This year, Samaritan Inns will celebrate its twenty-fifth year of providing affordable housing and recovery services to empower individuals experiencing homelessness and addictions to reclaim their lives.

Our staff has been blessed by the thousands of men and women who have had the courage to step through our doors over the years – a blessing that is only compounded when those same individuals successfully complete our program, reunite with their families, begin rewarding careers, attain safe housing and maintain sobriety. As we have watched individuals change, become healthy, and reclaim their lives, we know what success in recovery looks like, and the many different faces it may wear.

In celebration of the men and women who have renewed their lives through the work of Samaritan Inns, we would like to hear your Stories of Hope. Our panel will select twenty-five stories which together present a dynamic and diverse picture of recovery* to be published in a commemorative compilation in celebration of Samaritan Inns’ twenty-fifth year. The powerful stories of the countless men and women we have been privileged to share in their recovery have been an inspiration to us as well as others on the path of recovery. The book will be called Hope Realized, and it will be distributed at Samaritan Inns’ 25th Anniversary Gala. All submitted stories will be published online on Samaritan Inns’ website.

Samaritan Inns would like to hear the story of your journey. Please send your handwritten or typed story to:

Samaritan Inns
Hope Realized
2523 14th Street NW
Washington, DC 20009

Please keep your story to 2,000 words or fewer.

You can also email it to paula@samaritaninns.org. If you do so, please attach it as a Microsoft Word document or type it in the body of the email.

Please include your Name, phone number, email address, and mailing address with your submission. If you would like to remain anonymous, please indicate so in your submission.

The deadline for submission is March 15th, 2010.

Note: Submitters are free to remain anonymous or change their name. If you submit your story and it is selected to be published, Samaritan Inns would like to photograph you so your picture would accompany your story. If you wish, the photograph can remain anonymous (shot from the back, just your hands, etc.) but know that by submitting your story you agree that if it is selected your photograph will be taken for publication. If you do not wish to be photographed, we cannot consider your story for publication in the Hope Realized book.

*Our panel will select stories based upon their reflection of the larger recovery journey and experience. This is not a contest for the “best” recovery story; this is a call for the submission of individual stories that together portray a diverse recovery composition.