Tara Perkins sat on the couch in the mobile home with one leg crossed over the other, swinging it nervously, smiling and occasionally crying as she talked.
And that’s OK, she said, because at least she’s not squashing her feelings with drugs anymore. She doesn’t want to die anymore. She doesn’t cover her mirrors with blankets anymore so she can’t see how meth has ravaged her body.
“Today I can look in the mirror and say, ‘Hey, I kind of like that person,’” she said, smiling.
On Saturday, the 39-year-old Conway native will become the first graduate of STAND — Stand Together And No Drugs — a Christian program for women. It was founded by Suzanne Gonzalez, a former drug addict. Several mobile homes, donated by the owner of Glen Echo mobile-home park in Conway, have been renovated as shelters for women. Many of the residents have been released from jail and have nowhere to go. They attend Bible studies and have a mentor while they’re there.
To graduate, Gonzalez said, women must complete six months of the program, get their GED if they don’t have a diploma, and complete 300 hours of community service. Perkins is the only woman, to date, to meet the requirements.
“It’s amazing; she’s done an awesome job,” Gonzalez said. “She’s a leader, and she’s helping others get into their sobriety, and moving forward and teaching Bible studies.”
Perkins said she came to STAND at the lowest point in her life. A drug addict, she was hospitalized in May and almost died from an infection caused by using drugs, and when she was released from the hospital, she went to a shelter in Little Rock. However, Perkins said, she wanted to come home to Conway.
She said the Women’s Shelter of Central Arkansas in Conway told her about STAND, and she went there in July, still mad at God, still using drugs. She sneaked in Xanax pills, and they were found her second day there. When Gonzalez confronted Perkins and asked her what she wanted to do, Perkins said she wanted to go across the road, take the pills and end her life.
“I hit bottom,” Perkins said. “Death was the only option I had.”
She said Gonzalez told her, “Well, you can do that, or you can come take a shower and rest,” Perkins said. She took Suzanne up on the offer and slept for the better part of two days.
When Perkins woke up, “I didn’t have the desire to use anymore,” she said.
Gonzalez saw the transformation. “When she woke up, she was on fire. It was amazing; she was on fire,” Gonzalez said.
On July 13, Perkins said, she accepted Jesus Christ as her Savior while at Mosaic Church.
“This is where God wanted me so I could bloom,” she said.”It took me six months to realize my life is important.”
Perkins said she was on nine medications when she arrived at STAND. Today, she is on two. She is on disability because of her severe depression, but she said it’s improving.
“When I get sad, I like to feel my feelings. If I cry, I cry; if I laugh, I laugh. I’m positive now. I was so negative in my past,” she said. “I can’t regret what I’ve done in my past because I wouldn’t be the person I am today.”
Perkins graduated from Conway High School, and in junior high, she was a member of the pep squad and played sports.
“My family never smoked or drank. I was raised in a Christian family,” she said.
When Perkins was 12, she said, her mother died of breast cancer. “I blamed God a lot.” Perkins said she was depressed, and her father, who has since died, gave her whatever she wanted. “Dad kind of bought my love,” she said. It was his money she used to buy drugs.
Perkins said she started smoking marijuana and cigarettes at age 17, and at 20 became addicted to methamphetamine and prescription pills.
“I just wanted to cover up all the feelings I had,” she said. “I got hooked really, really quickly.”
At 19, she had her first son, and she quit using drugs while she was pregnant, she said. He weighed only 2 pounds at birth, and she eventually used his disability check to buy drugs. She had another son when she was 21, and a daughter at 23.
“As soon as I had the baby, I went back to using drugs,” she said. Perkins said she went through a sobriety program and was “clean” for four years, 2008-2012, but she was miserable. Her “higher power” was many things, she said, but never Jesus Christ. “Today, it’s Jesus Christ — it’s so much easier. When I got here, I hated God.”
For years, Perkins lived in different places for about a month at a time, usually failing to pay rent because she used the money for drugs, she said. Perkins said she used blankets or sheets to cover the mirrors wherever she lived.
“I was ashamed of how I looked, and I just couldn’t look at myself,” she said.
Perkins said her middle son was taken away from her when he was 18 months old. Her older son, now 19, and daughter, now 15, were taken away three years ago by the Department of Human Services, and she was fighting to get them back. Her son met his biological father and went to live with him, she said.
“I realized I was selfish,” Perkins said, so she allowed her daughter to be adopted by a foster family.
“It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” she said, starting to cry. “I wanted to give her a better life. She has an awesome life — she’s got a mom, dad, brothers and sisters.”
Perkins said people sometimes comment that she didn’t love her children, but they’re wrong.
“I love my kids. Drugs consumed my life,” she said. “Unless you’ve been in my shoes, you really can’t judge me. I know that God’s going to bring my kids back to me one day. I’ve been praying. I pray for my kids every day.”
She said her daughter’s adoptive family doesn’t want the girl to have contact with Perkins.
“I don’t blame them. I have put my kids through heck and back. I want to be the example I should have been when they were growing up,” she said.
Perkins called her older son her “best friend.” He’s in the Navy, stationed in Japan, and she said they talk on the phone, and he came to visit her at STAND. “He’s so happy,” she said.
Perkins said she’s saved money while she’s been at STAND, and she had her teeth — ruined by drugs — pulled and bought dentures with her own money. She is continuing to save money, she said.
“I’ve always been co-dependent. Now, I’m doing it on my own, and it’s a great feeling,” she said.
She also is taking classes to qualify to buy a home through Habitat for Humanity of Faulkner County, which is building several homes in Vilonia and Mayflower. The nonprofit organization has also partnered with STAND to renovate the organization’s trailers, and more work is needed, Gonzalez said.
Perkins is not quite ready to leave STAND, though.
She became a house mom about 4 1/2 months ago, and she oversees the residents of three mobile homes, planning their days, making sure they are on task.
“My first priority is making sure the women are safe,” she said. “Sometimes I’ll just get up and go walk the grounds to make sure they’re safe.”
Sixteen women and five children were housed in the mobile homes as of Wednesday.
Perkins said she also enjoys tutoring the women in math.
“I was a math whiz; I love math,” she said. Perkins said that in the drug world, she didn’t get along with women, but that’s changed. “God gave me a heart to love,” she said.
Perkins said she usually wakes up at 3:30 a.m. every day, gets her coffee, reads her Bible and meditates.
“It’s working. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” she said with a laugh.
Graduation is at 10 a.m. Saturday at Cornerstone Church, 1905 Dave Ward Drive in Conway. After graduation, Perkins said she plans to stay with STAND to work. She admits it’s a “safety net” of sorts, but she also said it’s where she is supposed to be.
“I feel like God has called me to help women. I’m allowing him to use me in whatever way he wants to use me in this ministry,” she said. Perkins said it’s a structured program. “It’s not easy, but it’s doable,” she said. “Some of these girls are addicts, and I say, ‘I know.’ If I can do this program, anybody can do this program. It’s God-centered, and I love it.”
“Man, I’m just graduating the six-month program, but I’m not graduating from life’s struggles. Every day, I’m going to have to live through life. I feel like to graduate from this program is the beginning of a new life,” she said.
More information about STAND is available by calling Gonzalez at (501) 504-9641 or by emailing her at suzanne@gmail.com.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached by calling (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.