Answer Addiction

Tag: incarceration

  • The Joy of Saying YES to the Addict I Love

    The Joy of Saying YES to the Addict I Love

    Karen had to let go of her addicted son in order for them both to heal. Years later, her son is sober, healthy, and helping others. Here is their journey in their own words.

    In November 2016 I wrote an article for The Fix titled Saying NO to the Addict I Love, about how hard it is to let go of someone you love who is an addict. You try everything you can to help them, but you only succeed in becoming a bigger part of the problem. At that time, the measures I finally took to change my bad habits were so drastic that I put what little possessions I had left into a storage unit, packed a bag, and left the country. My son, Harry (others call him Harrison), and I had to go our separate ways, and I had to trust that God or the universe or whatever you want to call it would lead us both where we needed to go. 

    Addicted to Intervening

    I landed first in Sucre, Bolivia, one of the most out-of-the-way places I could find on the map that still had decent internet. Once there, the knowledge that I was impotent to do anything ate away at me like parasites. I couldn’t even make a phone call to my son. Guilt wracked my body. Being so far away forced me to see things more clearly. I started to realize that I, too, am an addict of sorts. I am addicted to intervening, to cleaning up messes so I can pretend they aren’t there, to giving and giving, even when it’s detrimental and makes no sense. I simply can’t stop myself. 

    The withdrawals from this habit were intense. Alone in my small garret room, besides suffering from severe altitude sickness, I sat on my bed at night and compulsively rocked back and forth in mental anguish, sometimes for hours. I began to worry I had some physical ailment but I’ve since learned that this type of rocking is a product of PTSD. 

    That was the beginning of three years of wandering the globe. I morphed into a digital nomad. During that time I didn’t see my son. Slowly, I learned to let go of those feelings of panic and despair and focus on what fulfilled me. I traveled to places as diverse as Costa Rica and Morocco, and most recently Luxor, Egypt, where I’ve spent the past year. 

    I started to find gratification in my travels; I’m a writer and kickboxing coach, so I worked on my urban fantasy series and connected with boxing gyms where I’d teach and train. On my terrace in Luxor, I hung the first boxing bag to ever be seen in the West Bank villages and began training girls. I started My World Project, a volunteer program connecting kids in far-flung places through writing and art. 

    Shortly after I arrived in Luxor last April, I learned Harry was in jail again and facing serious prison time. The familiar feelings of panic and despair washed over me. Resolutely, I took a few deep breaths, put on my gloves, and punched the bag. Martial arts and kickboxing training have saved my life and my sanity on many occasions over the years. 

    Hope Is a Scary Thing

    And then, a few weeks later, the news that Harry had been accepted into the Salvation Army. The upsurge of hope I felt also made me afraid. Hope is a scary thing. Yet, as the days and weeks went by, he seemed to get better and better. When I returned at Christmas, I had the joy of hugging my sober son—my artistic, intelligent son, with the clear blue eyes and the big smile. Few moments have felt as good as that embrace. My son had followed his path and done what he needed to do. I had done the same. And now, here we were.

    Three years ago, I hardly would have dared to believe this day would come. Yet I have the joy of saying YES to writing this follow-up piece with him. My son is an incredible human being and my love for him knows no bounds. It is with great pleasure that I turn the story over to him.

    *****

    Hello, my name is Harrison, and I’m an addict. 

    From a young age I never felt like life made any sense. Everything hurt, nothing was fun, and being a good kid seemed very dull. I was a reader and a writer and probably thought too deeply and darkly about things. 

    I will always remember the first time I got loaded: the world seemed to light up around me, nothing hurt, and boring became fun. When I was high or drunk, it was like the weight of the world was lifted from my shoulders. I didn’t care that my father wasn’t really around and that I felt like a black sheep in my home. I didn’t care if kids at school liked me. Nothing really mattered. Soon drugs had become the solution to all my problems. In middle school, I went to school intoxicated, ditched class, and had few friends. Most of my peers hadn’t begun experimenting with drugs and alcohol while I was trying everything under the stars. 

