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Two years ago, West Chester resident Jennifer Cheek spent Thanksgiving Day in a Hamilton crack house.

The traditional meal she had eaten with her family earlier that day would be the last food she would consume for days, as her appetite became only for the chemical smoke that flew when flame met glass.

A little over a year later, Cheek would again find herself in the same house, this time with her 3-month-old daughter, Kaylee — her second born — in tow.

Eventually, the knock at the door would be Cheek's mother and sister-in-law, hands upturned to accept the child from a willing, strung-out mother.

"It was mortifying," Cheek said last week sitting on her feet in her mother's living room. "I just said, 'Here's my child.' I just told them I'm sorry."

Cheek sunk back into the house that day because her bottom had not yet come. She would steal from her family, lie, drink and drug her way into a $1,000-per-day crack addiction. And then she would get better.

Cheek, 30, has a handle on her life now, though clean for nearly eight months, a past like that is never very far behind.

The local woman graduated from Edgewood High School in 1996. At age 17, she worked feverishly, then later found herself accepted into Miami University, where she studied secondary education for two and a half years before dropping out.

In September 2004, Cheek separated from a serious boyfriend, a trigger that turned social drinking into dependency. Soon after, when she started snorting away the pain of depression, it was already too late. Her downward spiral was seemingly without stairs, and she slid out of "the world," as she called it.

"It was just something different," she said. "When I would drink, I would get depressed and (cocaine) would numb it. I was really afraid of being by myself."

When she left work at the end of September, the combination of depression, addiction and bankroll snowballed.

Hitting the bottom

In 2005, Cheek lost cocaine and found crack. She lost her Lindenwald home, lost her son, lost her privilege to drive and lost her freedom. She stole from her mother and grandmother; the latter landed her in jail on felony theft charges for racking up more than $2,000 on a credit card she didn't own.

She spent 2006 shuffling in and out of drug treatment programs, but playing the junkie trump card at every turn.

"It's like torture," Cheek said. "It's knowing that you're doing something horrible for you and your child and you can't stop."

Cheek became pregnant with Kaylee in 2007 — and stayed clean for the first and third trimesters.

On Nov. 6, 2007, another reason for Cheek to check her habit was born. But on a frigid February afternoon, that reason was handed over to Cheek's mother on a doorstep of a crack house.

A childless and penniless Cheek faced a decision in April: Kick addiction or sell her body for dope.

"I had no other option," she said flatly. "Everybody has their bottom. Mine was being a prostitute, and I couldn't do it. I didn't do it."

Then Cheek got a call from Sojourner Recovery Services. The Hamilton-based recovery center had one spot to fill. Decision made.

The past eight months have been void of relapse, and full of experiences that are new but shouldn't be.

On Nov. 20, 14 days after Kaylee's first birthday and less than 24 hours after regaining full custody, Cheek tipped a glass of ice water to her daughter's lips. The little girl drank and giggled as the cool liquid trickled onto her purple striped shirt.

It was a normal act between mother and child, but a moment put on hold for too long.

"She's really been dedicated," said Cheek's caseworker from Butler County Children Services who asked not to be named. "As an individual, she did what she needed to do and she did it well.

"Most people don't go to that level," he said. "If more people had acted like she did, we would have a lot more success."

Today, instead of living puff to puff with the shades drawn, Jennifer Cheek will enjoy the air of sobriety — while still understanding the flipside is a burden she must carry.

"I'm never going to be perfect, and that's good," she said, lifting Kaylee to her lap. "Because then I wouldn't want to get any better."

Where to get help

• Butler County Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services Board, 6 S. 2nd St. Suite 420, Hamilton; (513) 867-0777.

• Sojourner Recovery Services, 520 High St., Hamilton; (513) 868-7654.

• Alcohol and Chemical Abuse Council, 2935 Hamilton-Mason Road, Hamilton; (513) 868-2100.