So Hope House to me, I've had someone

else explain it to me and I feel like

it's the best way to really visualize

it, was kind of an adult timeout, right?

So I got to come here and essentially

just have nothing else to do but work on

myself. I didn't have to worry about

bills or responsibilities or work as

much as I may have wanted to do it. I

got to just focus on myself. Most

mornings I woke up and my only concern

was did I have group that day and what

time I needed to be there and and that

was it. I got to read my spirituality,

focus on step work with my sponsor

and just read my recovery literature. It

just gave me the breathing room to not

only heal from what I may have done in

my past, but to then start setting the

stage to plan for future events. It's

it's almost hard to put into words

because there's almost nothing like it.

It's to say it's a recovery house is to

not do it justice because it's much more

than that. It's not it's not a place for

just people who are in recovery. That's

not how it started and that's not what

it continues to be. It may have expanded

in that role, but it's a place for

someone to come in for whatever reason.

They have nowhere else to go. They've

isolated themselves from their family.

they were maybe kicked out for whatever

reason, but it's a place where Father

Frank and and I mean the hundreds of

people that contribute to it just

welcome you with open arms and give you

the resources and the tools to better

yourself whether it's mentally,

emotionally, recovery based, physically

to an extent. It's a place that gives

you the breathing room, the time and the

resources to set yourself up for

success. I mean, the the biggest thing

for me was

when I first came to Hope House, I had

gotten arrested. I was facing some

serious charges, and I I felt the lowest

of the low. You know, I I had committed

a robbery, and and I just did not feel

deserving of care, affection, love, and

empathy. Christmas morning, walking into

the senior lounge and just finding it

packed just full of gifts, monetary

value aside and all that, but just the

fact that someone who I was essentially

a stranger to not only welcomed me into

their home, right, because he lived

there with us, his room was just right

down the hallway from mine, but gave us

a loving Christmas, a Christmas Eve

dinner, Christmas Eve mass, a Christmas

morning full of presents. I mean, that's

what you think of when you think of

hopefully what your childhood was with

your parents and Christmas morning.

That's what he gave us. And and most of

us come into Hope House feeling like

we're the lowest of the low and that

that's the thing that we probably think

we deserve the least at that moment. And

he freely gives it to us. It was just

astonishing.