    Choosing a Life of Crime

    As middle school came to end, though, curious minds began to show interest in me and my small circle of friends. We began providing drugs (for a small fee, of course). We went from outcast loners to the most popular kids in our area. Everybody knew who had the dope. It started with small stuff like marijuana and pills, but when somebody wanted to step up their game and try the real thing, well, we had that, too. Slowly but surely I lost the little interest I had in school. I knew what I wanted to do with my life: I was going to be a criminal. 

    Drugs were my escape and they worked for a while, but a few years later they weren’t even scratching the surface anymore. I was 23, with two daughters, a strung-out girlfriend, and completely lost. All I knew how to do was hustle. L.A. County Jail was a frequent pit stop for me. Every time I got out, I’d say “I’m never coming back here” but shortly afterwards I’d be in that blue get-up, once again behind bars and writing letters to the outside world. 

    My mother got the worst of it, watching my kids when I was too fucked up and getting thrown out of apartments because the neighbors knew her son was selling drugs. 

    In and Out of Prison

    It got so bad that my mom literally left the country and we stopped talking for a long time. I continued walking the same road, knowing I was hell-bound and not really caring. I kept getting locked up, I was used to it. But my imprisonment didn’t end when they let me out. The world felt dark, cold, and bitter. I began to resent the people around me. In a room full of people—close friends, family, didn’t matter who—I felt alone. 

    I think I perfected this drugged-up, criminal lifestyle to the best of my ability. I had a cycle: I would get out, hustle some money together, get some stuff like cars, nice clothes, electronics, and even a mobile home one time, and hold onto it until the cops found me. Get locked up and lose everything. Do my time. Get out, and repeat. I was stuck on a weird hamster wheel. 

    Finally I got sick of it.

    The last time I got locked up, I was looking at some serious time. I guess that was around the time my mom was in Egypt. I was withdrawing from heroin again and I was in pain. I knew nobody would answer my calls, so I didn’t bother. I knew I couldn’t make bail, so I didn’t bother. I didn’t want to get out and do the same shit again. So I did something that I never did: I prayed to God and asked for an answer. I asked for him to release me from this strange cycle of anguish that I was trapped in. I asked him to show me how to live. 

    Now, prior to this, my belief in God was non-existent, but the very next day I got a visit from someone who interviewed me for a rehabilitation program. In order to get in, my paperwork had to be approved by the judge. But when I finally made my way to the courtroom and faced him, it looked like I was going to be denied. 

    So, before the hammer dropped, I spoke.

    Give Me a Chance to Change My Life

    “Your Honor, if I get sentenced time in prison, chances are when I get out, I will do the same thing I always do and you or another judge will see me again shortly. Give me a chance to change my life. Allow me to try a different way.” 

    Miraculously, the judge did a complete turnaround and let me into the program. I’d made a million promises to stay sober before. But this time, the moment I stepped through the door of the Salvation Army, I surrendered. The program was strict and you had to work hard; it was exactly what I needed. Day by day, I changed deeply ingrained habits. They taught me how to live a normal life. 

    While learning how to actually hustle and work my ass off legally, I learned another very important lesson: Wanting to change will not make anything different. Action is what will make things different. Henri Nouwen’s quote really hit home for me: “You cannot think your way into a new way of living, you have to live your way into a new way of thinking.”

    I used to think about changing my life, as if it meant something, and even talk about it. But nothing happened. Then I started actually doing stuff, like my laundry and making my bed—simple stuff—and it changed my mentality. It’s been over a year since I stood in front of that judge and made that promise. And just last month I stood in front of him again, clean and sober, and he congratulated me.

    From Criminal to Hero

    Today I work in a rehab helping people with the same struggles I know so well. I used to be a criminal, and now I’ve heard people call me a hero. It took a lot before I was ready for recovery, and I don’t know what finally flipped that switch. I wish there were some magic words I could say that would make you understand, but the truth is, back in the day you could have told me anything and I wouldn’t have cared. My experience is what defined me. I used to be the best at being the worst. Now I use my powers for good. 

