A New Sobriety, a New Beginning

On the outside, Theodora Triggs is a woman transformed. Her eyes are clear and her shiny dark hair is pulled back into a neat ponytail. Her jeans, sky-blue shirt and white sneakers are spotless.

Now, she is cleansing the inside--the dark impulses that fueled her obsessive pursuit of heroin, leaving her little daughter Tamika tossed in the turbulent wake.

“Sobriety is the first thing in my life,” Theodora said from an Anaheim rehabilitation facility. “I don’t have to wake up sick anymore. I don’t wonder where my next dollar comes from. I’m working for a total life change--a change of everything inside of me.”

Although her journey will last a lifetime, she already has taken some encouraging first steps. Theodora and those around her have even allowed themselves to harbor the thought of mother and daughter being together again some day.

Only three months ago, such a prospect would have seemed criminal.

After Theodora and Tamika were featured in The Times’ “Orphans of Addiction” series, police and social workers found them living in the garage of a filthy Long Beach home. Within easy reach of the girl were crack pipes and hypodermic needles, some of them uncapped, one filled with a brown liquid believed to be heroin. Human waste filled a broken toilet.

“My heart sunk,” Theodora recalled of that November morning when the authorities arrived. “I was scared. I was losing my daughter.”

Theodora was permitted to put 3-year-old Tamika in the social worker’s car. She told her daughter she loved her and then pressed a cross into her tiny hand.

“God is doing this for a reason,” she told Tamika, who responded tearfully: “Mommy! I want you!”

“It will be all right, sweetheart,” Theodora said as the car drove away.

Theodora was arrested, and Tamika became one of 531,000 youngsters in the nation’s foster care system. She was placed in the loving home of a woman in Bellflower, where Tamika is said to be on the mend--like the mother whom she talks of missing so much.

The progress they have made since then was evident last month at the Oasis Treatment Center, where Theodora now lives. A group therapy room was filled with pink and white balloons, Barbie plates, piles of presents and dozens of guests, most of them patients at the facility.

At the center of it all was Tamika and a big cake with four candles, the only ones ever lit for the youngster on this, the first birthday party of her life.

“I want another birthday party,” she later told the center’s founder. “I want to have lots of parties.”

As for Theodora, the affair was bittersweet, providing a glimpse of the future while reminding her of what had led her to this place.

“What kind of mother was I? . . . I abused her,” Theodora said of Tamika. “It’s hard for me to grasp and accept that.” But, she said, “the more the fog lifts, the more I accept.”

A Stranger’s Offer of Help Accepted

The process of recovery for Theodora began in jail, where she realized she had lost something far more precious than her freedom: her daughter. “I wanted help,” she said.

Obtaining a list of drug treatment programs, she began dialing, seven of them in all. Some wouldn’t accept her collect calls. Others said they were full or charged too much for the destitute woman to pay. Publicly funded programs generally have long waiting lists.

Although an estimated 67% of parents with youngsters in the child welfare system need substance abuse treatment, there are only enough publicly funded treatment slots to accommodate less than a third of those requiring such help.

In Theodora’s case, however, help came to her.

A worker at the Oasis Treatment Center was infuriated after reading that Theodora had been sentenced to serve 10 days behind county bars on misdemeanor child endangerment charges rather than being provided with treatment. She promptly beeped the program’s founder, Jim Antonowitsch, 57.

“I want her,” Antonowitsch responded.

A recovering alcoholic himself, Antonowitsch opened the Oasis Treatment Center nine years ago with some of the substantial wealth he had amassed through a landscaping business. Rich enough to retire in his early 40s, Antonowitsch wanted to help others find the serenity he had achieved during 16 years of sobriety.

He and his wife, Kathy, sold a beach home they owned and plowed the money into an Anaheim crack house that today has a swimming pool, a rose garden and 12 flagstone steps leading to the front door, symbolizing the facility’s adherence to Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12-step recovery program. Oasis has treated more than 2,000 people from all walks of life.

Many people believe that only stiff penalties will straighten out addicted parents who repeatedly neglect or abuse their children. But Antonowitsch, like most substance abuse experts, argues that treatment is substantially more effective and cost-efficient than incarceration.

“They talk about two things in prison,” he said. “Getting laid and getting loaded.”

Convinced he could rescue Theodora, and ultimately Tamika, Antonowitsch persuaded the judge to ask the mother whether she would be willing to undergo rehabilitation at Oasis--for free. Theodora gratefully accepted the stranger’s offer. “I was stunned,” she said.

