For women, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge brings a special focus on recovery needs

Since as far back as middle school, Elizabeth has been struggling with addiction. 

“I started using meth and alcohol at age 14,” she said. This struggle continued into Elizabeth’s adult life, and has negatively impacted her relationships with everyone — most of all her six children. By 2016, Elizabeth, who asked to use her first name only in this story to protect her children’s privacy, had seen her share of struggles with the law and had been in and out of treatment five times. Her life was crumbling before her eyes.

When one of her sons tested positive for methamphetamines at birth, Elizabeth said, a Child Protective Services (CPS) case was opened and her three youngest children were put into foster care. “I was using meth during that pregnancy,” she said. 

For three years, Elizabeth struggled to stay sober and regain custody of her children. “Over that period, I was basically in court,” she said. “I couldn’t stay sober and I was in and out of these 30-day treatment programs.” Eventually, Elizabeth was forced to sign guardianship of her three youngest children over to the foster family that had been caring for them. 

When Elizabeth was once again arrested on drug charges, the foster family cut her off from her children. “The family decided,” she recalled, “’You can’t stay out of trouble. You can’t stay clean. So we’re not going to let you see your kids anymore.’”

This was a particularly low point in Elizabeth’s already troubled life. While she was serving her time in jail, she realized that she needed to finally commit to making real change. “I told myself, ‘I don’t want to be like this no more. I really miss my kids,’” she said. “Life just seemed hopeless and pointless. I missed them deeply.”

Elizabeth felt that the only way she could really turn her life around and regain a connection with her children was to enroll in a long-term residential treatment center, a place that understood the unique struggles faced by women with substance use disorder, a safe place where she could stay long enough to make her recovery stick for good. 

Most insurers cover inpatient treatment programs that last around 30 days, but Elizabeth had tried that approach enough times to know that she needed something more. “Probation wanted me to go to treatment again,” she said, “but I knew they were going to send me to a 30-day program. I just knew that wasn’t going to be enough. It never has worked for me. In order to work it had to be something different.”

Elizabeth eventually found something different at the women’s residential treatment program at Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge, a nonprofit substance use disorder program offering a range of Christian-based treatment and recovery programs at its locations around the state. Earlier this year, Elizabeth moved into Grace Manor, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge’s women’s residential treatment facility in Northeast Minneapolis. She will live there for about a year. 

Rebecca Cambara, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge director of women’s programming, explained that the organization’s long-term program is funded largely by individual and corporate donations. “We have a significant donor base,” she said. “We go into churches every week. We also work with quite a few Christian businesses, including HOM Furniture and Sea Foam. And we have individual donors that provide funds. We have a lot of fundraising events during the year, too.” 

Recently, in response to the increase in the number of women struggling with addiction and the toll it takes on their families, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge has expanded its treatment options for women. The nonprofit already operates four residential facilities in Minnesota exclusively for women — one each in Brainerd, Garden City and Rochester, and two in South and Northeast Minneapolis. This November, it will open its sixth women’s facility, a 44-bed residential program in Buffalo called RockBridge Treatment and Recovery. 

Cambara explained that her organization understands the unique issues that women face during the recovery process. “Women need something completely different than men,” she said. “We see that, and we’ve tried to develop programming that works for them.” 

‘We really need Jesus’

While Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge’s focus on promoting Christianity and conservative Christian values as a way to find sobriety is controversial among some members of the state’s recovery community, many participants like Elizabeth and Shanaya, a resident at Freedom Manor, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge’s residential women’s treatment program located at 3111 1st Ave. S. in Minneapolis, say the program’s singular commitment has been central to their recovery.

“I knew the faith-based part of this program was really going to make the difference in my life,” Elizabeth said. “I knew Christ could help me and I knew it was long-term.” 

Shanaya, who also asked to use her first name only to protect her children’s identity, explained that as an Indigenous woman, she at first felt suspicious of Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge’s singular Christian focus. 

“I wasn’t a believer before I came into this program,” Shanaya said. “I’m Native American so hearing the words Jesus and church, if you know the generational trauma behind them, those responses came up. But then I was so desperate at that point where I was like, ‘OK. I am going to give this a try,’ and I did and it completely changed my life and my perspective on it.”

