Lynnette Dowdell was glowing just one day after giving birth to her first child.
No dowdy blue hospital scrubs for her, the 23-year-old proudly greeted visitors to her LakeEast Hospital room in Painesville from her reclining bed in a brand-new, feminine pink nightgown that perfectly accented her café-au-lait skin and striking hazel eyes.
Her mother, Bonnie, marveled at how Dowdell instinctively knew from the moment Malaki was born whether her son was tired, needed to nurse or just wanted to be held.
She doesn't even express any bitterness toward Malaki's father, an ex-boyfriend who distanced himself from her after learning he got her pregnant.
"She's handled the whole thing like a champ," Bonnie said in admiration.
"I love him. I couldn't ask for nobody else," she said dreamily while protectively holding the visibly content newborn against her chest July 29.
But Dowdell - a spunky young woman whose friends call her "Big Momma" - was not always so together.
Born in St. Petersburg, Fla., she was raised by a single mother who had to bring up five kids on her own while Dowdell's father served nine years in prison.
doesn't know why he went to prison and that she never asked.
Dowdell, now 24, said she prefers not to dwell on her past because it is too painful.
Her downward spiral began after getting kicked out of Harvey High School in Painesville two weeks before graduation for hitting an administrator.
She spent four years being homeless after getting evicted from the apartment she got through Lake Metropolitan Housing Authority.
"I was scared to live by myself," she said. "I got evicted because my friends were there when they weren't supposed to be. One week after I moved back home, I started arguing with my mom. I started moving from place to place. Sometimes I would just be with people just to have company.
"There was plenty of times when I had to sleep outside. Under bridges. In cars. In laundry rooms. I started stealing to eat, to put clothes on my back. But the majority of my legal problems are caused by my mental-health issues."
Dowdell says she attempted suicide several times, unable to deal with the fact she was molested between the ages of 3 and 13 by several people she was left alone with as a child.
For that reason, when she discovered she was pregnant, Dowdell prayed that God would give her a boy.
Dowdell's mother liked to travel. She relocated the family from Florida to Cleveland, and then to Los Angeles, before settling on Lake County nine years ago.
Dowdell - who once clashed bitterly with her mother - said the two have now reconciled. Until recently, she and her son had been staying with Bonnie at her Willoughby home.
"We've always had a roof on our heads, clothes on our backs, food in our mouths," Dowdell said of her mother. "Her teaching and parenting skills ... she did a good job. We clash, though. Me and my mom are like oil and water."
Dowdell does not wish to specify the reasons she and her mother battled in the past.
But one of those clashes led her Mentor Municipal Court and Judge John F. Trebets - a man who would change her life.
Trebets recalled the first time he met Dowdell - when her mother had kicked her out of the house in the dead of winter. Dowdell turned out to be the inspiration Trebets needed to start Lake County's first Mental Health Court.
"It was February 2002. Six weeks into my term, she came in on a criminal trespass charge," the judge said. "The alleged victim was her mother. It was about 5 degrees with a wind-chill factor of about 23. As judge, I'm thinking, 'What can I do?' She didn't have the support of her family at the time.
"I could see something about her wasn't right. Her thinking was out of joint. She had a little bit of a 'tude - a little defiant."
After listening carefully to Dowdell, Trebets determined she was unstable because she had stopped taking medications she needed for mental illnesses, including bipolar disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder and severe depression.
"I sentenced her to jail," the judge said. "The thought was we'd have a place where she'd have shelter and food. I also talked to the probation department about a halfway house for her. That's when I knew we needed a program that could help people who had mental illness, rather than just incarcerate them."
After serving her time on the trespassing charge, Dowdell - whose case continued to bother the judge - showed up in Trebets' court once again a year later.
"She was back again for trespassing at Great Lakes Mall," he said. "I said to (Clerk of Courts) Nancy (McClatchy), 'There's got to be a better way.' "
As if on cue, Trebets received a memo from Lake County Sheriff Daniel A. Dunlap asking him to be on a new probation committee.
The sheriff also asked him for help in starting a jail diversion program for people suffering from mental illnesses who commit misdemeanors - and the county's first Mental Health Court was born.
Dowdell was one of the first chosen to participate in the voluntary program, which operates on the cardinal rule that participants must continue to take their medication or risk ejection.
