HOPE PROVING STRONGER THAN METH ADDICTION IN FAITH-BASED PROGRAMS

Tonya Mahan's future seemed hopeless.

Her nine-year addiction to methamphetamine had sent her to jail, isolated
her from family and driven her to the brink of suicide several times.

"I didn't have anywhere to go," said Mahan. "I had used up all my
resources. My parents wouldn't have anything to do with me, and I had no
friends."

When she was ordered to get treatment while on probation, Mahan found
Serenity House, a faith-based recovery program for women. It may have saved
her life.

In Tennessee's ongoing war against methamphetamine, Serenity House is among
a number of alternative programs that state and health-care officials are
using to help addicts.

Mahan, 35, a mother of three, is now on her own in Cookeville and has been
off meth for almost two years. Her ex-husband has custody of her children,
but Mahan says she talks to them daily and sees them one day a week and on
the weekends.

"That's probably the best thing that's happened to me, being able to see my
kids," she said.

Serenity House keeps its location a secret to protect its residents, many
of whom have what program director Niki Payne calls "baggage."

But regardless of what they've endured, Payne said, all the women seem to
benefit from the faith-based element of the recovery program. "It gives
them hope, somebody stronger than them they can hold onto," said Payne,
herself a recovered meth and cocaine abuser. "I didn't get clean until I
got God. I recommend other programs incorporate that element."

Methamphetamine is an addictive stimulant cooked from a recipe that
includes toxic household and workplace products and cold tablets that
contain ephedrine or pseudoephedrine.

People who use the stimulant tend to hallucinate and become aggressive, in
some cases violent. Others, such as Mahan, become so emotionally distraught
that they contemplate taking their own lives.

Tennessee has become a center of meth abuse. The federal Drug Enforcement
Administration re-ported that 1,253 meth labs were cleaned up in Tennessee
in 2003, the most of any state for the third straight year. It estimates
the state is home to three-quarters of the meth labs in the Southeast.

A report last year by the Department of Children's Services said the state
would take about 750 children during the year from parents involved with
the drug. That's about 150 more meth-related child removals than in 2003.

A task force appointed by Gov. Phil Bredesen has recommended limiting the
availability of products used to make the drug, tougher penalties and
expanded treatment for addicts - including faith-based and community-based
treatment options.

"The reality is, very few addicts are able to break the grip of this deadly
drug," said Bredesen, who is expected to push the measures in the General
Assembly this year. "We need to be using every tool we can find to address
the epidemic. If an effective faith-based initiative can help, then we
ought to consider it."

In August, Bredesen announced that the state would receive a $17.8 million
federal Access to Recovery grant to aid in the fight against meth and other
drugs. Over the next three years, the state Department of Health will
receive about $5.9 million annually to expand access to treatment.

State Health Commissioner Kenneth Robinson said part of the money would go
toward faith-based programs because of the "holistic approach" they use in
treating addiction.

"We think the depths of caring, long-term spiritual support, comprehensive
support to client and family will be particularly relative as we look for
ways to treat meth addiction," Robinson said.

Dr. Sullivan Smith, emergency medical director at the Cookeville Regional
Medical Center, said many recovery initiatives that address abuse of
substances were incorporating faith and shouldn't be ruled out as means of
dealing with meth.

Mahan agrees. "For meth, it takes more, because it gets so ingrained in
your life," she said. "I definitely recommend faith-based programs to others."