Failure Is Not the End of Recovery

“I never fully surrendered.” Vickie Proctor finished UGM Women’s LIFE Recovery in 2019. She got a job, she moved out, she was honored at Commencement.

And she relapsed.

Although it doesn’t come as a shock when this happens, (statistically, it takes five years in recovery for the risk of relapse to diminish significantly) at UGM we’re invested in people’s stories and what makes one person more likely than another to find long-term success. Time and again, we hear the same thing: “I was relying on myself… and I wasn’t strong enough.”

Vickie says that if her life had a motto it would have been, “I can do all things myself.” Still living out of that mentality after Program, Vickie started using again, but she was really good at hiding it. The only thing that was different this time was that she knew something better existed for herself and her children. She had tasted it. Now, she wanted God to intercede, to help her stop...but she demanded that it be on her terms. 

“For two months, every day, I was asking God for help. I’d say, ‘Please help me stop but don’t send me to jail.’”

But God did allow her to go to jail. “I got another possession charge. This time I had a $100,000 bond because it was my fourth possession charge. I couldn’t get bonded out.”

Vickie’s deepest fear had come true. She was at a serious risk now of losing custody of her youngest daughter. She had failed her family, her “sisters” from UGM, and most of all, herself.

Today, however, she says that “failing herself” was the best thing that could have happened. She came to the end of her own strength, and what was left?

Surrendering to an all-powerful God.

“God answered my plea for help when I went to jail. He showed me the seriousness of my sin—he showed me that if I don’t change, I will not have my daughter. That if I don’t change, I’ll spend the rest of my life in prison.” Sitting with that revelation, Vickie says she started to let go, to admit that if God didn’t help her in any way that he saw fit, she would be a slave to her addiction forever. She would have to trust him.

“It makes me want to cry and it makes me really sad that God has been there my whole life. I was just looking for a huge miracle instead of taking what he’d already given me—I just couldn’t see it. I needed something big and he did that. He worked a miracle for me, while I was doing all the wrong things.”

Through an inexplicable oversight, Vickie got an attorney that she didn’t pay for, and after only 27 days in jail, she was released on her own recognizance without bail. “Realistically, that would’ve never happened without God. It was absolutely a miracle. And that was my motivation to seriously surrender everything. It gave me hope that he does love me just the way that I am. Makes me want to cry every time because I just don’t deserve it.”

Isn’t that what Jesus does all the time?

He paid the price for our sins, so that we could be totally and completely free without our having done anything to deserve it. And in that freedom is the ability to live differently.

Vickie went back to UGM when she got out of jail. “I came to see JoAnn and asked her if I could get some help, get some support. I said, ‘I can’t do this alone.’ And that was new for me.”

JoAnn, UGM Director of Women's Ministries, and the staff at the Center for Women and Children created an individualized program for Vickie. “I’m taking Untying the Knots again with JoAnn. It’s where your core beliefs from your childhood, all the lies you grew up with—it’s growing up the child inside you. And I’m taking Genesis again, and Freedom in Christ, and Trauma Counseling.” Vickie is diving deeper into the reasons she made the life decisions she did. Raised in a loveless home, she spent her life seeking love and acceptance… and being disappointed. Ultimately, she gave up on other people and chose complete self-reliance.

“My whole life I was looking for someone to save me, and I felt like the only one saving me was me. That was a lie.”

Today, Vickie has her daughter back, and she’s taking the opportunity to invest in her life in a new way. “I have raised all four of my kids in an unhealthy way, but I’m getting the chance to reparent my daughter. It’s amazing. It’s hard and it’s frustrating, but I’m super excited. I’ve done a lot of parenting out of guilt, but now that I’m trying to parent her the way God says to, I ask him every day for strength.” Her daughter has a counselor now, and Vickie has gotten involved at her school and told the school counselor about her addictions and prison record, all with the aim of giving them the greatest chance at helping her daughter heal.

“Most of my problems stem from my childhood, but after a while, you have to own and be accountable for the way you respond to things. I was hurt so bad that I hurt my kids in different ways. I tried so hard to not be like my parents so I went too far the other way. I’m just thankful that I finally came to my senses before it was too late.”

She and her daughter moved into an apartment of their own in March this year, but Vickie is still technically in Program, remaining dedicated to following through with the healing God has made available to her.

“God heard me, and he’s pulled me out of that life. And I don’t ever want to go back. But without him, the chances of that happening are very slim. So, I’ve surrendered everything. I’m not even really trying; everything is just going so smooth and I know that’s not from me. I know God is doing it. He is my Father. He is my protector. And, most definitely, my Savior.”

Surrendering to God is counter-intuitive.

It requires the kind of faith that is only established in relationship. Vickie’s growing relationship with her Savior has changed everything. Through experiencing his unconditional love, she has learned to trust him. “I’ve spent most of my life blaming God for the things that have happened, and now that I know who he is, I feel so bad. I feel bad for the way I’ve hurt him. I’ve spent so much time hiding from God, not wanting him to know… well, guess what, he knows. And he loves me anyway.

“Most people don’t just change, unless something drastic happens. And God did that for me. Sometimes now I just ask him, ‘Why me? Why did you choose to love me so much?’”

Show the love of God this summer by sponsoring a child at UGM Camp.