One community is helping its members with addiction one tattoo at a time.
WATCH: Tattoo studio helps addiction recovery with community fundraising event
Tattoos for a Cause in Centreville, Maryland, is providing resources for those struggling with addiction. The brainchild of Keith Edmonds, the co-owner of Anchor Eye Studios, who is himself 7 years clean.
Keith says addiction is "cunning, baffling, and powerful."
"I too am a product of recovery," Edmonds said.
"What I witnessed was people losing their funding and running out of money and not having the support that they needed to stay in those recovery houses and get put on the street and some of the people that got put on the street died in the street and so what our mission here is today is to make sure everyone has the opportunity that wants to get and stay clean," Edmonds said.
People like Westminster rapper B-RAiN, who is in longterm recovery from addiction and has turned his journey into music.
"All my music is about my recovery and just like my journey, my struggles, the successes, and just hoping to inspire somebody else to, to just get one more day clean, one more day sober, that they can do it," B-RAiN said.
And that message of hope was reflected by everyone who attended Tattoos for a Cause.
"I think that shot of hope means a lot... addiction... Is not seclusive to a race or economic class. It affects individuals black, white, Asian, rich and poor. So, the ability to have these resources available for individuals is extremely important," said Samuel Alston, co-founder and vice president of Recovery and Awareness Foundation.
With the end goal of making sure those struggling with addiction get the resources they need.
"Our goal has always been to raise as much money as possible just with the full intention of giving it away. We don't take any other funding from anywhere else, so it's all organic donations that we do get so that there's no stipulations on how we can assist people," said Newton Gentry, executive director for Recovery Awareness Foundation.
If you're interested in donating or need help finding resources, you can visit us on our website at WMAR-2 News dot com.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
