As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands, one for helping yourself, the other for helping others. (Audrey Hepburn)
Today is the day. After months of love, sweat, tears, writing, and playing with photos – the new She Recovers website is born. She Recovers is my passion project – and has been since I created the She Recovers Facebook page in July, 2011. My purpose here, as it is on the Facebook page, is to create a space for recovering women to visit, access resources, and connect.
I don’t care what you are recovering from, how you are recovering, or how long you have been recovering. I happen to believe with all of my heart that we are all recovering from something. I myself have been in recovery for decades from addiction (including alcoholism). I also consider myself to be recovering from losing my mom fifteen years ago and from stage 3 colon cancer 10 years ago. More recently I have been working on my recovery from workaholism. I also have a touch of codependency and sometimes struggle with food issues. I would love to recover from my perfectionism.
She Recovers is not my career or my job. My professional career is as a consultant, policy researcher and writer focusing primarily on mental health, problematic substance use and intimate partner violence. I have experience with all three. To sum things up – recovery is my life, I spend a lot of time thinking about it.
On this site you will see that we sell spots at our amazingly popular She Recovers Yoga and Recovery retreats, as well as a new line of beautiful Malas created by my daughter Taryn Strong. Taryn is also the yoga guru at our retreats – more about her on the yoga page on this site! I’ve created a Reading Room where you can browse a library of helpful recovery books, and a Recovery Resources page. You can also learn about recovery coaching – both as a recovery tool and as a career. If you check out our About page you will meet Sharonlee Latham, our wellness goddess and partner for our Mexico retreats, and my oldest daughter Ashley Prosser – who is our admin support for mala sales and retreats.
We are a small team – and we all have other jobs. So please be patient with us as we launch this new website and try to attend to the newest venture – mala madness. We will also try to be patient with ourselves. At the end of the day – what I know perhaps more than anything is that my recovery depends on my own self care. I’ll be talking a lot about that on this blog too. I’ll blog as often as I can and try to respond to comments, but the latter will definitely depend upon volume of said comments. One day at a time.
We are really, really excited about this new and improved version of the She Recovers website. We’ll keep sorting it out and figuring out what She Recovers more broadly is really all about – with your help and participation, as always. Many of you have been long time friends on the She Recovers Facebook page, others are new to our community. From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you. Stay tuned – things are going to get interesting around here!
By the way, I have to express my gratitude to the amazing Kim and Niki from Boutique by Design. Kim’s design eye and Niki’s technical expertise have brought this baby home, their patience with me as I messed about with the content and with building the shop is greatly appreciated. Their encouragement and support for the concept and for our vision has also helped me to keep going – sometimes blindly into the night.
Love
Dawn
Congratulations! This looks amazing. You’ve come a long way BABY! Thank you for your valuable service to women and I look forward to “things getting very interesting”. Namaste. ~Shelley
I appreciate your support and friendship, Shelley!
Looks wonderful Dawn… Thank you for Shareing this wonderful life and journey…
Thank YOU for having been with us on this She Recovers journey from the very beginning! I can’t wait to spend more time with you on the beach this November.
So excited! I remember “friending” She Recovers before it became a FB Page. Your beautiful sister and my beautiful friend, Deb, originally invited me. You have been part of my daily existence since I have watched your little feminine corner of the recovery world grow. You have helped me to understand that regardless of path, recovering is the focus. I have learned through your offerings how to respect the journey, regardless of what it looks like individually, and especially if it doesn’t “match” what works for me. I am sharing this with you, because you have already been a big part of my recovery from “judgement & comparison”. This new perspective has allowed me to relax, which in turn has opened my mind to thinking outside the box, opened my heart to those I wouldn’t have before and has enriched my perspectives beyond anything I ever dreamed possible. Grateful. Sending good vibes and prayers for your little team. How blessed are we???
Melissa, I can’t tell you how much your words mean to me. Thank you so much. I am passionate about promoting the truth that women (people) need to be supported to choose the recovery pathway that works best for them. Since starting She Recovers (I remember you from a long time ago but didn’t recall until tonight that you were Deb’s friend) I have met literally hundreds of women online who have shared about their recovery successes outside of the normally prescribed routes. Many blessings to you and yours. I’d love to meet you in person one day!
Hey Dawn congratulations on the next step. Looking forward to sharing in more of the journey. Let me know when your ready to expand to Asia Pacific as previously discussed. I know two perfect Spas in Thailand and I am sure many Australians and others in Asia will be excited to come. Best of luck with it all. Self care rules. Xoxo Alvida
Hi Alvida! Nice to hear from you! We would love to do a retreat over in that part of the world one day. Hope you are well, my friend!
Congratulations! I’m so happy for you. I absolutely love She Recovers and all the women who share stories on their path of recovery. It’s helping me to finally find what works for me. I love how open you are about sharing the different paths and letting women know there isn’t just one way of recovery. I love the retreats and malas. I love you and your family. I just love everything about She Recovers and I can’t wait to be at another retreat with amazing women in recovery. Thank you so much for all you do.
Xoxox
Melissa – you and women just like you are the reason we do what do. You are deeply loved.
