Valiant Living Podcast
Welcome to the Valiant Living Podcast where we educate, encourage, and empower you towards a life of peace and freedom.
Valiant Living has been restoring lives and families since 2017 by providing multiple levels of care for men and their families. Fully accredited by The Joint Commission, Valiant Living has earned a national reputation as a premier treatment program, offering IOP, PHP, and recovery housing programs for men ages 26 and older. Founder and CEO MIchael Dinneen is a nationally recognized therapeutic expert, speaker, and thought leader in the behavioral health field.
On this podcast you’ll hear from the Valiant team as well as stories of alumni who are living in recovery. If you or someone you love is struggling to overcome addiction or trauma, please call us at (720)-756-7941 or email admissions@valiantliving.com We’d love to have a conversation with you!
Valiant Living Podcast
Valiant Victories: Dylan and Lily's Emotional Journey of Overcoming Addiction and Finding Strength in Recovery
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Are you ready to be moved by a tale of resilience? Brace yourself for an emotional roller-coaster as Dylan and Lily recount their heart-wrenching journey from addiction to recovery. With raw honesty, they share their experiences with addiction, the strenuous path to recovery, and how they navigated their lives after treatment. They unlock the door to their past, revealing the impact of their choices on their relationship.
Imagine hitting rock bottom, the point where the only choice left is to seek help or die. This was the reality for Dylan and Lily, who courageously open up about their lowest points, the intense process of detox and treatment, and the profound effects of loneliness and trauma. But, their story doesn't end in despair. In the latter part of this episode, they talk about their life after recovery, the newfound purpose they found in NA recovery meetings, and the significant role of connection in their journey.
You'll discover their grit as they prioritize recovery above all else, including their relationship and parenting. They reveal the courage it took to surrender and overcome addiction and how they found inspiration amid their struggles. Their story is a testament to the strength, resilience, and hope required to beat addiction. In Dylan and Lily's words, you will find encouragement and hope, especially if you feel distant from recovery. Don't miss this deeply stirring conversation about surrendering to the process and finding strength in vulnerability.
If you or someone you love is struggling with addiction, you don’t have to face it alone.
Valiant Living helps men and their families move from crisis to stability through clinically driven care, community, and hope.
Learn more about our programs at www.valiantliving.com
or call us confidentially at (720) 796-6885 to speak with someone who can help.
Well, hey, everyone. Welcome to the Valiant Living podcast, where we educate, encourage and empower you towards a life of peace and freedom. I'm your host, Drew Powell, and I'm a grateful alumni of the Valiant Living program. Valiant Living offers hope and transformational change to men and their families struggling with addiction and mental health challenges. So on this podcast you'll hear from the Valiant team, as well as stories of alumni who are living in recovery. If you or someone you love is struggling to overcome addiction or trauma, please call us at 720-756-7941 or you can email admissions at valiantlivingcom. We'd love to have a conversation with you, but for now, let's dive into today's episode.
Speaker 2Does he do parkour stuff. Yeah, I did parkour for like 12 years or something like that. He's amazing, he's always so humble.
Speaker 3He's like yeah, I did parkour. He's one of the best parkour athletes in the country. Maybe not anymore, but because he doesn't do it anymore? Well not anymore, for sure.
Speaker 1But he could get back to you, so you were like a legit parkour guy. Do we have video? Do videos exist of this Mm-hmm?
Speaker 2Okay, when we get done recording.
Speaker 3I'm going to have to see some of this.
Speaker 1That's incredible. So what do you do? You said something about unicycle downstairs.
Speaker 2Yeah, electric unicycle, unicycle, yeah. So I got into that a little bit before treatment, didn't really have the Capacity to do it while I was in active addiction. I kind of like sporadically did it. And then I yeah, once I I actually hounded them at treatment to give me my electric unicycle so I could ride it around. But I made the mistake of telling them that it goes like 30 miles an hour and they were like no.
