Each September, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration sponsors National Recovery Month. Throughout the month, SAMHSA encourages awareness and understanding of mental health and substance abuse disorders. The campaign also celebrates people in recovery.

In Winchester, Celebrate Recovery will recognize the campaign by hosting its first National Recovery Month event this weekend.

Rally 4 Recovery will take place Friday and Saturday.

The event was inspired by two women’s desire to bring awareness to the issues of mental health and substance abuse, and the hope those who struggle with these issues have in recovery.

JuaNita Everman and Amber Fields are co-coordinating the event, which will include a prayer and remembrance walk, a 5K, worship, speakers and food.

For Everman and Fields, it was their own experiences with the issues that made them want to raise awareness.

Everman and her husband, Dickie, started their recovery journey 20 years ago. They eventually started a recovery program called Recovery Through Christ at Calvary Christian Church.

After about a year, the pastor at the time introduced Dickie Everman, who is a discipleship minister at Calvary in charge of recovery ministries and adult ministries, to Celebrate Recovery.

“I fell in love with it,” Dickie Everman said. “When I read about Celebrate Recovery, it’s sort of an umbrella program for a lot of hurts, habits and hang-ups. I thought everyone could work through the steps and get this healing that I’ve received from alcoholism, it’s just great.

“I use the steps in every part of my life, in every struggle.”

Fields said she became passionate about Celebrate Recovery after losing her husband to an overdose two years ago.

“When I got sober and came of out that grief I was in, I really wanted to to do something for Celebrate Recovery and show others that there is healing. You can get through this.”

Fields will tell her recovery story during the rally Friday evening.

Friday’s events begin at 5:30 p.m. with registration, recovery posters and pinwheels at the Cairn Coffee House, followed by the prayer and remembrance walk at 6 p.m. in front of the Clark County Courthouse. Speakers will share information about mental health and substance abuse, along with stories of recovery. There will be a community prayer service, and a free spaghetti supper at the Cairn until 8:30 p.m.

“National Recovery Month covers mental health and substance abuse, and a lot of times there’s a dual diagnosis,” JuaNita Everman said. “We are having professional speakers from the Agency for Substance Abuse Prevention, Bluegrass.org and drug court that will cover the educational side and give some background information.”

Saturday will feature worship, speakers and recovery stories at 9 a.m., prior to the start of the Run 4 Recovery. There will also be an awards ceremony and community prayer at 11 a.m. There will be food, family activities and fellowship after the race.

Fields said the rally is family-friendly and there will be stuff for everyone to do, regardless of their financial situation.

“(Mental health and addiction) affect the whole family. Even if the kids aren’t the ones on drugs, of course they’re affected if the parents are. It changes the whole direction of their life,” she said. “We didn’t want to leave anyone in the family out because the whole family needs healing.”

Fields said the committee wanted to have the rally downtown to make it easy accessible for the population typically struggling with these issues.

“The hope is that someone who’s actively addicted to struggling with mental health would be able to walk down and find all the resources they will need to start recovery.”

Along with Celebrate Recovery at Calvary Christian Church, the two-day event is also sponsored by the Clark County Agency for Substance Abuse Prevention, Clark Regional Medical Center, Rachel Fairchild Design and Beall Recovery Centers.

For more information about the event, contact JuaNita Everman at juanita.everman@calvarychristian.net or Amber Fields at amberfields333@yahoo.com. To register, visit run4recoverywinky.com.

“There’s a saying that goes ‘No hurt is beyond healing. No habit is beyond help. No hang up is beyond hope,’” Dickie Everman said. “We just want to put hope in people that there is help available. There’s healing available.”

Contact Whitney Leggett at whitney.leggett@winchestersun.com.