Healing & Hope: Six Women from the Betty Ford Center Share Their Powerful Journeys of Addiction and Recovery

Laurette was only a high school freshman when she started drinking and doing drugs. Her father absent, her mother emotionally abusive, Laurette joined a gang for survival. By nineteen she was in jail. After being released, Laurette discovered she had a gift for cooking, and over the next decade worked her way up to become a renowned sous chef. But drugs and alcohol still controlled her, and slowly tore apart everything she had worked so hard for. On the verge of self-destruction, threatened with losing her career, Laurette entered the Betty Ford Center -- and for the first time, took control of her life. Laurette's story is remarkable, but she's not alone. She is one of six women in Healing and Hope who experienced the pain and devastation of addiction -- and managed to break free. Originally brought together by the Betty Ford Center's twentieth-anniversary reunion, these women share their poignant stories in this book. Their combined voices create a groundbreaking and ultimately triumphant memoir that lays bare the destructive power of addiction. These are regular women, not celebrities, and they cross a broad spectrum of race, age, and class. One is a nurse, another a housewife, another a schoolteacher. They were addicted to alcohol, prescription medications, illegal drugs, or a combination of the three. For some, treatment was successful the first time around, while for others the journey to recovery was much more arduous. Former First Lady Betty Ford weaves her own commentary around their narratives, giving insight into the women's lives -- what they went through at the Center and what happened afterward -- and shares stories about her own battle with alcohol and prescription drugs. Healing and Hope is an intimate, intensely moving look at the power of addiction and the difficult journey to sobriety. These stories are honest and open, at times funny, often heartbreaking, always compelling. Book jacket.