The Mental Health Court team's unwavering willingness not to give up on Dowdell would slowly lead her to break away from her tough, street facade and show off the sensitive woman underneath who likes to relax by drawing and writing in a journal.
Trebets recalls being impressed with Dowdell's quick wit, honesty and hard work.
But the judge and his staff would find themselves getting frustrated when she would pull stunts in the beginning, like not showing up for Mental Health Court because she didn't have a ride.
Determined to help her, McClatchy, case worker Brooke Ball and treatment program manager Julie Hammond found themselves taking turns driving her to court and taking her home, which would often be a different place from week to week.
When she got pregnant, they got her a room at Hannah's Home, a county agency that helps single pregnant women.
But after two weeks, she suddenly left the home, partially because of what she perceived to be overly strict rules.
For instance, Dowdell was reluctant to take out her facial piercings, saying, "I have a lot of money in my face."
The judge threatened to let her go from the Mental Health Court program, saying too many people who want their help were being turned away and she was wasting their time.
The turning point was when court officials told her there was a possibility children services would not let her keep her baby if she didn't find a stable address.
Dowdell decided to stay with the program, and she also began calling McClatchy - sometimes two and three times a day, sparking an unusual friendship.
"Lynnette called me at home several times when she was upset," McClatchy said, adding, "I didn't mind at all. It's a compliment."
McClatchy acknowledges it wasn't always easy dealing with Dowdell.
"Sometimes with Lynnette, it was like taking two steps forward and 10 back," said the clerk. "But it was worth it - we love her. There's just something about her."
With no job, little money and no car of her own, seven-months-pregnant Dowdell was determined to get to her Mental Health Court appointment one hot spring day - without inconveniencing anyone in the court system.
After she arrived to court, albeit a few minutes late and a little sweaty, an incredulous Trebets learned she had walked an hour and a half to make her Mental Health Court date.
That type of spirit is typical of Dowdell, Trebets said.
"She would do all these things, but she wouldn't take her meds," recalled the judge. "One day I asked her why she wasn't taking her meds. She said, 'Judge, in life you have to feel things. I'm not feeling anything when I'm on these meds.' That was a real moment. It was an eye-opener for the whole program. Now, I will be a much more effective judge because of Lynnette."
Meanwhile, Trebets convinced Dowdell to go back to her doctor to get on another medication that would keep her illness under control without altering her vibrant personality or harming her baby. So far, Dowdell says she has stuck with it.
Although she still has days where she gets nervous or depressed, Dowdell says her Mental Health Court experience is helping her be a better person.
She is now dating a man named Rico who wants to be a father figure for Malaki. Eventually, her goal is to get her GED, but for right now, she is happy just being the best mom she can be.
Dowdell says she hopes her 11-year-old sister, Katelyn Nicole, whose initials she had tattooed on her left hand for moral support, will not make the same mistakes she's made.
"She wants to follow in my footsteps, but I've done some really ignorant things and ended up in some ignorant predicaments," Dowdell said.
Dowdell graduated from the Mental Health Court program Aug. 23, but not without a few surprises beforehand.
After telling the judge and his staff how thankful she was to them for changing her life, Trebets told Dowdell he plans to keep track of her because he cares.
"I'm gonna miss ya," the judge told Dowdell as she held Malaki. "I want to see this little guy grow up. You're doing a very good job taking care of him. You're a good person. God bless you."
Then Dowdell spoke from the heart, bursting out, "I love you, Judge Trebets! I love everything you guys ever done for me. You've kept me sane. You kept me going. You made me follow that yellow brick road.
"I've done some ignorant stuff, but you've made me something better, something new. I feel like I've matured as a person - mentally, physically, emotionally and everything else.
"I really do appreciate all you guys did. You were the hug I needed. I want to see how far I can take life in a good way, instead of going down that ignorant path."
She then shocked Trebets by asking, "Can I have a hug?"
The same judge who stunned her by visiting her and Malaki in the hospital then came off the bench and tearfully embraced her.
Dowdell and Malaki are temporarily staying with a friend in a two-bedroom apartment until they can afford their own place in Cuyahoga County. She now has a good relationship with her father, who is back together with Dowdell's mother.
Trebets and his staff continue to hold Mental Health Court every Tuesday afternoon, for no additional salary. Their program has become a model for the state, and has been lauded by the Ohio Supreme Court.
They currently have 17 active cases and a growing waiting list.
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