It was late in the summer of 1987. I was at the lowest point of my life. On that August morning as I walked through the piney woods of Spearfish Canyon in the Black Hills of South Dakota, I knew that the judge I would face that day in court was going to sentence me for the felony charge of possession of a controlled substance. I asked myself, "How did a nice girl like you wind up in such a dreadful situation?" How had I gotten to the point that I was going to go to prison?

As I looked back over the previous 15 years, I couldn't believe how far I'd swerved from the path I'd started on as a young girl from a lovely family. Although I'd attended our local Christian Science Sunday School until I was 18, somehow I'd drifted away from the wonderful spiritual teachings I'd grown up with. As I got into my 20s, my friends were all experimenting with drugs, and I just didn't see how harmful that could be. Along with drifting away from my life-long spiritual values, I also began to seek medical attention for health problems. Before long, I found myself abusing the prescription drugs I was taking.

Along the way, I got married and had two wonderful children. For a number of years, on the outside our lives seemed as typical as those of most young families. But on the inside I was living a nightmare of growing addiction. Eventually the turmoil this caused affected my family. The children began spending more and more time with my parents, and my husband and I divorced.

From there my life just continued in a downward spiral, as I rode a roller coaster of emotional instability, disastrous relationships, and financial problems. During all these ups and downs, my whole extended family continued to love and support me, and to pray for me. And I, too, tried sporadically to get off the drugs and clean up my act. There were times when I would lean on the lessons about God I'd learned in Sunday School, and they sustained me through many rough times. But always, after a few months, I would return to the drugs.

By the time my daughter was a teenager, she began to have her own struggles. I got off drugs during this time to try to support her and be a strong mother. However, when she went through one very traumatic time, she just did not recover, and took her own life. This event drove me into a deep depression. Filled with guilt, I turned to very self-destructive behavior. This is when I began to combine drinking alcohol and using cocaine and pharmaceutical drugs daily. I had been drinking and abusing drugs just to try to feel normal.

And this was what had brought me to the point I was facing today: a court hearing that would determine my sentence for drug possession.

As it turned out, I served four months of the two-year sentence I was given in a minimum-security prison in South Dakota. In prison, I had a lot of time to rethink the direction of my life. I began to read the Bible and Science and Health again, and to reacquaint myself with God. The peace I began to feel as I rediscovered my unbroken relationship to Him gave me the confidence to continue this spiritual study when I got out of prison. Once out, I returned to college. I was finding a new balance and direction in my life. I studied Christian Science all the time.

Then I began getting migraine headaches, which I associated with the stress of school and adjusting to a new way of life. Despite recommitting myself to learning about my spiritual identity, I was still struggling with a lot of self-condemnation and guilt. I just didn't feel I deserved to have a good life after all I'd done in the past.

To alleviate the migraines, I began to use more and more pain medication. But, at the same time, I continued to study the Bible and Science and Health. At one point I came across a very helpful statement: "The sharp experiences of belief in the supposititious life of matter, as well as our disappointments and ceaseless woes, turn us like tired children to the arms of divine Love" (Science and Health, p. 322). This clearly described how I was feeling. I was so tired of getting up every morning and taking drugs—of not being able to face the day without anesthetizing myself. I kept praying. And as a result of learning that God's love for me was constant, I found the migraines beginning to go away. Finally they disappeared, never to return.

But I was still addicted to the drugs. On the morning of September 10, 2001, I remember standing in the living room of our vacation cabin and thinking that I was going to die. My heart was beating so fast that I thought, "I'm just not going to make it." At the same time I remember realizing from my study of Christian Science that I could never really lose my life, because God was my Life for eternity. So I left the cabin and came back downtown to our home.

The next morning, September 11, I was lying on the couch when my nephew called me from Dallas and told me about the terrorist attacks that had been happening in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania. I just felt overwhelmed with compassion for the people who were affected.

The following day, our local Church of Christ, Scientist, held a prayer meeting. And it was there, on that morning, that I really began to heal—as I reached out to pray for all the people who had been affected by the attacks on the East Coast. I was not thinking about myself, about my need for drugs, or about my problems. I was really loving others. And that reaching beyond myself was the catalyst that began my journey to the final healing of drug addiction, of grief over my daughter, financial problems, and all the guilt I'd been feeling—everything. Even my health troubles.

The healing of all these problems took a total of about six months. As I began really to understand my true identity as God's beloved child—worthy and pure—the drug addiction just fell away. And now I wanted to understand spiritual existence better. A sentence from Science and Health became my guide each day. It says, referring to God as Love itself, "Love inspires, illumines, designates, and leads the way" (p. 454). And each day I really was inspired to do only God's will.

Today, I am so grateful for all the understanding I have gained on my spiritual journey. I love being a Sunday School teacher, and I know my experiences can only help me to help others. At last, I have recovered the truth I learned so long ago in Sunday School—that I am completely wrapped in God's love.