I thought, oh, this is the answer.

This makes me happy.

I can be happy 24/7.

I thought, I'm a better mother.

I'm a better wife.

A better friend because I'm joyful.

When Jeannie [INAUDIBLE] was a young mother of two,

she struggled with the daily grind

of being a stay-at-home mom and began to slip into depression.

She thought she found the answer to a problem

when she was prescribed pain medication after she

had dental work.

You, once again, enjoy routine life.

So you once again enjoy interacting.

You know, if you're high, you enjoy doing the dishes.

When the prescription ran out, Jeannie

found it difficult to function and sought out

ways to get more.

I would go to the doctor and fake symptoms that

need to be treated.

I would meet people and buy pills from them.

Jeannie's husband became concerned

about her ever-growing dependency

and convinced her to seek help at a methadone clinic which

treats opiate addiction with a synthetic narcotic

similar to morphine.

Honestly, I just wanted to be high,

and pretended to get help.

And methadone took me to a much larger scale of addiction.

I did not know that I was trading something so small

for something so large.

Jeannie was instantly hooked, but there

was another unintended consequence

of her methadone use.

After a couple of years, my husband began using also.

I believe that it was to cope with the life style

that I had created for us.

Over the next several years, their drug use escalated

and they lost custody of their two young daughters.

Your children are wondering, why does my mother do this?

Does she love me?

And, of course, you just get high again

and you block it out.

Jeannie and her husband began dealing drugs

to support their habit and were eventually arrested.

Jeannie had been raised in the church,

but alone in her jail cell she questioned whether anything

she had been taught was real.

And it started me down a path of God is not real.

He can't be real.

He's mythical.

And it also relieved me of consequence.

Once released from jail, they continued selling drugs

and began to make their own meth.

When their home was raided in 2010,

Jeannie was charged with possession,

but her husband was charged with manufacturing.

He faced life in prison without parole.

When I got out of jail, and he was headed to prison,

and I knew that I would not see him.

I would not spend the rest of my life with him anyway.

That is when I hit my bottom.

I would do anything to escape the reality

that he would be serving time for not only crimes

we both committed, but something that I basically pulled him

into anyway.

Jeannie cut off contact with her husband

and did whatever it took to get her next fix.

I have never not accepted his calls

and, of course, the reason I did not accept his calls

is because the things that I was doing to obtain drugs

so that I could stay high.

And he knew this.

Jeannie's husband finally got her on the phone

and begged her to enter The Lovelady

Center, a faith-based rehab facility in Birmingham,

Alabama.

I came in not believing that anything would work.

I came in OK with the fact that I was going to die an addict.

That there was no joy beyond substances.

Nothing that-- there was no joy beyond something

I could manufacture for myself.

But over time, the message began to sink in.

Something started to penetrate.

You know, what if he is real?

What if there is a creator?

What if all this crap that you've been thinking

for many, many years is wrong.

And then one night at the center,

after 15 years of addiction, Jeannie cried out to God.

I just said, Lord, I know that you created me for a purpose.

I know that you want me to do something.

Help me.

I don't want to be this way anymore.

I want to be saved.

I want it for you.

And the joy that came and, of course,

prayed a lot that night.

The joy that started happening after that, I can't describe.

And there is no drug that matches it.

Jeannie surrendered her life to Christ.

Her husband, still in prison, had also

become a Christian and the founder of The Lovelady Center

intervened on his behalf.

Our founder, Miss Brenda, spoke with the authorities

and asked them if they would please

drop the last charge against him, the manufacturing

charge against him, and release him into her custody

and see what she can do with us together as a couple.

She could help us.

The charge was dropped.

And together, Jeannie and her husband

received counseling and prayer and freedom

from their addictions.

They reconciled with their daughters

and became a family again.

Today, Jeannie is a director at The Lovelady Center

and shares the true source of her joy

with others just like her.

The needs that he has met in my life,

that no drug could meet or do for me,

His worthiness, acceptance, love, true of purpose.

I believe that to know why you were born,

because we all are born for a reason, results

in unexplainable joy.

I believe that part of my purpose

is to tell other people that, hey,

look what He's done in my life.

If He does it in one, He will do it in another life.