Speaker 2But then of course I asked Michael Denene and I was like hey, can I have my electric unicycle? Yeah? And he was like oh yeah, that sounds great. And everyone else was like are you serious? You're going to give him your electric unicycle?
Speaker 1That's so amazing. Yeah, that's kind of crazy.
Speaker 2He gets it, so he let me ride it around Estes Park when we were up there, oh no way. Yeah, it was actually really cool to be able to do that.
Speaker 1It's interesting how you gravitate towards that parkour.
Speaker 2These are kind of interesting pathways of yeah, I mean I'd say I was addicted to adrenaline before I was addicted to anything else.
Speaker 1That was your first addiction.
Speaker 2Yeah, maybe not my first. Porn was probably my first, but yeah, I mean, yeah, just doing crazy stuff. Yeah, parkour was kind of like that way to fill that void. I don't want to reduce it just to that, but I do think that there was an aspect of it that was about that feeling I get when I do something really scary and having to overcome that fear. There was an adrenaline rush of doing that and that helped me kind of not feel the feelings that.
Speaker 1I was feeling around that time.
Speaker 1I've always wondered about that with adrenaline, because I'm a different kind of adrenaline, drunky, risk taker, but my type is not like jump out of planes and stuff. But I always wondered if that was part of the addiction for some people. Yeah Well, I'm really grateful that you guys are willing to have this conversation today. It's kind of cheesy but we call them valiant victories and I know we're never fully complete. We're never fully. We're always on this journey of recovery. But you guys are such a success story of people who are willing to show up every day and do the work and so on the podcast we've heard from some of our staff, but we want to tell more stories of alumni People have gone through the program and that are just every day working the process. So thanks for being on. I'd love to hear just a little bit of y'all's story. Let's start with how did you guys meet? Give us the genesis of this couple, do?
Speaker 2you want to take this away.
Speaker 3Yeah, sure, I'll take this one.
Speaker 1I tell this story all the time.
Speaker 3Dylan just doesn't have as good of a memory as I do.
Speaker 1We'll just play it on addiction.
Speaker 3He's just got that brain. So we met when we were 18 years old. So we were little babies and Dylan was doing his parkour thing and I was a gymnastics coach. So we used to have a parkour drop-in where the guys would come and me being an 18-year-old girl, I was like, oh hello boys.
Speaker 1There's boys in the gym.
Speaker 3So I always graciously offered to work drop-in, and one day I saw Dylan prouncing and I thought he was the most beautiful thing I'd ever laid my eyes on.
Speaker 1I love that you said prouncing. Is that what it's called, or is that just your word for it? I'm just giving him shit Prouncing. I was like I don't think you want to be called prouncing.
Speaker 3I mean they do a lot of bouncing and prouncing.
Speaker 1That's funny.
Speaker 3But I don't even know exactly what happened, and I think I told his friend that I thought he was hot. He yelled it across the gym in front of everybody, did he just?
Speaker 1call you out in the back.
Speaker 3Yeah, he was like hey, she's totally in love with you and I was like, oh my god, what is happening? I just said he was hot.
Speaker 1Did you hear her say that from?
Speaker 3across the gym.
Speaker 1Yes.
Speaker 3Everybody did. It was so loud. So I came back into the gym later and his phone number was there, so I texted him and we started our little romance At 18 years old, at 18 years old.
Speaker 1Okay, so how long have you been together now?
Speaker 2So I'm almost 32. I'll be 32 September 29th, so we've been together, yeah 12 years, 13 years, almost, 13 years, almost 13.
Speaker 3Yeah, coming up on 13. We've been married for a year.
Speaker 1Okay.
Speaker 3That was one of the things we decided to do in very early recovery that everybody told us that we should not do.
Speaker 1What's that?
Speaker 3We were like three months clean and they were like, you're going to do what? And we're like, yeah, we're getting married. I don't know why this is crazy, but looking back it maybe wasn't. It's kind of a risky thing to do in early recovery. Early recovery, yeah.
