December 2020 Newsletter

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Together Again

After five months of being separated from his mom, four-year-old Atraevian was reunited with her at Samaritan Inn. He was able to have DHS supervised visits with his mother, Shawna, when she was living with a friend. He was then able to have unsupervised visits with her when she moved into the care of Samaritan Inn. Atraevian had spent his separation time with his father’s mother.

Seven-year-old Novah faired better than her brother, only being apart from her mom for two weeks. The difference was that her biological father was in prison and unavailable. Novah had spent her separation time with her mother’s mother.

Trouble started for Shawna after her parents divorced. By her junior year in high school, she was taken into a rebellious group of peers, that drank and used drugs. She dropped out of school that year. When living with Novah’s father, before expecting the child, her boyfriend came home one day with methamphetamine. Shawna was indifferent. He had been using it, then enticed her to do the same. She recalls the temptation as, “Look at this. I said, ‘why not.’ I don’t know why exactly, just poor choice.” After Novah was born, he met someone else. Shawna dealt with the rejection by being a meth user. Even though she has consistently held jobs, she struggled with addiction. Her last trouble happened after four months of recovery. Shawna said, “I thought, ‘I got this.’ But, you always have to be facing your demons and fight your addiction.” She relapsed hard, yelled at people uncontrollably, police were called, she was arrested, and her children relocated. Because she maintained her work ethic, her employment afforded her the ability to post her own bail and keep her job.

Shawna began to change her ways on her own, but desperately needed the help of Samaritan Inn. She said, “When my kids were taken, I knew I wanted them more than the drugs.” Immediately after her release from jail, she went to an out-patient treatment program. She wanted to show the judge that she had initiated the process to regain custody of her children. Still, she lost the court case, because she did not have properly supervised housing. After arriving at Samaritan Inn, she had full custody of her son in five weeks.

Roseburg Rescue Mission is about more than just reuniting families and holding people accountable. We teach Biblical Truth, the moral compass to keep people from being indifferent and falling into worldly traps. Genuine recovery is not just housing, employment, and abstinence from drugs and alcohol; it is in having a new identity in the Lord of Life. In our children’s chapel, Shawna and her children learned valuable lessons. She named “Biblical character” and “God’s mercy” as especially important. She said, “I believe in God, and I pray.” Together again, they pray out loud every night as a family.