Over 23 million Americans are in recovery from addiction to alcohol and other drugs. Deeply rooted social stigmas have kept recovery voices silent and faces hidden for too long. This silence has been filled by sensational mass media representations of people in active addiction that continue to perpetuate a lurid public fascination with the dysfunctional side of what is a preventable and treatable health condition.
The good news is that a vibrant grassroots recovery advocacy and support movement has emerged, and courageous people in long-term recovery and their allies are uniting for the first time in decades to offer hope. However, this public movement is still in its infancy stage of growth; the general public – and even millions in recovery – are largely unaware of the existence of this new, productive way of thinking, living, and serving. Recovery, like addiction, has existed too long in the shadows.