    My Mom is proud of me today. Even though my children are on the other side of the country, I’m able to be the best version of me, one day at a time. 

    Life is good…. Like ACTUALLY good.

     
     

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • The Empty Chair Campaign Highlights Loss and Sorrow Caused by the Drug War

    The Empty Chair Campaign Highlights Loss and Sorrow Caused by the Drug War

    The families of people incarcerated, distanced, or deceased because of the drug war live year-round with the unique suffering of loving someone whose pain you do not have the power to heal. During the holidays, that loss rises to the surface.

    Whether you’re celebrating Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, New Year’s Day, or something else this winter, the one element that probably shapes your holiday celebrations most is family. For most of us, that’s joyous, stressful, lovely, and anxiety-inducing all rolled into one. For those of us whose extended family will be present, we might even dread the holidays a little bit, fearing the awkward antics of Uncle Joey or the grotesque way our cousin brags about her perfect life. But for families affected by the war on drugs, winter holiday festivities don’t get to be about celebrating your family or nitpicking your sister’s new boyfriend. Instead, they are shaped by grief and loss.

    If you read the news at all, or even just scroll Twitter every once in a while, you probably know that drug overdose deaths have skyrocketed. Approximately 175 people die by drug overdose every day. That’s 72,000 each year, and the majority of those deaths — almost 50,000 — involve some type of opioid. Alcohol deaths, which are counted separately, account for approximately 88,000 deaths each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control. So the impact of death due to substance use is huge, all on its own. But losing a loved one to a drug-related death is not the only way families are affected by drug use and the stigma that surrounds it.

    The Impact of the War on Drugs at the Holidays

    There are currently 200,000 people locked up in state prisons for drug crimes, and 82,000 convicted of drug crimes in federal detention facilities. These people are fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, uncles, cousins, sons, daughters, and friends. Their loss is felt year-round by those who love them, but families affected by the drug war have an especially difficult time during the holidays. The pain of the season is why, each year since 2012, Moms United to End the War on Drugs runs their Empty Chair Campaign. It starts around Thanksgiving and extends through the December holidays. While families gather to celebrate love, unity, and forgiveness, the empty chair symbolizes those who cannot be present — either through death, incarceration, or the stigma that latches onto people who use drugs or struggle with addiction.

    “Part of the goal of the Empty Chair Campaign is to also destigmatize the loss of a loved one through overdose,” says Diane Goldstein, a retired police officer who now chairs the Law Enforcement Action Partnership, a group of criminal justice officials working toward system reform. Goldstein says she was inspired to work on criminal justice reform after watching her own brother struggle with substance use and mental health issues. Eventually, he died of a poly-substance overdose.

    “My mother was horribly embarrassed by my brother’s death and couldn’t talk about it,” Goldstein recalls. “I think you see a lot of families who that occurs with, so we are inclusive, not just of the victims of the drug war — which isn’t really a war on drugs, it’s a war on people — but to family members as well. It’s intended to reduce the stigma of the criminalization of drug use, support drug users, and help change the criminal justice system from criminalization to a public health approach.”

    The Empty Chair Honors an Absent Loved One

    The Empty Chair Campaign uses the symbol of the empty chair at the family table to stand in for the missing family member and highlight their absence. To participate, you can change your Facebook avatar to the empty chair logo, or you can post a photo of an empty chair at your table with a photo of your loved one and a label explaining why they’re missing: incarceration, accidental overdose, stigma, drug war violence.

    Gretchen Bergman, the executive director of Moms United to End the War on Drugs as well as its parent organization A New PATH, spent decades living with the overwhelming fear and anxiety unique to parents of children with drug addictions. That anxiety grew as she watched two sons sink into the world of destructive shame, stigma, and involvement with the criminal justice system which is now inextricably linked with addiction, thanks to the drug war.

    “My sons both tended to be leaders,” Bergman recalls, “My younger son was always a risk taker. He was the guy who jumped off the roof and dove into the swimming pool…My older son was very thoughtful, more cerebral.”

