Jeanne McAlister was on a dark and self-destructive path. But something happened on Nov. 23, 1956, sending her off in a different direction that eventually helped many thousands of San Diegans.
Born in 1932, McAlister was raised in San Diego.
As early as she can , she was repeatedly physically abused, often bloodied and injured.
“Even today sometimes I go back to that little girl who was beaten and scared,” she said. “I have to pick her up and love her.”
As a child, her reaction to the trauma was defiance and rebellion.
She first got drunk at 10 when she invited soldiers to her home while her parents were away.
At 12, she left home, finding her way to Long Beach, where she lived on the streets.
After fighting off a sexual attack, McAlister returned at 14 to San Diego, where she was caught stealing and sent to a girl’s correctional facility for a year.
At 15, she was released from custody and married an 18-year-old man. It lasted six months.
At 16, she became a single mother when her daughter Sandy was born.
While she lived in a downtown San Diego hotel room and worked as a cocktail waitress and hotel clerk, McAlister paid a family to house and care for her daughter.
“I drank every day and would go to Tijuana for drugs, ‘uppers’ and ‘downers,’” she said. “I woke up not knowing where I was.”
“Drinking made me feel like somebody. Without it, I felt like nobody.”
Twice she attempted suicide.
However, on Nov. 23, 1956, at 24, McAlister’s life changed. A man she befriended brought her to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.
“This was at a time when AA was in the basement,” McAlister said. “Those were the days of the town drunk stigma.”
“AA was different. It involved recovering alcoholics helping recovering alcoholics. I watched this happen at the first meeting and continued attending.
“I decided I wanted to be clean and sober,” she said, comparing it to a light bulb going on.
“It was not easy. But I followed the 12-steps [recovering alcoholics] live by and that’s what I still go by today.
“Every day I would say to myself, ‘I am sober and that’s all that counts.’”
McAlister has been clean and sober for 68 years, since that day in 1956.
In the early 1970s, she met Dr. David Rusk, a psychiatrist whom she describes as innovative and willing to experiment. Rusk hired McAlister to run his drug addiction and alcoholism program. Although she never graduated high school, McAlister had life experiences and attended educational seminars on counseling.
“No other program used recovering alcoholics and addicts as counselors at the time,” McAlister said. “Other professionals were uncomfortable with me and aghast that someone with little education was working as a counselor.”
She counseled hundreds of clients and was encouraged by how her experiences allowed her to relate to them and gain their confidence.
After five years, Rust changed his professional focus, but McAlister continued with counseling.
In 1977, she created McAlister Institute, a nonprofit drug and alcohol treatment facility, with a staff of 15 that included recovering addicts and alcoholics as counselors.
Ever since, McAlister Institute has been in the forefront of innovative and effective treatment techniques.
“We really care,” she said. “We think outside the box and meet clients where they are, not where we think they should be.”
Today, McAlister Institute has 375 employees and 24 programs for substance abuse treatment, recovery and continued , helping some 20,000 clients annually.
On July 31, McAlister, 92, will step down and her granddaughter, Marisa Varond, who has worked at McAlister Institute for more than 10 years, will become the new CEO.
During her 47 years as CEO, McAlister has won awards honoring her as San Diego’s most ired nonprofit CEO, recognizing her approaches to recovery and celebrating her lifetime achievements.
However, most important to her are the many people she helped escape darkness and improve their lives, just as she did 68 years ago.
About this series
Goldsmith is a Union-Tribune contributing columnist.
We welcome reader suggestions of people who have done something extraordinary or otherwise educational, inspiring or interesting and who have not received much previous media. Please send suggestions to Jan Goldsmith at [email protected]
