David and Rachael have been together for 23 years — since they were teenagers — all those years consumed by drugs. They’ve never known any other way to live. The list of all the bad in their lives is long: drugs, robbery, jail, homelessness, CPS, prison. Their lifestyle was so destructive; David and Rachael gave up their parental rights in 2008.

Hopeless and discouraged, it took them six more trouble filled years to face up to their addictions and seek the help they needed to break free. David and Rachael came to the Orange County Rescue Mission for help and spent 5 months wrestling the demon that had stolen their lives and taken away their children.

“The hardest thing about being sober is the reality of not having our children — the longer we are clean the stronger the reality knowing we blew it. We used drugs to numb that pain and now we are turning to God,” says Rachael. Though they don’t know what the future holds, David and Rachael cling to a promise for a broken and hurting family: God wants to heal them.

“The Rescue Mission gave me hope of being something else other than a drug addict,” says David. “There is so much that has been taken away from me, and I always blamed it on God. But now we are learning that the choices we made caused all of this — and He wants to restore us.”