Leading Brandywine Counseling & Community Services, one of the state’s largest prevention and treatment organizations, means I am on the front line, working with everyday people navigating through some of the toughest, most grueling challenges possible. Homelessness, addiction, societal rejection … and yet every day, my team and I see enough to inspire us, fill us with hope and get us out of bed the next day to do the same thing.

Since we first opened our doors to the Delaware community in 1984, we’ve met tens of thousands of very different people with equally different stories, all sharing one thing in common: a desire to begin their journey out of addiction. It’s an incredible thing to be part of helping someone change their life, like Pablo. As a functional addict, he hid his heroin addiction from friends and family for years, fearful of their judgment. He entered into a treatment program with us and, today, owns his own home and works as a business school admissions director.

Then, there’s Mignon, a single mom to four kids who lost her fifth because of continued addiction. Through her own determination and the support of her BCCS counselors, Mignon’s treatment program helped her begin a path that led to a new job, a new home and a new life with her family.

Victories like these are not won overnight. They can be long and difficult battles that need constant reinforcement on all fronts. Carefully customized treatment programs lead the charge.

The partner to treatment is prevention. That’s the combination that really helps communities flourish, making neighborhoods stronger, safe and healthier. My belief in reversing the cycle of self-destructive behaviors by creating strong prevention tactics impacts everything we do at BCCS. Everything.

Prevention means giving people all the information and resources they need to recognize the signs of drug and alcohol abuse, mental health issues and high-risk behaviors. It means programs like POP (Peer Outreach for Prevention) and SQUAD (Students on a Quest, United Against Drugs/Alcohol) are comprised of young adults from all three Delaware counties helping educate other youth about good decision-making around the topics of sex, drugs and alcohol. It means workshops like DOSE (Delaware Overdose Survival Education) helping educate the community on how to recognize and prevent an overdose.

It also includes the state’s own website, helpisherede.com, providing additional resources and information about the naloxone-distribution program.

Prevention means going to where our client communities are with street outreach and mobile health services, offering information, counseling and free testing.

My mission and that of BCCS is to bring hope to people, whether they are wrestling with addiction or mental illness themselves or seeking help for a loved one. Our BCCS team is a dedicated and selfless group of professionals passionate about what they do and the Delaware communities they serve. In our 40 years, we have served over 200,000 people, many of them with nowhere else to turn. BCCS is always here, and our door is always open.

Dr. Lynn Morrison is president and CEO of Brandywine Counseling & Community Services. She is a community health advocate and leader in substance abuse and treatment policies.