HILLSBORO, Ohio—Sitting in a jail cell alone, separated from her husband and teenage son, Candice Mueller said she was confronted with a decision that would alter the rest of her life: Make changes, or likely face an early death.
Mueller had battled substance abuse for more than two decades. In 2021, she was convicted of operating a vehicle while impaired and never completed the assigned treatments, so there were warrants for her arrest. Before her scheduled court appearance, Mueller recalls, she asked God for grace.
“I said to Him, ‘I don’t know what it’s going to take. I don’t know how you’re going to change my life, but I cannot do this anymore.’ And when I went to court that morning, the judge said, ‘I’ve watched you go downhill, and I’m not going to watch you die on my watch,’” Mueller recalled….