ROCKINGHAM — Amelia Eanes sat alone, soaking up the sun, on one of the back dining decks of Samaritan Colony’s SECU Women’s Recovery Center following Monday’s grand opening.
Since the Alamance native checked in as a client in February, she’s begun to see life in a new light — and appreciate some of the simpler experiences.
“I thought I would be gone by now,” Eanes said. “I was not supposed to make it this far, and I have found the will to live here.”
Eanes said that, as part of the program, they make a “grateful list” every morning and she frequently lists the sunrise.
“I always hated it,” Eanes said. “I always went to bed as the sun was coming up and then I would get up at, like, 2 in the afternoon. But being on a regular schedule is eye-opening to say the very least.
“And getting to spend time with people that I trust, people that have gone through the same thing that I’ve been through, it just makes the whole experience that much more beautiful — I don’t feel alone, even when I am alone.”
Eanes described herself as “a raging alcoholic,” noting that she was buying a brand of vodka that was less than $5 per bottle.
“Me and my dog were eating white rice,” she recalled. “I prioritized alcohol, then dog food and then cat food — which was disgusting … I didn’t even care if I ate or not because I had my dinner for the night and it was a bottle of the cheapest vodka known to man.”
Court records show she was charged, and later convicted, of driving while impaired in Mebane, registering a blood alcohol level of 0.14 during a 2022 breath test.
Eanes said she had previously checked herself into detox centers and psychiatric wards, as well as going to meetings, but “none of it worked.”
“This place is actually working,” Eanes said. “Everything has changed for me already. It’s like God has been yelling at me for about five years now that I can’t go down this road … and it just got progressively worse.”
Eanes’ journey to Samaritan Colony started in late January when she said she got blackout drunk during a poker game in Montgomery County.
She said she doesn’t remember what she's accused of doing after that — including leaving the game, going home, getting into an argument with and assaulting her boyfriend — until she came to, several hours later, in a restraint chair.
According to a magistrate’s order, Eanes moved her handcuffs from behind her to the front while in the patrol car and banging them on the window while on the way to the Montgomery County Jail. She also allegedly spit on one of the deputies.
Eanes is charged with one misdemeanor count each of second-degree trespassing and resisting a public officer, as well as one felony count of malicious conduct by a prisoner by throwing or emitting bodily fluid.
Being a waitress, Eanes said she’s nice and knows how to talk to people: “But drunk, I guess I’m just belligerent, and they were like, ‘You’re gonna need help, because you can’t stop.’”
When Eanes was in jail, she said she was told she was going to have to go to rehab and was asked how long she would want to stay, replying: “No more than a month, I have a dog at home.”
“But, I’m really glad that I said that because, had I gone to like, a six- to nine-month program … it would have been like, ‘Oh, just do it on your own time …just take your time with it,’” Eanes said. “And here it’s like, as Red Foreman (a character from ‘That ‘70’s Show’) would say, a foot in your ass.”
The program at the SECU Women’s Center, Eanes said, pushes clients to focus on themselves and look inward — something she never really did before.
“Being out here, honestly, just sitting outside, I drop to my knees and I thank the Lord, like, all the time,” Eanes said. “It’s so gorgeous. I’m learning to appreciate so much more here. I’m learning to appreciate myself and my story and my trauma … and that’s something I never thought I’d be able to do.”
Describing her hometown as smelling “like meth and death,” Eanes said that several of her friends have been killed by their dealers “for getting clean.”
Eanes said she thought she would always be in waitressing — “snorting drugs and drinking with my tables” — and didn’t have any real plans for the future.
“This is a really interesting experience for me where I feel safe, I feel comfortable,” Eanes said. “I know that this is a long way from home, but I’m glad that I’m away from home … This gives me the chance to stay away from the people I know … and reflect on myself.”
Now, she’s contemplating being a mother and working somewhere like the recovery center.
“It’s opened up a lot of new doors that I didn’t even know were doors — I just thought they were holes that have been sealed closed,” Eanes said.
Since starting the program, Eanes said she’s been able to let go of resentment she’s held onto for years and forgive those who have wronged her.
“Had they not done that and led me down the path that I am now on, I would have never ended up here,” Eanes said. “Had I stayed with those friends, I would be dead. Had I not been as angry, I would be dead. Had I not gotten kicked out of every single house … I would still be in Burlington, probably dead.”
But, Eanes said because she “ruined everything,” she’s “gained so much more.”
Kailyn Mead embraces her grandfather during the grand opening of Samaritan Colony's SECU Women's Recovery Center.
Like Eanes, Kailyn Mead also struggled with alcohol, as well as marijuana.
Mead, of Rockingham, said she started drinking around the age of 13 and later became interested in marijuana and eventually dropped out of school.
“I was full-blown into drinking everyday and smoking everyday,” Mead said. “Then, after 18, I started dabbling in other drugs.”
Those other drugs included cocaine, methamphetamine and opiate pills, as well as psychedelics like LSD and mushrooms.
Mead said she started bouncing around from state to state — including Florida, Arkansas and Arizona — “Just always on the move, never having a stable life.”
“I think the chaos with that also (led) me to being around the wrong people,” Mead said. “And so it just kinda became a staple of my life to stay high or drunk and avoid my problems.”
Mead said her life became so unmanageable that she would probably have wound up “in a pinewood box, six feet under.”
Court records show Mead has pending charges in Richmond and Mecklenburg counties, including resisting a public officer and being intoxicated and disruptive. She said she was also locked up in two counties in South Dakota and “got in trouble” in New York City.
After her Mecklenburg County arrest, Mead said she talked to her grandmother about the Women’s Recovery Center. She was familiar with Samaritan Colony’s men’s center, knowing several people who had gone through treatment.
“It was just by the grace of God I was able to get in and be like the first person here,” Mead said, adding she checked in on Feb. 4 when the facility opened.
“It’s been very … renewing,” Mead said about her experience at Samaritan Colony. “It’s changed my mindset …it’s given me hope and faith in myself.”
Mead said she’s learned to deal with acceptance, love others as she would love herself, give herself grace, “and no matter what, just get through things …finding out a new way to live that I had no idea about before.”
“It’s not even a sense about if I want it or if I need it, it’s just I have to do it … otherwise I’m gonna end up dead.”
Mead said she was scheduled to move to Bethany House in Southern Pines on Wednesday.
According to its website, Bethany House provides women recovering from substance abuse with “a clean, safe, structured and supportive home-like setting before returning to active family social and community life.”
After leaving there, Mead says she plans to go to college and get a steady job — and not go from job to job “just getting enough money for drugs and alcohol.”
Mead said she’s looking forward to rebuilding her relationship with her grandparents, who have been supportive. During her most recent jail stay, Mead said she was afraid to call them. But when she did, they offered to help.
“Without them, I wouldn’t be able to be here, I don’t think,” Mead said.
Both Eanes and Mead still have pending charges. All defendants facing criminal charges are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
Eanes is waiting for a bed to open up at Bethany House or another similar facility where she'll be for eight months.
“It’s just a blessing, it really is,” Eanes said about her time at Samaritan Colony. “I’m really looking forward to seeing what happens after I get out of here.”
