DEAL WAS TO QUIT DRUGS, NOT MARRIAGE

Last December, Tammy Waters dropped her husband, Orville, off at a
drug-rehab center near downtown Los Angeles and returned to their home in
Orange.

She hasn't seen or heard from him since.

Oh, her husband is alive and well. At least, Tammy Waters presumes he is.

It's just that the center, known as Delancey Street, bans all contact
between spouses--including phone calls, letters or personal visits--for
more than a year. At this critical moment in her husband's life, Tammy
Waters can't get close to him. As far as Delancey Street is concerned,
she's a nonperson.

She can't even call to say, "I love you." She'd have more access to her
husband if he were in jail or prison.

"I'm frustrated but not giving up hope on being able to see and communicate
with my husband sooner than they say," Waters, 38, says. Her one attempt at
contact so far--a letter from her to him--was returned to her.

I found Waters' story hard to believe. Until, that is, a Delancey Street
official confirmed their policy.

"With spouses, normally we find it's a sick relationship anyway," says Bob
Juencke, co-director of the Los Angeles site of Delancey Street, which has
been around for 28 years and has four other sites around the country. "We
give them [their residents] the first year to reestablish themselves and
focus on what they're doing, because if they don't get themselves right, it
does no good to send them back to their families."

Delancey Street specializes in turning around lives of drug users and
repeat offenders, like Waters. The attorney who represented Waters in his
latest criminal scrape, while not expressing a personal opinion about
Delancey Street, says it has been hailed nationally and is highly regarded
by Orange County judges.

Adding to its reputation, Deputy Public Defender Dennis Nolan says, is that
Delancey Street doesn't take easy projects.

Waters is a case in point.

By all accounts, he's lucky he's not in prison. After pleading guilty to
drug possession last October (his fourth brush with the law since 1986), he
was looking at a three-year sentence and a return to prison.

Instead, Waters got a break. Orange County Superior Court Judge Gregory H.
Lewis suspended the sentence in exchange for Waters making a two-year
commitment to a drug-rehab program. If Waters, now 34, completes the
program, he'll dodge prison.

The Waterses got a brochure from Delancey Street, which indicated residents
could begin contact with "family" members--at first, by mail only--after 30
days. A phone call would be permitted after 90 days. Future privileges
would be based on the resident's conduct, the brochure says.

The Waterses signed on. To Tammy's shock, however, she learned after all
the paperwork had been completed that Delancey Street defines "family" as
parents only.

For husbands and wives, the ban on contact isn't lifted until about 15
months into the resident's stay.

Juencke, a former heroin user who credits Delancey Street with turning his
life around, says spouses like Tammy Waters need to take the long view.

"The spouses have proved they can't do it on their own [turn their husband
or wife away from crime]," Juencke says. "We have rules we've followed for
28 years. When a resident comes in, they're aware of how it works. If a
spouse wants a spouse back in good shape, they have to trust Delancey Street."

Wouldn't a Delancey Street resident ever benefit from a spouse's support, I
ask Juencke. Would a phone call hurt? A letter?

"If he needed her emotional support, why is his ass in jail?" Juencke says.

Tammy Waters is stuck. She doesn't want to rile Delancey Street. She can't
buck the court order. But she's having trouble accepting not seeing or
writing to her husband for another eight months.

Fine, Juencke says. Orville Waters can leave any time he wants.

True. Waters could walk out of Delancey Street tomorrow and continue
walking directly to state prison.

Tammy Waters says their marriage will survive a 15-month separation.

She just wants to know why it must face the test. Couldn't someone from
Delancey Street at least interview her, she asks, to assess her role in her
husband's life?

"We have no reason to talk to the spouses," Juencke says. "They're not the
ones who are coming to Delancey. I guess if a spouse called and asked
[about the no-contact rule], we'd tell them. But they're not the one being
interviewed. They're not [facing] a jail cell."

This is what they call tough love.

I understand the tough part. But where's the love