The day before Thanksgiving, she walked out of Los Angeles County’s Twin Towers jail and into the recovery center’s foyer, decorated with a Christmas tree topped with a white angel. Antonowitsch greeted her with a tight embrace. Theodora cried.

She then was ushered to her new quarters, a sparely decorated room with a rose and blue carpet. One resident had placed a teddy bear on her bed. On the night stand was the 23rd Psalm.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want . . .

For Tamika, Some Stability at Last

Like her mother, Tamika also has been welcomed into a home filled with affection and concern. During her last year with Theodora, the youngster lived in nine different places--depending on Theodora’s latest boyfriend or where she was getting high.

Given the high visibility of Tamika’s plight, top child welfare officials wanted to make sure the girl was placed with parents with impeccable credentials and would not be bounced from home to home, as are many children in the strained foster care system.

The couple picked for Tamika has two other young foster children in their modest Bellflower house.

Five days a week, Tamika receives court-ordered “toy therapy” to help her deal with the psychological trauma of being the child of a heroin addict. Her meals no longer are dependent upon whether her mother has spent all their money on drugs. Tamika’s health also is good these days. Recent tests show that she, unlike her mother, is not carrying the AIDS virus.

Every Sunday, Tamika and her new family go to church, another first for the youngster.

“Tamika is bouncing right back,” said Theodora’s Oasis counselor, David Warner. “Tamika has stability and peace. Children are very flexible, forgiving and loyal.”

At first--and to some extent now--Tamika did not understand why she could not be with her mother, who had shared many tender moments with her between drug runs. With no frame of reference, Tamika had no reason to think she was being cheated out of childhood.

In her first telephone call with Theodora, Tamika asked simply, “Mommy, where are you?”

“Mommy’s getting help,” Theodora replied. She said she was at the doctor’s.

“Are you getting better? Did you get your teeth, Mommy?” Tamika asked, knowing that Theodora had dreamed of replacing the two front teeth a man had punched out years ago. Yes, she told Tamika, all her teeth were back.

As the conversation closed, Theodora repeatedly reassured Tamika that “Mommy loves you.” Her daughter listened quietly.

Their first face-to-face visit came two days before Christmas. Oasis founder Antonowitsch drove Theodora to a McDonald’s restaurant near Tamika’s new home. When Theodora saw her daughter running toward her, she dropped to her knees on the parking lot pavement and then wrapped her arms around the girl.

When it was time to leave, Tamika begged to go with her. No, Theodora said, not yet, not until she was better.

These days, Theodora and Tamika chat on the phone three times a week. Inevitably, Tamika comes around to the same wrenching question: “Are you coming to get me?”

‘I’m Learning My Character Defects’

Theodora knows that, although she has made progress, she has a long way to go before realizing her hope of being reunited with Tamika by next Christmas.

“I’m learning my character defects,” said Theodora, who has replaced drugs with a belief in the healing power of spirituality. “I’m not a bad person,” she said. “I have an addiction.”

Theodora said she is applying this same principle in accepting the fact that she is HIV-positive. Since entering rehabilitation, her T-cell count has tripled, dramatically fortifying her immune system.

Antonowitsch said Theodora’s odds of staying drug-free are excellent if she maintains the commitment she has shown thus far--no easy task. For, as time passes, the exhilaration of early sobriety can often give way to complacency and relapse.

Theodora has much to overcome. She used heroin on and off for 12 years. Her constant scramble to obtain drugs turned her into a master manipulator, especially of men, whom she mostly relied upon for her daily fixes.

“She is a total con,” said Antonowitsch.

What’s more, unlike patients who are relearning acceptable behaviors, Theodora never learned them at all. She is starting from scratch.

Ultimately, addicts such as Theodora won’t stay sober unless they work at it every day for the rest of their days, attending 12-step meetings and employing the survival tools they learn in treatment to transform their character, not just to kick drugs or alcohol.

“Sometimes, we get the idea that if we are sober, life will be a bed of roses, and it’s not,” said Oasis executive director Nancy Hamilton.

The first 30 days of rehabilitation at Oasis are focused on breaking through the denial common to addicts in early recovery. During the next months the search for work is introduced into the program. Most find jobs at temp agencies, local hotels or restaurants.

Not everyone makes it that far.

