Family finds healing through faith, recovery
RUSSELLVILLE — Recovery for Mindy Woodard began with a single meeting.
While Woodard was serving time at the Franklin County Jail in December 2018, she met Jocelynn James Edmonds, founder of The Place of Grace, who came to deliver Christmas gifts as part of her ministry for women.
Early the next year, facing another prison sentence, she persuaded then-District Attorney Joey Rushing to let her enter rehab instead. Edmonds personally drove her to the Lovelady Center in Birmingham on Feb. 4, 2019.
Two months into the program, Woodard said she finally admitted she had a problem.
“The Lovelady Center is a completely different feeling when you walk in,” she said. “Everyone tells you they love you. I learned that even after all the bad I had done, I could still be forgiven and lead a new life.”
When she returned home later that year, she stayed with her mother and began rebuilding her relationship with her three children.
“My daughter wouldn’t speak to me for seven months while I was in jail,” she said. “Once we talked again, I realized losing them wasn’t worth the life I’d been living.”
By August 2020, Judge Paula McDowell restored custody of her children. Woodard has remained sober ever since.
Today, she works as the activities director at Terrace Manor Nursing Home. Her mother serves as director of Nursing, and her daughter is a CNA.
“I love my job,” she said. “My residents come sit and talk in my office. It fills my heart.”
Part of rebuilding her life involved mending family relationships.
Woodard’s daughter, Kaden, was 12 when her mother went to jail.
She said life before then had felt normal, filled with friends. That changed when her mother’s addiction deepened, and she began facing questions from teachers and classmates.
“It was very hard because I didn’t have what other kids had,” she said. “She was my best friend, and I didn’t grow up with a father, so it was like I lost a second parent too.”
Kaden said she lived with her grandmother while her mother was in jail. The adjustment wasn’t easy, but her grandmother helped her through it.
“She was my rock,” Kaden said. “On the nights I was missing my mother most, she would just sit and talk to me and remind me that she was going to get through this.”
When her mother entered the Lovelady Center, Kaden said she hesitated to visit at first but eventually went with encouragement from family.
“It was emotional,” she said. “I was angry that I even had to be put in that position, but I could tell she seemed happier.”
What convinced her that her mother was truly changing, she said, was the honesty that began to define their relationship.
“We don’t lie to each other,” Kaden said. “When I saw her being open and trying to get on her feet, that’s when I knew.”
Kaden said she’s proud of how far her mother has come and of the relationship they share today.
“It’s wonderful,” she said. “I couldn’t have asked for a better mother. The Lord blessed me with an amazing one. She’s my best friend.”
She said the experience shaped how she views addiction and forgiveness.
“It’s definitely changed me for the better,” she said. “No matter how hard I fall in life, I’ll never turn to drugs. I’ve seen what it does.”
Kaden said she hopes people are kinder to children growing up in difficult circumstances.
“You never know what that child is going through when they go home,” she said. “Maybe school is their escape. I just wish people would be a whole lot nicer.”
For Woodard, recovery remains a daily choice and a reminder of how far she’s come.
“There’s always hope, and there’s always a way out. There’s always a better life. You just have to choose it every single day. You have to be better every single day.”
