Celebrate Recovery’s annual Recovery Fest is a free event distributing resources for battling addiction and promoting healthy lifestyles by bringing clean fun for all ages to the community.
The event kicks off in Sept., also known as National Recovery month, a symbol of what Celebrate Recovery does for those facing addiction.
Michelle Hammond, the event’s organizer, said, “Celebrate Recovery is a worldwide, 12-step rehabilitation program that’s biblically balanced. Anything you got holding you back from being the best person you can be, that’s what Celebrate Recovery is for.”
“Tifton is so rich in the recovery community, but a lot of it so secretive,” Hammond continued. “It’s hard to find the resources if you don’t know where to look, so we dreamed up Recovery Fest.”
There were 25 tables from the surrounding area giving out information to help both those facing addiction and those who have already faced the battle.
Harriet Felts with Oasis Recovery Community Organization was giving out resources at Recovery Fest.
Felts was originally born and raised in Tifton and has recently come back after helping those facing addiction elsewhere.
She said, “I wanted to come back to the place I love and give what I’ve been so freely given. I recently celebrated 27 years clean and sober… I want to share with others that if I can do it, you can too.”
Christopher Mendieta, who attended the event, said, “Recovery means to me, life. At one time, I was pretty much dead in my addiction doing the things I was doing. Now, I’ve got life.”
Mendieta continued, “At one time, there wasn’t this availability of help. There was such a big stigma on recovery, that people didn’t want to recover out loud. That’s why I’m recovering out loud.”
With this event becoming larger each year, those who faced addiction can relate to each other’s struggles, finding comfort in a growing community.
“I’m seeing people that I used to see in my addiction, and they’ve turned to recovery,” said Mendieta.
Hammond said, “I am a person in long term recovery. I came into church through the backdoor and was court mandated to start attending Celebrate Recovery. That was over nine years ago. Through the process of attending, I met Jesus and found recovery through that.”
Stories like Hammond’s, Mendieta’s, and Felts’s and their journeys to sobriety can be found in the 2025 Testimony Magazine. The idea behind the magazine is for those who are struggling to find the encouragement in their walk to sobriety to find some through other survivors’ stories.
Hammond said, “We got testimonies from all over the United States and put them all in one place. Maybe you can’t come to Recovery Fest, but your mom does. She can leave this on the counter, and you read it and find hope in someone else’s story.”
Someone on the walk to sobriety may cling to what keeps them in a life of addiction, but nothing comes without action.
Hammond thought the same thing for the first Recovery Fest: “We didn’t have a lot of expectations for the first year. We had a lot of people come out and share their stories. We knew we would be doing this every year after that.”
If you or someone in your life is experiencing addiction in any fashion, you don’t have to wait for next year’s Recovery Fest. Celebrate Recovery meets every Thursday at First Baptist Church, Tifton. A meal will be provided at 5:30 p.m. followed by a group meeting at 6:30 p.m.
