Sunshine Sober Living offers structured women’s sober living for Reseda residents at 5650 Donna Avenue in Tarzana, south of the Victory Boulevard line. Women aged 21 and older live in a substance-free house with curfew, testing and staff oversight, while keeping jobs, classes, therapy, outpatient care and their own children in view.
A woman leaving treatment is often asked to return to the same apartment, the same block and the same people, with thirty days of recovery and no plan for the evenings. Recovery housing interrupts that. The Reseda area overview covers the house in general; this page is what women in particular ask, and what the short trip south changes.
Sunshine Sober Living is family-owned and has served the Valley’s recovery community since 2019. Wendy Goldberg, Founder and Director of Admissions, takes most first calls, which matters when the caller is weighing whether to say out loud how bad things got. The men’s program runs separately, and the wider women’s program explains the approach beyond this neighborhood.
Two women’s meetings sit inside Reseda itself, the Sober Sals discussion at Reseda Boulevard Church of Christ, 7806 Reseda Boulevard, and the Love and Care group at First United Methodist Church of Reseda on Saticoy Street.
Mainly it offers ordinary days that are hard to build alone. A bed in a substance-free home, other women counting time, a curfew that removes a nightly decision, and staff who notice when someone stops eating. Thirty days of residential care gives a woman a foundation, but foundations sit unused without somewhere to stand. Women’s sober living in Reseda holds the shape of a normal week.
It also removes a particular pressure. Many women are the person everybody else in the family leans on, and going home means resuming that role before the strength is there. Living here for a stretch is not abandoning anyone. It is arriving back into those relationships as someone who can carry them.
Safety in recovery housing is mostly unglamorous. It looks like a locked front door, a known curfew, a written guest policy, and clear rules about what enters the house. It also looks like staff who take a complaint seriously the first time rather than the third. Those expectations are set before a woman moves in.
Quiet matters as much as security. Sleep is usually wrecked by the time a woman gets here, and it is among the first things needing repair. The house schedule protects night hours deliberately, because a woman who is sleeping again has a far better chance with everything else being asked of her.
Children are the reason many women delay getting help and the reason many finally ask for it. This is adult recovery housing, so children do not live here; what a Tarzana address provides is closeness. A child staying with a grandmother or co-parent in the 91335 ZIP code is minutes away, not states away. Reseda Charter High School at 18230 Kittridge Street is a short drive.
Custody conversations, family court dates and supervised visits are real life for some residents, and the daily framework here accommodates them rather than competing with them. Metro Line 240 covers the school run for a woman without a car. A steady, verifiable address with rules and testing is often the most persuasive thing she can show a court.
Yes, and she should. The house is not a clinical facility, does not deliver therapy, and does not manage anybody’s prescriptions. Residents keep their own providers or get referrals to licensed California and Joint Commission-accredited programs through admissions, including intensive outpatient care that fits around housing. Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center at 18321 Clark Street is the nearest hospital to Donna Avenue.
Anxiety, depression and trauma histories are common among women in early recovery, and the evidence suggests time helps. In a study of 455 sober living residents, those who stayed at least six months had more days abstinent, fewer psychiatric and depression symptoms, and lower odds of an ongoing substance use disorder.
It is treated as information rather than a verdict. NIDA puts relapse rates for substance use disorders at 40 to 60 per cent, comparable to the 50 to 70 per cent seen in hypertension and asthma, and frames relapse as a signal that treatment needs to resume or change rather than proof that a person failed. That framing shapes how the situation is handled, without pretending it is a small event.
Practically, safety for the other residents comes first, and the honest conversation about the next level of care happens quickly. Sometimes that means a return to residential treatment; sometimes it means more meetings, a sponsor and a tighter schedule. What it never means is a woman left to work it out alone on a Tuesday night.
Ask who owns the house and who is actually there at ten at night. Ask what happens after a relapse, before you need the answer. Ask whether the place is recovery housing or a licensed treatment program, because those are different things in California and the difference changes what it can provide. A fuller list of questions is worth taking to every house you tour, including this one.
Worth asking on every tour:
These addresses come up repeatedly in a woman’s first month at the house.
| What it is | Where | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Sober Sals women’s discussion | Reseda Boulevard Church of Christ, 7806 Reseda Boulevard | A women-only room listed in AA directories |
| Love and Care women’s group | First United Methodist Church, 18120 Saticoy Street | A second women’s meeting, on Saticoy Street |
| Hospital care | Providence Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center, 18321 Clark Street | Closest hospital, directly south of the house |
| Bus connection | Metro Line 240, Reseda and Ventura Boulevards | Reaches family and work without a car |
Meeting times change, so confirm with the current AA directory before making a trip.
The house is about 2.5 to 3 miles from Reseda, roughly 8-14 minutes in normal traffic – the shortest run of any area we serve. The full route, turn by turn, is on the directions page below.
Sunshine Sober LivingYes, and the distinction is legal as well as practical. A treatment program provides clinical services under a state licence. Recovery housing provides a substance-free home with structure, testing and peer support, and no clinical treatment. Sunshine Sober Living is the second kind, which is why residents keep outside therapists.
No. This is adult recovery housing for women and men aged 21 and older, so children do not live on site. Many residents are mothers, and visits, calls and school events remain part of daily life. The Tarzana location keeps a Reseda family within a few minutes’ drive.
Detox must be medically complete and she needs to be committed to long-term recovery. Beyond that, arriving without a job, a car or a plan is common and not disqualifying. Residents build the daytime side of life from the house, with work searches, classes or volunteering filling the week.
The Sober Sals discussion at Reseda Boulevard Church of Christ and the Love and Care group at First United Methodist Church of Reseda are both listed in AA directories as women’s meetings, which is why residents use them heavily. Many women do best with one women-only home group plus mixed meetings during the week.
Clothes for work and for meetings, toiletries, any prescriptions in their original packaging, identification, and insurance information if coverage is being checked. Admissions goes through the specifics before move-in day, including anything not permitted. Bringing less is smarter than bringing everything.
Sunshine Sober Living provides structured recovery housing and transitional living. Medical detoxification, residential clinical treatment and other higher levels of care are provided by appropriately licensed treatment providers, and our admissions team can arrange a referral. Recovery is personal, and no sober living program can guarantee a particular outcome. If you or someone you love needs immediate help, the SAMHSA National Helpline is free and confidential on 1-800-662-4357, 24 hours a day.
A phone call commits a woman to nothing. Call 866-216-9789 or email info@sunshinesoberliving.com to schedule a confidential assessment, and Wendy Goldberg or a member of the admissions team will talk through timing, cost and the first week. If you are still weighing it up, read what a stay is for, then call anyway.