From Rejection to Redeemed

When Jennifer was eight years old, she spent three precious days with her biological mother. “It was the best,” she recalls. But after those days ended, there were no calls. No letters. For years, Jennifer carried the painful belief that her own mother had met her—and then chose to disappear. That silence cut deeply into her sense of worth.

Just before graduating high school, her biological mother reached out again and flew in to visit. The very next morning, Jennifer left with her, hoping for a new beginning. Instead, she walked into a home filled with trauma. Her brother had abused both her and her younger sister. Her mother was living with untreated bipolar disorder and was still using drugs.

Out of that chaos, Jennifer’s addiction was born.

She returned to Tucson and began drinking, partying, and using drugs to numb the pain. Over time, the darkness only deepened. Her mother protected her abuser, and Jennifer was medicated and placed in psychiatric wards instead.

“I’ve had seven overdoses—including a couple suicide attempts,” she says. “I don’t even know how I’m still here.”

In her lowest moments, Jennifer cried out to God, begging Him to take her life because the pain felt unbearable. But God kept saying no—preserving her life for a purpose she couldn’t yet see.

Even in the midst of her suffering, small doors kept opening. One of them was a bed at Gospel Rescue Mission—available just in time.

At GRM, everything began to change. Jenifer slowly started to believe that Jesus truly loved her—and that her life was not an accident.

“For the first time,” she says, “I don’t hate myself.”

Today, Jennifer is 13 months sober. God is healing her heart step by step. She is making amends with her adoptive parents, learning to forgive, and discovering who she is through faith, community, and truth.

Looking back, she reflects, “My worst day here is better than my best day in active addiction on the street.”

Through abuse, addiction, betrayal, and despair, Jesus never gave up on Jennifer. And at Gospel Rescue Mission, surrounded by faith, compassion, and hope, she is learning that she is not worthless, not forgotten—but deeply loved, with a future that is only beginning to unfold.