Anyone who escapes the pit of substance abuse knows about hitting rock bottom before beginning the climb back up the jagged slope to light and life again.

TSU graduate Lindi Marti reached that place 20 years before walking across the gymnasium with other Ketner School of Business students to claim her BSBA with high honors in June 2000. She eventually used those KSOB business skills to create a business plan, attract board members and incorporate as the non-profit Women in Transition, an Angola, Ind. recovery house for women battling substance abuse. The recovery house began its fifth year of supporting troubled women in October 2007.

But before she could help others, Marti had to find herself. "I started drinking at 15, moved on to cocaine, and by age 21 was taking any other drugs I could get," Marti said, reflecting on the journey that brought her to the end of WIT's fourth year.

Pregnant at 29, she thought a baby might cure her drug problems, but by the time her son reached 21 months, nothing had changed. "I realized after waking up on the kitchen floor after a binge and finding him standing over me that I didn't want him to see me like that any more. I called around and got into a Charter hospital" she said. On Jan. 7, 1988, she checked into the treatment facility for 28 days.

“I love what I do, helping and dealing with the women. We're returning moms and enabling them to reclaim their kids from the system. We save the courts money, and return people as responsible citizens who work and pay taxes instead of draining the system."

Those who manage to weather the storm of withdrawal eventually find the hobgoblin of addiction blocking their path to recovery. "I really wanted to be sober," she said. "But it's harder when you get the urge to start using again about 60 days into the program."

A slim percentage resist the lure of the old habits. Of the 12 men and women with whom she embarked upon her journey toward sobriety, only three remain substance-free after 20 years. A good support system like the one WIT offers recovering women helped her through it.

The California native moved with her husband and family to Steuben County in August 1993, after the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles prompted their search for a better and safer place for their children. They made the move "on faith and money from our condo sale. We had no jobs and stayed in his parents' vacation mobile home on Hamilton Lake. We had eight days to find housing," she said.

Settling in Pleasant Lake, the job search began. A trained real estate professional in California, she had tired of that business climate and experimented with a couple jobs at the Steuben County unemployment and temporary services offices. "None of the jobs seemed like' it,'" she found.

However, after speaking with a TSU representative and weighing the cost and benefits of various schools, she started in the TSU business school in 1995. After graduating, she took jobs in sales and accounting, but those failed to satisfy her.

"People kept saying, "You should run a recovery house." At first I thought, 'No, I don't want to work with people whose thinking is off-kilter. I'm past that,'" she said. However, 30 interested local partners soon encouraged her to make the recovery house a reality. Attorney Linda Zabona contributed services for the non-profit incorporation. Marti's TSU business professor, accountant Ruth Gitzendanner, donated time for the filing of Internal Revenue Service documentation. The Steuben County Community Foundation also aided in the incorporation.

After eight months of fundraising, she raised $10,000 to open in a rented house on Angola's Park Avenue. Almost immediately, the space proved too small for size of the need. With no insulation or air conditioning, the facility lacked basic comforts.

More fund-raising and grant writing ensued in the following years, and a new facility now stands on John Street, giving women ages 18-57 an airy space and cozy kitchen in which to interact. In January, WIT expanded to an adjacent house. That means a better chance for success, Marti said.

"I love what I do, helping and dealing with the women," she said, watching a group of residents chat as they added hot peppers from their own garden to a pot of chili in the bright kitchen. "We're returning moms and enabling them to reclaim their kids from the system. We save the courts money, and return people as responsible citizens who work and pay taxes instead of draining the system."

They're also bucking the odds. While statistics show only 10 percent of addicted people staying sober for one year, 24 of 118 WIT residents remained sober over the past year - 21 percent success rate.

She gives back to the university that equipped her to help others. "I'm a speaker for a psychology of addiction course and for Dr. Susan Anspaugh's sports health classes every fall. I also work with TSU during its Alcohol Awareness Week" she said.

She also works to educate the local community on the problem of addiction. "I speak to church and civic groups to make them aware alcohol and substance addiction are a disease, not a lack of morals and discipline. It's a brain condition," she said.

But a safety net like WIT costs money, and she urges local citizens not to become complacent about its support. One-third of the budget derives from the residents' payments, one-third from grants, and the other third from donations, she said. The recovery house serves women from southern Michigan, as well as those from Steuben, LaGrange, and Noble counties, and the city of Indianapolis, in Indiana.