Recovery isn’t a straight line. It’s not a before-and-after picture, a clean slate, or a one-size-fits-all story. It’s messy, nonlinear, and deeply personal. It’s shaped by trauma, resilience, poverty, connection, and the systems we must navigate. In rural communities like ours, recovery is complicated by distance, lack of resources, and a level of familiarity that makes anonymity impossible. Everyone knows everyone, and everyone has an opinion. 

Recovery looks like so many different things. For some, it’s abstinence, choosing to live substance-free. For others, it’s reducing use, using safer methods, or accessing safe supply. It might mean going to therapy, reconnecting with family, getting a job, or simply surviving another day. It’s housing stability, harm reduction, community support, self-acceptance, or the ability to hope again. Recovery might be taking methadone or Suboxone, it might be staying out of jail, or it might be carrying naloxone and saving someone else’s life. Every step matters. Every positive change is recovery.

The idea that recovery only “counts” if it ends in abstinence is not only outdated, it’s dangerous. It excludes the people who need support the most. It dismisses progress. It creates shame where there should be pride. Recovery is not about conforming to someone else’s expectations but building a life that works for you, on your terms, in your time.

By Ashley Legere