Recovery Profile: Alina

In September of 2011, Alina Branscombe checked herself into an inpatient treatment center for the eighth time.

Facing 14 years in prison, weighing 95 pounds, battling drug induced psychosis, and her organs shutting down, she was welcoming death. She spent over a week inside of a hospital, a shell of a human that almost everybody had given up on.

When she left that hospital and got to Sunrise Centre in Alpena to treat her addiction, she had to use a walker. On the way into Sunrise, a lady was standing outside the entrance smoking a cigarette. She looked at Alina and simply asked, “are you tired of this shit yet?”

It was a defining moment in Alina’s life. She decided right there that she would never go back to drugs. Not only was it the spark she needed to start her recovery, she now asks a similar question to her own clients that walk in the doors of Pinnacle Recovery Services, a sober living program she co-founded.

Trauma and Filling a Void

Alina’s story started much earlier, though. She started experimenting with drugs and alcohol early, around age 12. For her, it was a social thing and a way to escape how she felt about herself.

“I wanted to fit in with others,” Alina said. “I didn’t like how I felt about myself early on, and I was always trying to find a way to fill a void inside.”

As a kid, Alina dealt with more trauma than some experience in a lifetime. She was sexually abused and lost several close family members, including a cousin who was murdered in a bad drug deal.

“I used those things for years as reasons why I needed to escape how I felt inside,” she said. “Instead of developing coping skills, I learned escaping skills through drugs and alcohol.”

As her teenage years dragged by, she started getting in trouble for petty crimes, but still thought she had control. That all changed when she found heroin.

“When I was introduced to heroin at 19, my entire life changed. I became the epitome of addiction; the person I swore I would never become, I became.”

Life of Chaos

Once using heroin, Alina went downhill fast. She started lying, stealing, conning, and manipulating.

“It didn’t matter who or what got in my way. I needed to use and not feel, and it came at no surprise that there weren’t any lengths I would not go to in order to fuel my addiction.”

She spent years in and out of jails, rehabs, detoxes, and mental health centers, trying hard to get sober and figure out what was wrong with her.

“The more I tried to get well, the more my disease grew,” she said. “I would get clean for three to four months, and off I would go again.”

In the midst of her addiction, Alina did have two children: two boys born three years apart. She tried to do better for her kids, even staying sober 18 months at one point. Unfortunately, it was easier said than done. She is now in her first son’s life after being in and out for years, but her second son is still living in Canada – his birthplace.

“I was not capable of being a mother at the time,” she said. “Addiction robbed my ability to be a mother. I have fought for years to see my youngest son.”

Making a Difference

It takes what it takes, and that is a sad, harsh reality sometimes for people in addiction. It often takes more than just simply wanting it. On that day she transferred from the hospital to rehab in 2011, Alina didn’t just want it; she was finally desperate and beat down enough to do anything to get it.

She hasn’t used drugs or alcohol since. She just recently celebrated nine years of sobriety and works in the field of addiction. She went back to college and got an education, her oldest son now lives with her, and she runs a successful business that helps other people who are in similar situations to the one she was in.

Pinnacle, which she co-founded and co-owns with her friend Teresa Stokes, is a sober living community in Lansing. They operate men’s and women’s houses and are currently expanding. She is now that person who looks at someone coming in with nothing and asks, “are you tired of this shit yet.”

Even in recovery, though, it hasn’t been an easy journey. Alina lost her son’s father and a best friend to overdoses in 2016. It took a while for her family and friends to trust her and want her around. Sobriety does not mean life all the sudden gets easier.

“I thought once I stopped using that everything would be great, and the heavens would open up and everyone would welcome me back in…this took several years.”

She’s had to practice acceptance, learn how to love herself and to cope, and live life on life’s terms. It was not easy, but through it all, she has found a new life and a new freedom.

“I have found out what true connection looks like. I have some of the best people in my life today. I truly believe that every single person in my life – including residents of Pinnacle – have been placed uniquely there to learn something from, to be a part of recovery, and to share in this experience of life.

“Recovery is a blessing and gift and I am thankful for the life I have today.”