13 Rehabs, Family Trauma & Finding Hope | Bestselling Author Paige Dearth13 Rehabs, Family Trauma & Finding Hope | Bestselling Author Paige Dearth
Recovery Matters! Podcast
Recovery Matters Podcast Episode 219
36:39•11 Aug 2026
13 Rehabs, Heavy Trauma and Hard-Won Hope with Paige Dearth
Episode Overview
- Trauma and addiction affect whole families, not just the person using, and family members often receive far less practical support.
- Fiction grounded in lived experience can help people feel seen, reduce judgment and shift how society views those who are homeless, trafficked or addicted.
- Portraying people with addiction or abuse histories as full, evolving characters challenges the idea that they are defined by a single label.
- Families are urged to seek professional guidance so they can support recovery without enabling destructive behaviour.
- People in recovery are reminded that it is not too late to change their lives and that they deserve better than what harmed them.
“"Talking doesn't pay the bills. Talking doesn't do any of those things that you have to do."”
How do people find strength in their journey to sobriety? This conversation with bestselling author Paige Dearth offers one powerful answer, blending raw honesty about addiction and trauma with a surprising amount of warmth and hope. Host Stacey Sharpentier talks with Paige about how childhood sexual abuse, family addiction and years of chaos eventually pushed her to write fiction that feels painfully real.
Paige explains that every protagonist carries her emotions, even if their circumstances differ: "There is not one book that I've written that doesn't, the protagonist always feels what I felt." Her stories tackle heroin addiction, human trafficking, cult-like control and family dysfunction, but the focus is always on people, not labels.
You’ll hear Paige describe living through five years and 13 rehabs with her ex-husband, and what it was like to be the one working, paying off drug debt and keeping the insurance going while he received intensive support. Her blunt line, "Talking doesn't pay the bills," captures just how overlooked families can be in the recovery system.
The chat moves between her books and real life: how she balances being honest about abuse without being gratuitous, why she refuses to write one-dimensional "addicts", and how side characters who show small acts of kindness can keep someone going. She shares messages from readers who say her novels changed how they see homeless people or led them into a life of service. Paige also speaks directly to those in recovery and their loved ones.
She urges people who are struggling to believe they deserve better, and families to seek professional help so they support rather than enable. Her final wish is simple: that everyone in recovery, and every family alongside them, finds a healthier way forward. If you’ve ever felt invisible as the family member, or judged as the one using, this conversation might make you feel a little less alone.
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