I was 19 years old and I walk in to my first real job ever which happened to be
at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue the White House if on day one when I walked into
that building someone would have turned around to me and said hey you know
you're gonna be homeless using you know heroin on the streets of Los Angeles in
in about a decade I would have looked around and I said there is no way like
what are you talking about that's impossible but that's exactly what
happened
in 2003 and I went hiking with my roommate and slipped and fell this
doctor prescribed me a high-grade opioid painkiller and that was really the
beginning of kind of a downward spiral for me into full-blown addiction within
a few very short years I got into long-term sustained recovery because I
had recovery supports I was able to get things like housing I was able to get a
job I was able to get peers that would lift me up when I wasn't able to lift
myself up so late in 2015 I lost my friend Greg to an overdose when I was
still living in a sober living home and right after Greg died it seemed like
another friend would die every couple of weeks and it got to a point with me
where I had to do something it was hard to get policymakers to listen to our
community I couldn't get newspapers to publish anything I couldn't get town
halls together but I did have the power of my story being able to not have to
lie about Who I am anymore it's an absolute feeling of freedom yeah I made
a big decision about a year and a half ago to get public as you know not just a
person in recovery but an LGBTQ person in recovery and proud of it and it was
one of the best decisions ever because it allowed me to truly fall in love and
and and to experience this incredible life with someone else so we talked a
lot about addiction we don't necessarily talk a lot about recovery 23 million
Americans live in long-term recovery today right now here in the United
States but where are their stories because for me had I have not known that
recovery was possible had I have not seen successful recovery stories out
there I would have given up hope we want people to like know who we are we want
them to know what we're about we want them to experience this recovery journey
with us
you