WOODLAND HILLS, Calif. — Sitting near a koi pond was a calming moment for Cara Sandweiss as she reflected on her past drug addiction.

Sandweiss explained how it started with high school parties, alcohol and marijuana until she moved on to harder drugs like heroin. As an adult, her drug use became an addiction that led her to homelessness and jail.

"It was a very dark, miserable, horrific place that I was in," she said. "And still to this day, I don’t know how I let that happen. But that’s the issue with the disease of addiction: It happened."

Sandweiss shared that she was in and out of sober-living homes while she was still using. As she battled her addiction, an accidental overdose almost cut her life short.

"As I was injecting it, the last thought I had was, I just did too much," she said. "I could feel that I had done too much, and that was it. I woke up several hours later, thank God, on the floor on that bathroom with the needle on the ground, and I sat up and realized, you know, something kept me here."

Sandweiss was grateful to survive her overdose experience and find her way into recovery with the assistance of CRI-Help, a nonprofit recovery center that has helped over 45,000 people overcome drug and alcohol addictions in Los Angeles.

But many during the pandemic struggled with their addictions. Provisional data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows more than 88,000 Americans died from an overdose during a 12-month period ending in August 2020. That number is about 7,000 deaths higher than an earlier report released by the CDC last year.

According to Sandweiss, the pandemic’s impact on operations within recovery facilities made it even harder for those newly seeking sobriety during the pandemic.

"When you don’t have that human connection and those meetings you can go to, it makes it really difficult," said Sandweiss. "So for the people that were newcomers during the pandemic, they struggled, and a lot of them didn’t make it. You know a lot of us who had several years clean, multiple years clean, we were able to hang on to our recovery and get those Zoom meetings going."

Despite the challenges of the past year, Sandweiss is now over seven years into her recovery, engaged and works with her fiancée to help others seek recovery from their addictions with Profound LA treatment centers for those in need.

"It was a rough year," she said. "There were so many things that happened and so many things I faced personally, my family faced, my friends faced. But recovery gives you fortitude, and as long as you can make it through adverse situations, you’re going to be OK."

After seeing the challenges of addiction firsthand, Sandweiss is hoping her recovery will help others know they're not alone.

CRI-Help will be featuring a ticketed fundraiser to celebrate its 50th anniversary on May 14 at Santa Anita Park from 8-11 p.m. The event features catering by Trejo’s Tacos and a drive-in documentary screening of “Inmate #1: The Rise of Danny Trejo.”