    Perhaps it was that cerebral nature which helped Bergman’s elder son, Elon, survive the prison system as he cycled through during his active addiction. He spent a combined eight years in prison, and three years on parole — and it all began when he was just 20, with a marijuana charge. Elon first acquired a taste for IV heroin behind bars, says Bergman, an addiction which would rule his 20s.

    “Today, because of our change of laws, he wouldn’t even be arrested at all,” Bergman notes of her son’s initial marijuana arrest — touching on a bitter truth that the lack of drug law uniformity has created across the United States. Whether or not a person becomes caught in the destructive and self-perpetuating criminal justice system depends largely on when and where they were arrested. Marijuana arrests are also disproportionately weighted against people of color, with the American Civil Liberties Union reporting that black people have historically been 3.73 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana than their white counterparts despite equal rates of use.

    Family Celebrations Marred by Grief

    For the Bergman family, the war on drugs became a constant, uninvited guest at their holiday celebrations. Year after year, Gretchen Bergman found herself faced with the decision: should she spend the holidays with her son in prison or with the rest of her family? Even when she decided to attend the big family dinner — knowing she’d spend the night nursing her broken heart as she thought of her son cold and alone in his prison cell — she didn’t always have her youngest son Aaron with her, either. Though Aaron never got caught up in the cycle of release and re-incarceration that seems to follow people with felony convictions, he used IV drugs for decades. The shame that often accompanies this type of drug use, which is so heavily stigmatized that even other drug users feel superior to people who use needles, led Aaron to stay on the streets and miss family functions.

    “We really thought we were going to lose him because his health was compromised, and he seemed so lost, and he became a multi-drug user,” Bergman recalls. “But I always believed he was still there.”

    Today, both of Bergman’s sons are in recovery. Aaron, the younger son, managers a sober living home owned by his older brother Elon.

    Julia Negron, who runs the Suncoast Harm Reduction Project in Florida, grew up around drugs. She ended up in the foster care because of her mother’s drug use, and eventually battled her own heroin addiction. She has never known a life not touched by drug and alcohol misuse. And, not surprisingly, she has lost a number of friends and family members to drug-related complications, including overdose. But the experience that haunts her most was the total helplessness she felt as the mother of a drug-addicted child being forced through the criminal justice system instead of guided toward drug treatment that could have truly helped him.

    “It’s just terrible,” she says about the holiday celebrations when her son was absent. “It’s not just that they’re not there, you feel they’re unjustly being held somewhere. You feel like it’s a hostage situation.” She recalls packing her family, including young grandchildren, into the car one Thanksgiving and driving them four hours across the California desert to get to the facility where her son was being held. “By the time we went through security and they had to strip search him and do all their stuff on that end,” she says, “they managed to use the entire time allotted to visiting…We never did see him.”

    Parents and families of people incarcerated, distanced, or deceased because of the drug war live year-round with the unique suffering of loving someone whose pain you do not have the power to heal. During the holidays, that loss rises to the surface, almost as tangible as the missing person. The Empty Chair Campaign does not seek to cure this sorrow, which won’t abate until the drug war is finally given the ceasefire we all need. Instead, it hopes to bring it to the surface, in order to raise awareness and honor those very real people who deserve their seat at the family table.

    “What kind of kills you is you know the person inside, you know who he is,” says Bergman, describing the experience of having a child who is incarcerated for having a substance use disorder. “Right at the time he needs treatment and healing, which would have involved introspection, he’s behind bars, where in order to survive you have to harden your heart. You watch him disappear into that shell that he needed to in order to survive in that cold, concrete, violent atmosphere. It’s terrible to watch.”

    Have you lost someone due to the drug war? Let us know in the comments.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • Oregon Tries To Break Cycle Of Jailing People With Mental Health Issues

    Oregon Tries To Break Cycle Of Jailing People With Mental Health Issues

    A new initiative was created to divert people with mental illness from the criminal justice system in Oregon.

    There’s been more attention given to the fact that a significant percentage of incarcerated Americans suffer from mental illness.

