Achieving a Life of Recovery

All individuals—regardless of condition, disability, or circumstance—have the right to pursue fulfilling lives in their communities. The Office of Recovery Transformation (ORT) helps make that possible. We work with providers and community partners to infuse Georgia’s behavioral health system with an array of clinical and nonclinical services and supports that make treatment more recovery-oriented. Ultimately, we aim to empower individuals to define and sustain recovery, wellness, and independence in their communities.

Our long-term commitment is to transform our behavioral health system into a recovery-oriented system of care (ROSC). This means that—together—we must continue to build a person-centered, strength-based continuum of care that promotes the right of all individuals to pursue their dreams. In addition, we must attend to the needs of the whole person, not to just their diagnosis or disability. So ORT aims not only to empower individuals using the behavioral healthcare system, but also to strengthen their families, environments, and communities.

We envision a behavioral health system in which all services and stakeholders across the state share an approach that is

  • focused on the individual as a whole and complex person
  • guided by lived experience
  • grounded in a peer workforce
  • built on a person’s strengths
  • strategic in scope and reach
  • integrated and inclusive of mental health, substance use, intellectual and developmental disabilities, children and adolescents, and primary care

What is Recovery?

Recovery is a deeply personal, unique, and self-determined journey through which an individual strives to reach his or her full potential. Persons in recovery improve their health and wellness by taking responsibility in pursuing a fulfilling and contributing life while embracing the difficulties one has faced. Recovery is not a gift from any system. Recovery is nurtured by relationships and environments that provide hope, empowerment, choices, and opportunities.

Georgia’s Recovery Guiding Principles and Values
Recovery…

  • Emerges from hope
  • Is person-driven
  • Is strengths-based
  • Is age-independent
  • Recognizes the wisdom of “lived experience”
  • Occurs via many pathways
  • Is holistic 
  • Is supported by peers, allies, advocates, and families
  • Is nurtured through relationships and social networks
  • Is culturally based and influenced
  • Is anchored in wellness, addressing a person’s emotional health, environmental well being, financial satisfaction, intellectual creativity, occupational pursuits, physical activities, social engagement, and spiritual health
  • Addresses trauma
  • Supports self-responsibility
  • Empowers communities
  • Is based on respect

For more information about achieving a life of recovery, please contact
Dana McCrary
Director, Office of Recovery Transformation, DBHDD
[email protected]