GREENFIELD, Ind. (WTHR) - The nicest house on the block at Vine and Main Streets in downtown Greenfield is the Talitha Koum Women's Recovery House, completely remodeled and ready to welcome its first residents next week.
"We wanted the ladies to be able to feel like they mattered,” said Talitha Koum Recovery House director Linda Ostewig during a tour of the home Wednesday. “We felt like having something new and beautiful would give them that."
Talitha Koum are the words of Jesus in the bible, translated "Little girl, rise up!" The recovery house is the culmination of three years of work led by Ostewig, whose own daughter struggled with substance abuse addiction for 11 years.
"Now we get to put feet to it and we get to see lives changed,” said Ostewig. “Maybe instead of going and standing beside the casket of a dear friend who lost a daughter or son, we'll be able to stand alongside of them when they walk out free."
The house is not a Christian ministry, offering both a traditional or faith-based recovery program. The Talitha Koum staff of four, plus Ostewig, includes two women who battled heroin addictions and lived at recovery houses.
Talitha Koum residential assistant Katina Ruffin struggled with addiction for 14 years, starting when she was 17 years old. Ruffin celebrated a year of sobriety last week.
"Getting off the drugs is the first thing that we want to do,” said Ruffin. “But after that, it's like ‘What do I do with myself? How do I live?’ Most of us started using at such young ages we never learned to do anything an adult did. So, getting off the drugs and then learning how to live and be productive is vital."
The city of Greenfield invested $50,000 and Hancock County another $150,000 toward opening the house. Churches, Hancock Regional Hospital, and families that lost loved ones to addiction all sponsored rooms in the house. The strong community support followed some resistance to the house in the neighborhood during the early stages of planning.
Talitha Koum can serve nine women, who must complete detox before arrival. Every woman that checks in is committed to at least a 90 day stay at $120 a week. They can live at the house for up to a year. The women strictly attend meetings 5 days a week the first 30 days of their treatment before they begin job searches and training.
Talitha Koum case manager Gwen Swartzentruber is a former nurse. She is sober for two and a half years after a five-year addiction to heroin.
"It's really the joy of my life is to be able to have gotten to the other side of a living death is the best way I could describe it, coming back to life and being able to see that process happen in somebody else,” said Swartzentruber.
Women are welcome to begin the process at Talitha Koum starting Monday.
Four of the nine beds at the recovery house are reserved for women coming out of the Hancock County jail and the county’s heroin protocol program.
Ostewig expects the house to fill quickly but hopes to expand eventually and add a men’s recovery house.