    “The vast majority of the individuals are not violent criminals,” according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). “Once in jail, many individuals don’t receive the treatment they need and end up getting worse, not better.”

    They also tend to remain in jail longer and are at a higher risk of victimization than the non-mentally ill.

    Officials in Oregon are trying to break this cycle with a new initiative: the Justice Reinvestment Initiative.

    A new committee of 28 officials from state law enforcement, justice and health care, government officials and more—named the Behavioral Health Justice Reinvestment Steering Committee—will submit policy recommendations for how to divert people with mental illness from the criminal justice system.

    The committee is planning to submit a plan for the 2019 legislative session.

    “The criminal justice system was designed to prevent, protect against and prosecute criminal offenses. It was not designed to treat mental illness or substance addiction,” said Oregon Health Authority Director Patrick Allen, who is on the committee.

    Instead of cycling this population in and out of jails, where they will receive no support, Allen says there needs to be a long-term solution. “The best way to support people with behavioral health needs is to connect them to treatment in their local communities. The Justice Reinvestment process will allow us to develop solutions that better promote individual recovery while preserving community safety.”

    Senate Republican Leader Jackie Winters is also on the committee. “It’s not appropriate for the jail to be the place for the mentally ill,” she said, according to the Statesman Journal. It is for the committee to figure out: “how do we treat the individual without sending them into the criminal justice system?”

    The committee has begun reviewing jails across Oregon and gauging the needs of counties. They will work in concert with state health and criminal justice officials, who will contribute data to the initiative.

    “We know that when we make meaningful change in behavioral health treatment and addiction recovery, we lift a burden off of our prisons, our hospitals, and our law enforcement,” said Governor Kate Brown.

    “Oregon successfully used justice reinvestment to slow prison growth and expand programs that help people succeed outside of prison. By focusing on the intersection of the behavioral health and criminal justice systems in this new model of reinvestment, we can continue to improve both health and public safety,” the governor said.

    View the original article at thefix.com

  • The Newly Sober and Recently Incarcerated Find Purpose at DV8 Kitchen

    The Newly Sober and Recently Incarcerated Find Purpose at DV8 Kitchen

    People want to look into the eye of someone they’re helping by eating there, and our staff wants to see people enjoying what they’ve made.

    Whatever our experience with life is, was, or will be, there’s one thing we all have in common: food. It’s one of the things we need to survive, along with the social support and shelter we need to thrive. These things come together in a powerful way at a dine-in bakery in Kentucky called DV8 kitchen, where Rob Perez and his wife oversee a staff comprised entirely of people in recovery, many of whom are coming out of incarceration and looking for a second chance. After getting sober at 25, Perez, already a career hospitality veteran at a young age, decided to open a fourth restaurant located within walking distance from three different transitional living facilities. They serve homemade bread and southern breakfast-style foods, and, most importantly, employees and customers are always interacting with one another. We spoke to Perez about the employees he’s lost to addiction in the past, the ways in which the bakery is impacting the community, and that time NFL Quarterback Chad stopped by to teach a workshop on leadership and teamwork.

    The Fix: Would you say there is a stronger chance of sobriety if you set your employees up with a job in a sober environment?

    Rob Perez: When you do a job with quality, you build self respect, self-esteem and pride in a craft you’re developing. In recovery, we need a support system and an accountability system. And the camaraderie you get out of a job when you have common interests, backgrounds and circumstances, is pretty powerful. We’ve had a few employees tell us that it’s nice not to feel bad about turning down invites from coworkers to grab a drink after work, or even feeling pressured to do so. Our staff don’t leave programs or meetings or houses and come to a foreign environment 40 hours a week, they come to a place where we all speak the same language, have the same customs, and discussions, so its a 24/7 program.

    Are there any logistical benefits to the way it’s set up?

