She was recovering from addiction. Then, her community stepped in to help

Jessica McCutcheon, a mother of three, opened a gift box in a parking lot in Florence, S.C. in early December. To her surprise, most of the gifts were from people she had never met.

Meredith and Steve Shannon – the couple who had fostered McCutcheon’s 2-year-old daughter, Harper, for almost a year – had brought her the presents.

Earlier this year, social services officials in South Carolina had taken McCutcheon’s three children from her home. WYFF4 reported that McCutcheon was recovering from drug addiction and had also dealt with domestic violence.

In October, McCutcheon was reunited with her children, Meredith Shannon said. The foster parent said she knew McCutcheon was a good mom and wanted to keep supporting her, she said.

“I’m scared,” McCutcheon said as she opened the gift box.

In a video taken by Meredith Shannon, McCutcheon opened the box to find a Bible and a red envelope containing a greeting card and a $400 Visa gift card.

Although the Shannons came bearing the gifts, student athletes from North Greenville University in South Carolina had donated a total of $625 toward gift cards for McCutcheon, said North Greenville University’s head cheerleading coach Kate Sepko.

Sepko and the Shannons are neighbors.

“We started talking about Jessica’s children and how it’s almost Christmas time,” Sepko said.

McCutcheon had been working two jobs to make ends meet and the Shannons wanted to make Christmas special for her kids, Sepko said.

Sepko also wanted to help, so she talked to the university’s athletic director and got five teams on board to donate money.

“Some of them were giving $5, $10, $20,” she said. “It just impressed me so much, you know, $5, $10 is a big deal for these kids. That’s a meal or a couple meals.”

In the video, the Shannons hand McCutcheon the rest of the gift cards – and a set of car keys.

At the sight of the keys, McCutcheon puts her hand over her mouth and begins to cry.

A family had donated a 1999 Honda Accord to McCutcheon when they found out she had been borrowing her family members’ cars to drive, Meredith Shannon said.

Inside the car were Christmas presents from the Shannons for the kids and birthday presents from the Shannons and their friends for Harper, who turned 2 on Dec. 4.

McCutcheon lives in Kingstree, S.C., about three hours southeast of Greenville, S.C. where the Shannons live.

Meredith Shannon said they’re helping McCutcheon and her kids find a way to move to Greenville so McCutcheon can have better job opportunities and so the families can be closer together.

The video was shared on North Greenville University Athletics’ Facebook page, where it was shared more than 124,000 times as of Thursday afternoon.

This story was originally published December 15, 2017 at 10:08 AM with the headline "She was recovering from addiction. Then, her community stepped in to help."