My life changed 20 years ago, when my friend and I floated along the Rogue River in Oregon. Suddenly the engine engine fell, which tilted. I slid into the icy water. Some young children threw a life jacket for me, but I gave it to my friend.
While I sank in the river, my lungs began to fill with water. My hands put his hand out to a branch on the side of the couch. As I looked up, I saw clouds moving in the air and birds fly by. I heard a powerful voice say: “This is a bit of my strength and what I can do to you.” At that moment I knew it was my creator.
When an ambulance arrived, the medical emergency aid technician told me it was a miracle that I survived the ice -cold water.
I had been addicted for more than 30 years. I started my addiction at the age of 17, and until I was 47 years old, it was meth, marijuana, cocaine and alcohol. The last two years of my addiction I suffered from homelessness.
But after surviving that fateful accident, I started my recovery. The first year was very difficult and fights the impulse to go back to my addiction. When the year passed, my mind seemed to be clear. I went to two years of lectures and studied mental health and addiction. The courses have taught me how the brain works with addiction and the challenges for mental health that perpetuate this disease.
I also worked as a Dui -Counselor for 10 years and worked in mental health for five years with drug addiction. After I received a certification, I came to UC Davis Hospital to support the Emergency Department in training the medical staff on how to treat homeless people who come from the street or the families who bring them to the Emergency Department to find help with the disease.
There is a short moment when we have the opportunity to help those individuals change. That person can come to the Emergency Department about 50 times. We always have the opportunity to help them change their lives forever.
Through training, a medical team member teaches how to treat the individual with care and respect, to make contact with them without building judgment and trust. Then a counselor can help the person find a treatment plan that suits them best.
In the past, recovery consisted of the treatment of the addiction. Since then we have discovered that the needs of mental health must be tackled to have the recovery process take place.
There is a pain that drives the addiction in each individual. The discovery of that black hole and working on healing that emotional pain is the key to recovery.
My goal is to help recover addicts like I get clean. I want to be an example to inspire people to start their journey to recovery.
I have used drugs for more than 30 years. Those 30 years caught me up and passed so quickly. I have lost all this time.
I want to help the suffering person not to let his toes stick his shoes, to be hungry every day – not only for food, but also for family and shelter. I want to help those who suffer not to sleep on the street or on the couch of a stranger, with hope that one day things will change. I want to help people to overcome feelings of shame, sadness and hopelessness. I want to help them not to feel that deep hole of loneliness.
Every person can awaken. It can be spiritual, physical or emotional. There is recovery and it is a difficult way to start, but it is the journey that is worth so.
Tommie Trevino is a drug and alcohol abuse adviser at UC Davis Medical Center. He wrote this column for Calmatters.
Originally published:
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