“Recovery has many faces,” says Wood Marchant ’89. He knows this as someone who overcame addiction but also as the director of the recently launched Collegiate Recovery Program (CRP). The College of Charleston program is designed to provide a structured, healthy community where students recovering from substance and addictive disorders can thrive academically and socially while actively pursuing their recovery. The program also provides students an opportunity to bond together in an alcohol-free and drug-free environment.
Last semester, Marchant invited Wake Up Carolina founder Nanci Shipman to speak about losing her son to heroin and the effects of a child’s addiction on the parents. Marchant also invited restaurateur Steve Palmer to speak about his sobriety group, Ben’s Friends, which is geared towards food and beverage workers. That gathering had such a positive impact that the groups decided they had to work together again.
The Bridge to Recovery walk on Thursday, Sept. 28, 2017, is a chance for many of the Lowcountry sobriety groups to come together and showcase the diversity of the movement. In honor of National Recovery Month, CRP will join Wake Up Carolina, Ben’s Friends, Faces & Voices of Recovery (FAVOR), and Friends of the Charleston Center for inspiring speeches at Mount Pleasant Memorial Waterfront Park for a group walk to the top of the Arthur Ravenel Bridge. The event starts at 6 p.m.