With help from her chaplain and spiritual advisor at Freedom Manor, Shanaya said that she was able to resolve the inner conflicts between her Native identity and her new Christian beliefs. “Jesus is the only one that can heal or redeem us, I believe,” she said. “Our culture is really important to our identity because that’s who we are, but since it’s so lost, it’s hard for us to redeem ourselves and we really need Jesus to do that. That’s what I believe in.”

A conversion to Christianity like Shanaya’s is not a requirement to participate in Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge’s programming, Cambara said. 

“When people come into the long-term program, the program is Christian, but you can be Muslim or any religion. You don’t have to declare anything. They do not have to convert. We do allow them to do their own prayers as well.” That said, Cambara said she believes most participants come into the program with their eyes open. “I think people self-select to come in for the Christian part of it,” she said. “They find it to be a positive thing.” 

A focus on women’s needs

One of the specific issues many women in recovery face is working to repair relationships with children who have been severed by their addiction.  

Like Elizabeth, many women with severe substance use disorder are embroiled in CPS cases, Cambara said. Because so many clients are trying to regain custody or even contact with their children, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge staff focus on helping them through this process. “We have women who come in knowing they are going to have to work with CPS. We’ve learned a lot about that and that is a unique focus of our programming,” she said. 

That focus includes working with clients on a reward system that offers overnight passes to visit their children, Cambara said. “We’ve learned a lot about how many passes to give and when to give them and how to give them,” she said. Making the program work for women and their families takes flexibility and a focus on family connection. “We’re constantly evolving to make sure that women are able to unify with their kids, whatever that takes,” she said. “I think that’s the difference here because there are a lot of women in recovery looking at it from that end. “

Jen Brink, Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge vice president of marketing and communications, said the women’s program’s flexible approach results in more positive outcomes for clients and their families. “We realize that each woman here has different needs and so we try to tailor their program to that,” she said. “We make exceptions on a case-by-case basis to work with a family. We’ll do what we can to accommodate the women here — and that looks different for each client.”

A good example is a client who needed to leave the program a couple of weeks early so she could get her children ready for elementary school. “We knew we had to make an accommodation for that,” Brink said. “We’re not graduating her early. She’s just going to have to leave early and she’ll still graduate when she’s supposed to.” The unique contours of each client’s life is taken into consideration, she explained: “We tailor each client’s program for them. Each woman has different needs, and we recognize that.” 

Shanaya also has a long history of addiction and parenting struggles. 

“I started drinking at age 13 and it progressed,” she said. “By 21, I was using methamphetamines, and by age 23 I started using heroin and fentanyl. That really took a hold on me. I overdosed a lot and I really didn’t want to live anymore. It got to the point where I didn’t care if I overdosed and died. I was so deep in that bondage.” 

When Shanaya went to jail in Itasca County, she was ordered by a court to do a long-term treatment program. She’d done 30-day treatment programs before, she said, but none of them had worked. “I kept failing over and over,” she said. “I had a lot of probation violations, so they ordered me to treatment and I chose Minnesota Adult and Teen Challenge.” 

Shanaya’s run-ins with the law and history of drug abuse means that her father now has custody of her children. She misses them, she said, and now that she has maintained her sobriety goals at Freedom Manor, she’s been able to work with program staff to establish a regular time to see her kids. Once a month, Shanaya’s children visit her at Freedom Manor, spending the night in a special overnight space. And a second time each month, she gets a special 24-hour “Mom Pass,” which she can use to travel to her dad’s house and spend the night with her family. 

“That has really helped a lot,” Shanaya said of these special opportunities to connect with her children. “You also can get a free phone call each day to talk to your kids.” Having this ability to connect with her children, she said, “really made a difference. Even though we aren’t with each other every day, I still get to sit there and conversate with them, which is really building intimacy in our relationship, something we didn’t have before.“ 

These opportunities for communication and connection feel especially helpful in her life, Shanaya said. This is something she never experienced at other treatment programs. “It’s like they understand what mothers in my situation need. Having regular contact with our children helps support our recovery. They understand that here, and that’s really important.”

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