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'Each one of us are miracles and living the recovery lifestyle'

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Laina Reavis of Sanford ... thankful for her recovery from addiction and her life now helping other addicts. (Lebanon Voice photo)

Today when Laina Reavis sits down for Thanksgiving dinner in Kennebunk, Maine, she'll not only be enjoying her best family get-together in a long time, she'll be doing the things that give her the best chance to actively continue her recovery from a five-year battle with heroin addiction, a battle that she admits is never really over.

She'll be taking a friend to that family dinner, a recovering addict who had no place to go on this most special of family holidays.

"So not only am I seeing my family, I'm helping a recovering addict," she says almost giddily as she sits in a sun-splashed office that is the home of SOS Recovery Community Organization inside the First Church Congregational on South Main Street in Rochester.

Laina, who grew up in Sanford and graduated from Sanford High School, is a volunteer at SOS. She says helping addicts find what she calls a "path to recovery" is nothing less than a calling to her and is a vital cog in her own continued recovery.

"It's so important for me to help others," she said. "When I came into recovery I didn't know about 12 step or faith-based organizations. I knew nothing, so coming into recovery was pure luck. Someone told me about these programs and it saved my life, literally."

That began her long, tedious path to recovery, a path full of ups and downs, clean times and relapses.

But after being a full-blown heroin addict for some five years, recovery, even with its painful fits and starts, is a huge improvement from the past.

Laina said she didn't start using recreational drugs and alcohol till she was 15 and always in a social setting.

"It didn't make my life unmanageable but looking back now I can see that it affected my school time," she said. "Then I got into college and had foot surgery and that was my first time on pain meds. When I adjusted to that pain medicine I was off and running, to eventually using heroin."

"I needed it for pain, but I fully believe everyone is different," she explains matter of factly. "Normally opiates would make a person feel slow and tired but for my body chemistry it gave me energy and I was outgoing and I could feel like I could do anything and be more myself."

When the doctor pulled the prescription, "I got really sick, I didn't realize it was from withdrawals, so I had that craving and mental obsession to get that drug back, so I started purchasing pills on the street," she said.

Laina knew she had a problem, so she tried a suboxone program and ended up abusing it and relapsing again. By that time in 2010 cheap heroin was flooding the market and an easy choice. For some five years she went from getting clean to relapse and back again.

Then in 2015 she found out about a 12-step program, got involved with faith-based recovery and healing and her recovery began in earnest.

Now, working with an organization like SOS to help others find recovery is huge for her.

"Because I know as an active addict the desperation I felt like I was the only one suffering," she notes. "I thought I'd be a drug addict the rest of my life, so to be able to work with an organization that gets the word out that not only does recovery exists, but each one of us are miracles and we're living the recovery lifestyle, that's huge."

Laina's smile is infectious and effusive, her body language conveying strength and confidence and a positivity beyond compare.

But even in recovery it wasn't always that way.

It was only August 2015 that she officially began her recovery and last Thanksgiving was a joyous time, she said as she met with family and friends to celebrate her recovery.

"But I wasn't as confident then," she said. "I was shy and not strong."

Soon after she relapsed again, the last time on April 23.

"That's my clean date," she said.

Since then she's never used.

Now, she uses her work as a volunteer at SOS to help her stay on her recovery, that as well as continuing her 12-step program and giving it up to God.

Part of 12-step is to find a higher power, she said; that means any type of religion or spirituality. And while it's not religious based, it does have aspects of spirituality.

"For me, I chose to choose my higher power in God, so that brings a huge aspect to my recovery where I am surrendering and letting go and letting God guide," she said. "So once I was ready to get to that point - when I was ready to have that connection with a higher power - it really changed my life.

"I do have rules and values, but my rules and values are backed up by my religious choice. So going to church every Sunday and having that experience, and having that something outside of me that's higher than me, has really helped me."

Today Laina, who turns 35 in January, says she's most thankful for her recovery.

"I'm thankful that I am clean," she said. "I always place recovery first, because if I don't have recovery I don't' have anything else in my life."

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