Congrats Dawn. I’ve done a quick lookie Lou and wil be back to look more in depth. It looks fantastic! I’m so proud of you and as always in awe of your abilities and accomplishments. Great job and so much gratitude in my heart to know you. Again congrats.
Aw, thanks friend. I love you.
Look forward to visiting your site regularly and gaining insight, support and love…Thank you.
It’s so great to have you here, Nancy! Welcome.
I love this Dawn! As well as bfb I look forward to being a part of this awesome healing group and making it a part of my daily recovery.:)nice job. Rebecca
Happy to see you here, Rebecca! Hugs.
Congratulations Dawn! I am so glad to see your life has taken so many wonderful turns, including this newest production. You know how we attached to you and your family by way of that silver thread – the experience of our early recovery. It bound us together regardless of time and distance. I look forward to continuing to read your offerings, for I have found them to be helpful, sometimes inspiring, and always interesting. Thank you!
Aw, it is so wonderful to see you here, my friend. Thank you so much. Love to Brent and the kids.
With a little over 90 days into my new life of recovery from alcoholism, I have chosen to make significant changes to my online world as well. I am so glad to have found a place where I can learn, read, and enjoy the experiences of others in recovery. Congratulations and may your new site be a success!
Congratulations on 90 days+ and welcome to She Recovers. Hugs, Rhonda.
Beautiful beyond imagination. It’s a creative wonderland. I do see that I have about 40 new books to read. LOL. I adore you. Congrats ♥ Me
Aw, I love you my friend. Read that book on Sober Identity first – I hear it is good!
I just signed up for my first retreat. Nervous and SO excited !!
I am so excited for you – I emailed you Sheri! Nervous is normal 🙂
Congratulations on your next venture. You are changing the world.
Thank you for being part of the change with us, Anne. Love you.
It looks and feels amazing. It’s clean and feminine easy to navigate around. Congrats it looks great!!
Aw, thank you Kiki! That is lovely feedback and we appreciate it!
This is amazing, worth every moment of heart sweat and tears bringing it all together. You knocked it out of the park! The Malas and bracelets are georgeous <3 So happy that She Recovers is blossoming on so many levels and in the lives of thousands literally … including mine 🙂 We do Recover and some times its on a beach. Can't wait till we get to roll out retreat #5 with our ladies. I am so proud , humbled and honored to be apart of the team on the ground in Mexico. The logistics with our amazing chef Ismeal and his family,Massage by Hugo and Kata getting our ladies to and from where they need to be 🙂 will come together again for another over the top retreat..Just sayin…xosl
Thank you beautiful. The May retreat is starting to fill already!
Thank you Dawn (and your team). You have a wonderful website and I’m greatly excited to be a part of this recovering community! You have done a wonderful job here.
Thank you so much, Heather! Thanks for a being a part of She Recovers!
So nice to see the cool new website, Dawn. You are doing an amazing job, my friend. I am looking forward to browsing in the reading room. I am so proud of all you are doing. Wow.
Aw that means a lot to me sweet Val. I can’t wait to see you here!
This is Awesome!I am so thankful to have just seen this on a friends page. It couldn’t of came at a better time! Congratulations! I know it will be so beneficial to many! (Including myself) Looking forward to getting my learn on. Thanks again.
Congratulations Dawn!! Looking forward to seeing you in Mexico in November and will be around for ground support before and after the retreat. xo
Thanks, Gail – we will be there! And we always appreciate your love and support around the time of the retreats. Love you.
This is so awesome, Dawn. You are such an inspiration. Honestly – becoming acquainted with you has helped re-spark that fire in me to keep moving forward supporting women in recovery – to keep reaching out – to recover in community. Namaste.
This was a repost – as I realized I put the wrong website on the last post. Not sure if it would pass moderation that way. ?
You are very kind – and I’m really glad that we have connected!
Your new website looks fantastic. Congratulations! Hope to see you at Recovery Day in Victoria 2016.
Thanks, Lorelie and thank you for donating the books!
Hello Dawn I’m interested in your website I’m old school & believed
you cannot recover unless you GO to a 12 step program which in our
little town of 4,000 is not very anonymous plus I don’t like it.
can you help me.New recovery 5th attempt only reason for desire
for recovery is my relationship with God can’t use & be in fellowship
with Him.
Hi Linda,thanks for your comment and congratulations on choosing recovery. Have you tried online 12 step meetings at https://www.intherooms.com/?
I’ve heard great things about them. The other thing you might want to check out is http://www.celebraterecovery.com/. There may not be any Celebrate Recovery meetings where you live but they have resources online and events all across North America. I also encourage you to check out the Recovery Resources page on our website! I wish you all the very best as you pursue your recovery – you are worth it, my friend.
Dawn Thanks so much for putting this up – it’s amazing! I just checked in on a whim b/c I marked it as under development in my notes!! So glad I did! I know it’s early on, but would you consider a guest post? Maybe we could talk. Thanks again for having this here – I’ll be stopping in often! Joy
Hi Joy – nice to hear from you – thanks for being here! We will be accepting guest posts in the new year – just trying to keep up on all of the other projects that we have underway for the next few months – including our retreat in Mexico in under a month! Thanks for being here and please – let’s chat again in the new year?