Type “addiction” into Google, and you get more than 800 million results in under half a second.

But Talley Sergent doesn’t need to search for information about what addiction can do to a family: The sixth-generation West Virginian and congressional candidate knows the answer all too well.

The sister of a longtime addict, Sergent has made drug abuse and treatment a linchpin of her underdog Democratic run to unseat a Republican congressman in November’s midterms.

Her openness about her family’s struggle may resonate with voters in the Mountain State, which has the nation’s highest rate of overdose-related deaths. It also ranks her among women hitting the 2018 campaign trail with a deeply personal candor on issues they might have not just downplayed in the past but could have convinced them not to run at all. This week’s big primary contests feature candidates like Gretchen Whitmer, who is running for governor of Michigan and has spoken openly about being sexually assaulted as a college student, and Sharice Davids, a Kansas attorney and former MMA fighter who is waging a competitive congressional campaign as part of a record number of LGBT candidates for office.

For Sergent, that narrative is drug addiction. And she can't afford not to get personal about the struggle. In fact, getting real isn’t optional for female candidates, according to a 2017 study by the Barbara Lee Family Foundation: If they don’t confront questions about balancing home and public life, for example, they take a hit with voters—and have a harder time bouncing back than men do. This year even women with young kids are not just confessing to motherhood on the trail but embracing it and breaking new ground along the way. Foundation research released this year found voters respond well to female office seekers who vow to fight sexual harassment; some, like Whitmer, are choosing to make it personal by going public as survivors of abuse and assault.

“Twenty years ago, this would be political ammunition that my opponent would use against me. The reality of today is that [in] West Virginia and in so many other states and communities, this isn't just Demi Lovato,” Sergent said in an interview with Glamour, referring to the superstar’s recent hospitalization following an apparent overdose.

“People all across this country, regardless of their economic status or social status, [are] impacted by this," said Sergent, the third of six children, "and so I actually talked to some of my other siblings, and they're like, ‘Are you really gonna talk about this?’ Absolutely. If my talking about this and bringing these issues to the forefront helps another family from having to go through what I'm going through, [then] we need to peel back those layers, the stigma around it, and work to solve it.”