Alaina Knox is Sweetser’s director of recovery services and is herself a certified peer support
specialist.

There’s something profoundly healing about being truly understood. Not just heard, but understood by someone who has walked a similar path, felt the same isolation and navigated the same challenges. This is the essence of peer support.

Recovery from mental health challenges or substance use is not a solitary journey, yet stigma and isolation often make it feel that way. Traditional clinical care, while essential, can sometimes miss a crucial element: the unique perspective that comes from lived experience. This is where peer support can step in, bridging the gap between professional treatment and the authentic human connection that truly fosters healing.

Peer support specialists are individuals who have navigated their own mental health or substance use challenges and have been trained to support others on similar journeys. They are experts in their own lived experiences, using the raw reality of facing and overcoming life’s most difficult moments in their engagements with others. This experiential wisdom equips them with empathy, understanding and an ability to connect with individuals in ways that others often cannot.

Peer support instills hope in ways that clinical language sometimes fails to reach. When
someone in early recovery meets a peer specialist who has been thriving years into their own recovery journey, they see tangible proof that recovery is possible. This visibility matters immensely.

Peer supporters reduce stigma, improve treatment engagement and retention, fill gaps in the care continuum and build genuine community — all factors that research consistently shows lead to better outcomes.

While Maine’s crisis hotline, now the easy-to-use 988 number, has been in the headlines, there is another number that might be less known, but is nevertheless impactful in Mainers’ recovery journeys.

Maine’s Peer Support Line (1-866-771-9276) is a free resource, staffed 24/7 by peer support specialists to help Mainers process their feelings and emotions. You don’t have to give your name and there is no financial transaction or insurance needed. Just a nonjudgmental ear for you to lean on if and when you need it.

Last year alone, Sweetser fielded 30,000 phone calls to this hotline — 30,000. Our volume has only increased. It speaks to the need across our state for connection, support and hope. The average call length is anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes. For a rural state where isolation can be a common refrain, this resource can be a literal lifeline for many Mainers.

When someone in early recovery speaks with a peer specialist who is thriving years into their own journey, they see tangible proof that recovery is possible. This visibility matters immensely. Now, there is a physical place where Mainers can go to be in community and share in their recovery journey.

A new peer center has opened in Brunswick. The purpose of a peer center is to create a welcoming, judgment-free space where people come together to connect, share and support one another at all stages of their recovery journey.

Like the Peer Support Line, you bring yourself. No payment, no insurance, no barriers.
There are six centers throughout Maine. This one will not only serve the Brunswick area, but the counties of Sagadahoc, Knox, Waldo and Lincoln as well.

Programming centers around creating a sense of belonging through daily peer-run groups, life skills workshops and one-on-one peer support.

The new SupportME Peer Center stands as proof that recovery is not about treating
symptoms — it’s about building connections, fostering hope and creating spaces where people can show up exactly as they are.

As someone who is a peer myself, I know that your future can be a bright one. You are not
alone, and recovery is truly possible.