Hope, one day at a time: Peer supporters help individuals in early recovery 

Sometimes a firsthand story from someone who has “been down the road” before makes all the difference at the beginning of a recovery journey for individuals with substance use disorders or serious mental illness.  

In an industry where licenses and years of academic training are needed, there is also room on a treatment plan for unmatched lived experience. Peer support specialists have a place in professional mental health care because of the experiences they survived and the changes they made to recover. 

Former clients return to where recovery began 

Justin Vines credits the peer support specialist on his treatment team for being the biggest difference maker in his early days of recovery. Vines completed the outpatient program at Centerstone’s Phoenix Clinic in Columbia, Missouri. Soon after he finished the program, Vines attained the training necessary to become a peer support specialist and to go to work at the same place he found sobriety for good. 

Like many individuals in long-term recovery from substance use disorder, Vines had more than one stint in rehabilitations programs before he attained long-term abstinence from substances and began to believe in himself. The peer support specialist, Vines said, asked a very frank and honest question. 

“He asked me, ‘Do you really want it this time?’ and I told him, ‘I am in rock bottom’s basement,'” Vines said. “He had suffered with the same drugs and it was really hard to get through to me because I was very— I still am a little closed off — but he made the biggest, biggest part in my recovery.” 

Vines now facilitates conversations among Centerstone patients. 

“People who are dealing with substance abuse or any mental health issues have a hard time relating to other people. They’ve dealt with homelessness, incarceration or mental health disorders — they’re going through a lot. When they meet someone like me who’s dealt with all of them, it creates a connection that you cannot get sometimes on a clinical level.” 

Another Justin at the Phoenix Clinic, Assistant Director of Recovery Services, Justin Meals said individuals in the early days of recovery often struggle to speak openly about the extent of their substance use and its consequences. 

“They have gone down a path that can make you feel very alone and isolated,” Meals said. “You feel like, ‘No one else knows what I’m going through, no one else is as bad as me; I’m embarrassed and I don’t know what to do.'” 

Justin Meals points to Justin Vines as a story of perseverance and success. Vines, for his part, is concentrating on being there for his clients and staying present in his own recovery. 

“I never would have thought I’d end up here,” Vines said. “You always hear that saying, ‘if you do something you love, you don’t work a day in your life.’ I really love my job, and I can’t believe I get paid to do this because it’s something I would probably do just because — just to help others, because I know what the struggle is like.” 

New support systems begin on Day 1 

For Indianapolis-based Centerstone Team Leader Matt Bane, starting a long-term recovery effort meant saying goodbye to friends, familiar places and much of the life he knew before recovery. 

“When we are first diagnosed or we finally start a recovery journey, it’s fairly common for us to lose the biggest support systems in our lives because of stigma, because of a lack of education on a part of our loved ones and friends,” Bane said. 

Bane found a new support system among others in recovery, both individuals with experience and extended time sober and among others whose journeys were just beginning. Bane was working as a social worker at the time he took his final drink. 

“It was about three weeks to a month into being sober when my mental health started to spiral rapidly,” Bane said. “That’s when I realized that I needed to seek out help.” 

Bane sought help with several health care providers and met several setbacks. Some providers didn’t have space to take on new clients; others wouldn’t accept payments from his insurance providers while others carried insurmountable out-of-pocket costs. Bane found that not all providers were equipped to treat patients with substance use disorders in a trauma-informed manner. 

After he completed treatment at Adult & Child Healthcare (now part of Centerstone), Bane saw a job opportunity to work as a screener, helping the organization decide how to place clients in treatment programs. 

“I wanted to be part of an organization that had saved my life and that I knew could do incredible things,” Bane said. 

Bane went on to become a peer support specialist, then a team leader. He started working as a peer support specialist at Centerstone in Indianapolis because of his own recovery from substance use disorder. 

“Peer support is so instrumental for a lot of patients because when someone is going to a therapist or a psychiatrist for the first time and they start talking about the things they are going through, the provider might not be able to connect with them because they don’t have that lived experience,” Bane said. “We’ve walked the walk, we’ve talked the talk and we can sit with them and share through our own lived experience. That keeps the patients in services with their providers, and then the whole care team can come together to get that patient’s long term recovery goals and get them on their journey.” 

In July 2026, Bane celebrated seven years of sobriety.  

Meeting new patients where they are 

Springfield, Missouri-based peer support specialist Michael Little meets individuals struggling with substance use disorder in all sorts of places. Sometimes that’s in a clinical setting, but sometimes his outreach efforts take him to streets or hospitals. 

“If somebody shows me some genuine interest in wanting to get sober, there’s nothing I won’t do to help them achieve it,” Little said. 

When individuals struggle to cope with the idea of dropping everything and entering a substance use disorder treatment program, peer support specialists like Little are there to walk by their side in the first days of a new life. 

“We facilitate people’s entry into treatment,” Little said. “We facilitate their connection to resources and basically help them start building their foundation to hopefully provide some long-term success.” 

Little jumped at the chance to work full time helping people recover from substance use disorders. 

“I spent probably the better part of 30 years with some kind of drug problem or addiction, and once I did get into recovery, one of the hardest things to come to terms with was the 30 years that I felt I wasted,” Little said. “When I found out about job opportunities in mental health care, I pounced on it because the best I could do was to try to give purpose to the 30 years that I spent in some form of addiction.” 

Little notes it can be challenging for individuals in the early stages of recovery from substance use disorders to find enjoyment and excitement in day-to-day activities, or even from special events. Little tries to tell the patients he works with that the feeling won’t last forever, and that there is hope and enjoyment waiting in the future. Staying engaged with treatment, he says, gives individuals in recovery the best chance of a better tomorrow. 

If you or someone you know has reached a point in substance use disorder recovery where they are ready to support others beginning the process, please consider a career in the peer support specialist field. Your presence and experience can make all the difference. 

About Centerstone: Centerstone is the largest nonprofit behavioral health organization in the United States. With more than 10,000 team members working at 360 locations in communities across the country, Centerstone provides healing and hope to people of all ages through mental health services, addiction care and social supports. Centerstone is a leader in operations for the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Centerstone’s Foundation secures philanthropic resources to support the work and mission of delivering care that changes lives. Learn more at Centerstone.org.