    From a practical standpoint, even if people have insurance, most of the time, a recovery center’s money runs out after 30 days, and people have to start to contribute to the house they’re living in. So if businesses don’t take a chance on someone who has a difficult schedule to work around and a past to have to deal with, these folks can’t get through the program they’re in, and, generally, outpatient programs are a minimum of six months to one-year. Also, many of our employees have mentioned how nice it is to work with others who truly understand what they’re going through.

    Have the people you work with at the sober living houses given you any feedback about your impact?

    They think it’s working well as there’s a lot of accountability on the residents (our employees) to stay on track with the program. They really need to follow their program while they’re at work or they will be asked to leave the program altogether. In that way, we work in tandem with the sober living houses to ensure the employee is meeting their goals and staying on a good path.

    What do your employees do about housing when their stay nearby is up?

    The houses we work with have separate sober living environments our employees can go to after their initial first year of treatment. If they’re interested, we can also connect them with community services that will help them find housing.

    Why do you think there is still so much hesitancy to give people a second chance?

    When you say you’re a second chance employer you run a risk of people thinking ‘second chance’ means ‘second rate.’ They don’t want to spend money on second rate. What we’ve been taught in society is to be hesitant in employing convicted offenders and recovering addicts. Through DV8, we hope to show them success and really convince them that it doesn’t hurt to offer addicts or those who were previously incarcerated a second chance. Though we’ve only been open for about nine months, I’ve noticed that a handful of our employees have directly reached out to government officials to discuss the importance of offering second chance employment opportunities.

    Did people know your triple-bottom line when you first opened?

    In our first two weeks, people felt insecure about coming to a place that had many people in recovery in it, but we also didn’t formally announce it. Without us saying it, they knew people had incarceration in their past. But once I started to contact the media and talk about our mission and the people, it all changed. People want to know that they’re making an impact, and that’s why the glass wall we have between our cooks and service people and the customers is so important. People want to look into the eye of someone they’re helping by eating there, and our staff wants to see people enjoying what they’ve made. Ultimately, though, we want them to be unidentifiable from anyone else. The way they stand up straight, the enthusiasm, their confidence, we can see that they’re changing the way the public thinks about recovery and addiction.

    Tell me about your personal connection to the mission.

    Addiction found me and has crossed the paths of 13 other people in our other for-profit restaurants and, now, they’re gone. It affected the best server we ever had, it affects my city, and it affected me. I was a binge drinker. I didn’t have to drink everyday but when I did, I would frequently get out of control. I was always the last to leave a party, and the deeper I got, the more blackouts I had, taking risks with driving and getting out of embarrassing situations I had to reconstruct the next day. I was not as attentive of a husband as i should have been. I wasn’t being a good person.

    Rob and his wife, Diane. Image via DV8 Kitchen.

    When did you decide to get help?

    I had a blackout, went back to my workplace (then, it was the Hard Rock Cafe, on the corporate side) and made a fool of myself. I got suspended from work and had to tell my wife I couldn’t be paid for two weeks and I said I needed help. Diane’s an angel. She loved me through it and kept me honest and kicked my ass if she needed to.

    It also helps when pro-athletes come teach you a workshop.

    We’ve had a bank executive come to talk to employees about personal finance, a yoga instructor to talk about mindfulness, and, yes, NFL quarterback Chad Pennington came in to talk about teamwork. During his workshop, he discussed his journey to the NFL and why both teamwork and leadership were important. He also shared more personal stories about how his Christian values have helped him through his career and life journey in general. But, all kinds of people in the community are signing up three months in advance to lead these workshops. They really want to help.

    What do you think it is about the food industry that makes it such a popular ‘second-chance’ job?

    My gut is it has to do with working really hard physically, it’s mental as well. You learn to get along with people, form long-lasting relationships, make mistakes without fear and be able to say sorry. Then you get to serve your food and get instant feedback. In recovery, we need to know what our results are. I think we thrive in an environment where we “know right away.” If someone likes it, or what you do, it’s good to know it. There’s something spiritual about a dinner table, too, and having a meal with someone. Food, dining, and breaking bread is special and is innate to our happiness.

    Image via DV8 Kitchen.

    View the original article at thefix.com