Meth, Shattered Lives, Part 4C

METH NOSE-DIVES HAVE FAMILIAR ARC

It started out like most methamphetamine tragedies do. First, Wanda Hatton
lost her car. Next went the house and the support of her family. Then she
went to jail and lost her job.

Hatton was clearly on a meth nose-dive into the gutter when fate intervened
in the form of a reservation to drug court and a place to stay with Reba
Archer.

"I had hit bottom, and there was no bottom," Hatton said. "I was praying
for a way out when I found this program (drug court)."

About the same time, Reba Archer, a soft-spoken, petite 72-year-old
grandmother, found Hatton. Archer lived next door, although the two did
little more than talk about what grew in the garden.

With Hatton facing the prospect of life on the street, Reba and Gillian
Archer took her in.

"If God had not have put it in my heart, I wouldn't have done it, either,"
Reba Archer said.

Hatton's road to recovery is typical of how luck, happenstance and faith
play a large role in determining who in Oklahoma will receive help for
their substance abuse problem and who won't.

That's because help for substance abusers is hard to find and treatment can
get very expensive.

While surveys show that almost 80 percent of crimes committed are
drug-related, there are only about 400 regimented drug treatment slots
available in state-managed prisons.

The waiting time to get in state-contracted residential treatment centers
averages from five days to 60 days. For women, help is harder to find
because few residential treatment facilities are available to them.

As demand for their services grows, treatment facilities say the
certification process that will allow them to expand is unnecessarily
complicated and time-consuming.

Statewide, there also is a shortage of qualified drug counselors, most of
whom earn 20 percent less than others in the public and private sector who
hold comparable jobs.

"We have made tremendous strides in the last few years in creating drug
courts and expanding community-based corrections, but we still have a very
long way to go," said Vickie White Rankin, a lobbyist for behavioral
substance abuse providers.

"The biggest obstacle before us is educating the public and the policy
makers, so they understand the problem and are willing to make a commitment
to finding solutions."

Rankin also said there needs to be more awareness of the disease of
substance abuse, so parents recognize the problem and get early treatment.

"With treatment, there is hope," said Kyle McGraw, executive director of A
Chance to Change Foundation. "Substance abuse treatment/counseling breaks
the cycle of addiction, saving addicted adults from the revolving doors of
prison, welfare and hospitals, teen-agers from progressing from
experimentation to addiction and children of addicted parents the same fate
as their parents."

In reaction to the increase in substance abuse in the state, the
Legislature recently approved diverting $3 million from a fund used to
provide temporary assistance for needy families to help identify if drug
addiction has been a factor.

Two years ago, lawmakers also passed a mental health parity bill, which
required insurance companies to insure for certain behavioral health issues.

"While that helps a lot of people, they chose not to include substance
abuse and addiction," White-Rankin said.

While most treatment facilities in Oklahoma are not-for-profit operations,
the cost of treatment poses a burden on the uninsured.

Helen Bishop (not her real name) is 62 years old - "too old to have a
toddler," she said - but she and her husband are raising their
great-granddaughter.

That's been the rewarding part.

The hard part has been seeing how the $12,000 they took out of their
retirement savings to enroll their granddaughter in a 28-day residential
drug treatment program didn't help.

"We felt like we had to give her a chance if there was any way to save
her," Bishop said, "but now they say she needs to be on medication and see
a psychiatrist. The drugs alone cost $300 a month, and we don't have that
kind of money. We can't get help from the state because they say she's over
19, isn't pregnant, isn't disabled and isn't 65."

At the Pennsylvania Avenue Church of the Nazarene, NW 10 and Penn in
Oklahoma City, it's still possible to walk in off the street and get help.

Rhonda, who, as she described it, started using meth and used up her family
and friends until she didn't have a place to go, found shelter in the
church's "faith house" women's shelter.

A former employee with the Department of Human Services, Rhonda, 45, ended
up getting charged with writing bogus checks to pay for meth.

After she completed mandatory counseling, she said she didn't know where to go.

"It's OK now," she said. "Before I would throw up my hands and say, 'Why
me?' With the help of the church, I can handle it better now."

Pastor Richard Bond said it's important for his church to reach out to the
community.

"There's a big need here," he said. "We've gone from collecting cans of
food in the sanctuary to putting in a whole food pantry. It's easier as a
Christian to say what the church should be like than it is to be closer to
what the Bible teaches.

"We think that helping people at the bottom and lifting them up is what God
is all about."

The Archers have always had a soft spot for people in trouble. A couple of
years ago, Reba took in a woman who had 32 alcohol-related arrests,
including for riding a lawn mower under the influence.

The Archers say their faith in Wanda Hatton was sealed when she agreed to
attend church services with them at the Noble Assembly of God.

Hatton said it helped her confront the truth.

"With meth, you learn to deceive, to be in denial," she said.

That included the man she was going to marry. Hatton said he didn't learn
about her meth addiction until she called him from jail after her first arrest.

With less than two months remaining before she graduates from drug court,
Hatton is close to regaining much of what she lost.

"It's wonderful to hear my grandson's voice on the phone every morning,"
she said. "He calls me 'grandma.'"

"I feel great about myself. I've got my self-esteem back and a lot of love
and peace. And I pray every day for another day."