had eaten away at her arm, chest and face, causing irreversible damage. “It took a couple of months for it to heal.” Today, Amy covers up the scars with makeup and clothing. But she never forgets they’re there. And since becoming clean and sober at the Mission, she’s not ashamed of them anymore. “I figure this is a reminder of the ugly place I used to be,” she tells us today. “I don’t have to be there anymore.”

Finally at the Mission . . . HOPE!
At the Mission, Amy is finally clean and sober. She is learning to be a good mom. And she hopes to become a counselor and work with other women caught in the trap of chemical dependency. As she prepares for a new life, she is grateful to the Mission. “When you’re on the street, you have no hope. You don’t have anything,” she says with gratitude. “Now I have a personal relationship with God that means more than anything to me. I feel lucky to be alive. There are many times that I know I shouldn’t be.”