From Coffee with Felons to Rock Bottom Revival: How It All Began

Rock Bottom Revival didn't begin with a business plan, a podcast studio or even a podcast name. It started with an idea and one honest conversation. While working as a Community Center Director, Bethany was planning something special for National Online Recovery Day and came up with the idea of doing a live conversation she called Coffee with Felons. The idea was simple: sit down over coffee and have a real conversation with people who had lived experience with incarceration, recovery and rebuilding their lives. Bethany, Lenora and Charles sat down together for that first live—and the response was HUGE. People weren't just watching. They were listening, engaging, asking questions and connecting with a conversation that isn't often heard from the people who have actually lived it. We knew we had stumbled onto something worth continuing. One Conversation Became Something More After that first live, Bethany reached out to Lenora with an idea: What if we kept doing this? Together, they decided to bring the conversation to Facebook every week and Coffee Break: Felon Edition was born. The show began streaming through Bethany's All Recovery Ryzing Facebook group, with Bethany and Lenora sharing lived experience and having honest conversations about incarceration, supervision, reintegration, recovery and what rebuilding life after the justice system actually looks like. What started as one conversation over coffee began turning into a community. And that community taught us something. Our stories were about much more than being felons. Our Conversations Began to Grow You can't honestly talk about incarceration without talking about the things intertwined with it. Recovery. Mental health. Trauma. Relationships. Accountability. Stigma. Reintegration. Setbacks. Growth. Identity. Finding purpose and figuring out who you are beneath the labels you've carried. The people joining us were changing too. Felons and formerly incarcerated people were there, but so were family members and friends. Allies wanted to better understand the people they cared about. People in recovery connected with our conversations even when incarceration wasn't part of their story. Others simply wanted an opportunity to learn what life inside the justice system and rebuilding afterward looked like from people with lived experience. Our focus was expanding because our community was showing us just how connected all of these conversations really are. Growing Into Rock Bottom Revival As the show continued to grow, Tammy joined Bethany and Lenora, bringing another voice, personality and lived perspective to the table. With three women sharing ideas and imagining what the show could become, we began to realize that we had outgrown both Coffee Break: Felon Edition and All Recovery Ryzing. But changing didn't mean forgetting where we came from. Those roots are the reason we're here. We needed a name that honored the rock bottoms we've experienced while representing everything we were becoming—recovery, mental health, incarceration, reintegration, accountability, healing, personal growth and discovering who you are beneath it all. That name became Rock Bottom Revival. Why Rock Bottom Revival? Because rock bottom doesn't look the same for everyone. For one person, it may involve incarceration. For another, recovery or mental health. It may be losing relationships, facing the consequences of your choices, starting your life over or simply reaching the moment when you know something has to change. What matters is what you choose to do next. Rock Bottom Revival brings the realities of incarceration and the prison system to the table through lived experience. We talk about recovery without pretending there is one path that works for everyone. We challenge stigma and misconceptions surrounding felons, mental health and recovery while having the uncomfortable conversations that are too often avoided. We're here for felons and formerly incarcerated people. We're here for people navigating recovery, mental health, healing and personal growth. We're here for families, friends and allies trying to better understand and support someone they love. And we're here for people who haven't lived these experiences but genuinely want to listen, learn and understand what life can look like from a felon's perspective and through lived experience. A lot has changed since three people sat down for that first Coffee with Felons. But the reason we keep showing up hasn't. Real people. Real lived experience. Real conversations. We believe your past can be part of your story without becoming your identity—and sometimes the place where everything fell apart becomes the foundation for everything you build next. Welcome to Rock Bottom Revival. Ryzing from the Ashes.