Relapse rates are highest with long-term users like Theodora. One in four Oasis residents leave within three months. But of those who stay, 87% remain sober for two years, according to one study.

The strategy for Theodora is for her to undergo intensive treatment for one or two years and ultimately to bring mother and daughter together in one of Oasis’ 25 sober-living homes. Already, Theodora is earning pocket money by performing cleaning chores at Oasis--a job that, while humble, has given her a sense of purpose. Eventually, Oasis hopes to employ her full time, possibly as a counselor.

Theodora, for her part, says she eventually wants to volunteer in schools, using herself as a textbook example of where drugs can lead.

Like many in recovery, Theodora has been forced to confront the painful memories she has spent a lifetime trying to obliterate with heroin, cocaine and liquor.

When she was 9, her father died in a car accident. At 10, her alcoholic mother committed suicide. Some relatives took her, while others took her brothers. Theodora never accepted the separation, and began to act out. She ended up in a procession of foster homes, finally heading out on her own.

In one group therapy session, she recalled how, when she was 11 or 12, one of her father’s friends got her drunk and raped her.

Theodora has consistently hooked up with men who, in addition to being addicts, are physically abusive. She has hearing problems in both ears because of blows to the head.

Sitting by a marble fountain in the center’s palm-studded backyard, Theodora talks with her counselor, David Warner, about her past, about regrets and guilt.

“I killed a child,” she confesses, referring to a baby that was stillborn because she was on cocaine during the entire pregnancy. Tears streak her cheeks.

“What are you going to do differently?” Warner asks.

“I’m going to stay sober,” Theodora vows, adding forcefully, “I do have morals.”

Theodora and Warner climb the steps to the rooftop of the center, within sight of Disneyland’s Matterhorn. To the string of a helium-filled balloon, Theodora attaches a “grief letter” she has written to her deceased mother--one of many she has been writing to people in her past.

“I’m proud of you Mom. I love you Mom. I’m sorry,” Theodora writes.

She and Warner pray together. As he puts his arm around Theodora, she releases the balloon. The two quietly watch it disappear into the blue.

The exercise, Warner explained later, helps people let go of their past, to focus more squarely on today, to release their grief to a higher power.

Warner said that Theodora’s desire to adopt this new way of life--coupled with her parental instincts--should serve her well.

Oasis executive director Hamilton agrees: “I do think she can be a good mother.”

Small Tokens of Triumph

Every Tuesday evening, an inspiring ritual takes place at Oasis. About 150 recovering alcoholics and addicts, their friends and family members gather around a huge bonfire in the packed backyard patio. There, Antonowitsch hands out “sobriety chips”--coins commemorating the number of months recipients have strung together without drug or drink.

On one December night, Antonowitsch asks those new to the program to speak first.

“I hope to find peace of mind and sobriety,” says one.

“I want to be clean and get my family back,” says another, a third-generation heroin user, the fourth member of her family to find help at Oasis.

Laura, a counselor at the facility, rises to claim a chip for 18 months of continuous sobriety. “This is a really big miracle for me,” she says. Her parents found her passed out, her blood-alcohol level at more than seven times California’s legal driving limit. When she arrived at Oasis, she weighed 85 pounds.

“I don’t have that empty spot in me that I have to fill anymore,” Laura says, her voice trembling. “I get on my knees every day. I want to be a productive member of society. I’m just really, really happy.

“Thank you,” she mouths to Antonowitsch.

Now it’s Theodora’s turn.

“All right T!” the crowd cheers.

Antonowitsch lovingly places a chip for 30 days into Theodora’s hand, a hand more accustomed to the feel of a syringe than a symbol of recovery.

Flashing an infectious smile, she holds the token above her head, clearly overcome with emotion.

“You just focus on your No. 1 problem,” Antonowitsch tells her, “and everything else will come together.”

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ABOUT THIS STORY: In November, The Times chronicled the secret suffering of countless children living in substance-abusing homes. As adults, these youngsters often replay the abuse they endured, perpetuating many of our gravest social ills. Writer Sonia Nazario and photographer Clarence Williams recently revisited two families profiled in the “Orphans of Addiction” series, including Theodora Triggs, 34, pictured above with her daughter, Tamika, after shooting heroin last summer. Today, hope has supplanted despair in their lives.

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On The Web

To read the original series and join others in an online discussion, go to the Times’ Web site at: https://www.latimes.com/orphans