Speaker 1Well, don't they say don't make any big life decisions a year. But then sometimes life is just life and clearly it's working out beautifully.
Speaker 2It's more that I didn't consult anyone, that everyone was like, wait what you got me. It was more like they heard about it. I remember Jill was like so are you going to tell me anything? So she had heard through the grapevine, so she was like you got anything to tell me? Today and I was like I don't know what you're talking about and she's, like I don't know, married. I was like, oh yeah.
Speaker 1I love how the best of the staff gets in our life, because they really do care about us, even downstairs before we started this episode Like make sure we're the first to know about any big life events and I love it because they care deeply about us All. Right before we go any further, though, you got to brag on your sweet, beautiful little girl, tell us.
Speaker 3She's the best. Her name is Faye. She will be two in December. She's just like man. I'm going to try not to cry.
Speaker 1I love that.
Speaker 3The best part of everything, just like the brightest of the light in the world. She's been driving crazy recently because she's a toddler, but it's just so worth it. She was a big part of what motivated us to get clean. Yeah, she's just like the best part of everything. She's the best part of us. You know, little children are just such a light in the world. I've always loved working with kids, but having your own kid is so special and just so different.
Speaker 1It's funny to use that word because I was literally about to say she does light up, she does Everyone gravitates towards her, she does, she's got a little pull.
Speaker 3She pulls everybody in with her sweetness.
Speaker 1We all do in her hair with a little sprout.
Speaker 3It doesn't help anything. That's a magnet too.
Speaker 1It's like you're just asking for it at that point.
Speaker 3Oh, I know, she's so cute.
Speaker 1And you guys, just I love you just sit back and just let people just take over. Oh yeah, I love it.
The Journey of Recovery From Addiction
Speaker 2That's the best, I think. I'm naturally introverted, kind of I don't know, I don't know anymore. But yeah, I feel like I like that the attention is off of me and I can be on her in some ways. I don't know.
Speaker 1Well, you just represented parenting so beautifully in that moment, because you can be in tears and at the same time say they're driving me insane, and parenting is both at the same time it really is, I would take a bullet for you and also you're driving me crazy.
Speaker 1Yeah, Absolutely. Well, you know, everyone at Valiant is so proud of you guys and the work you're doing and you know, even just being downstairs and reconnecting with some of the team and the staff and they're just like I know for the team here you know the work that they do it's just, it's a lot sometimes. So seeing couples like you guys is just gives hope, and that's what I hope for listeners today is that they feel that hope, like in it's not without a lot of hard work, and I think that's what we're going to talk about on the podcast today.
Speaker 1You know, you guys put in you know, individually a lot of hard work to get to where you are today, and I know a lot of people have carried you as well, I'm sure, but it took you guys showing up and doing the hard work, and so we just want to celebrate that in y'all's lives. Like this is. This is huge and for people listening, like man, I don't know if I'll ever get to the place where I can be clean and sober and be happy and have joy and, you know, have a family or whatever they're thinking. You're an example that that's absolutely possible. So, if you're willing, I'd love to just go back to kind of the beginning of just your recovery journey, recovery story, and I don't even it's up to you how you want to start, if you want to tell it individually, because I know you're both have kind of been on this, this path. So I'm just curious how did it? How did it start? Even from like a recognition of like hey, this might be a, this is an issue, this is a problem.
Speaker 2Yeah you go, I'll take this, take it. Um, yeah, I guess if we started from when I thought it was a problem, it would be years before I ever got help for it. Um, I would like identify as an addict, but I just didn't. And I actually tried to get clean a lot of different ways. Um, I, I went and did like some like plant medicine journey kind of thing.
Speaker 3Who's?
Speaker 2you know, dmt like Eboga. I went to Costa Rica for a month and tried to do this Eboga thing and surfed for a month and came right back and dropped right back into addiction. Um, trying to think what else I mean. I tried to get clean in like hotel rooms and just try to, you know, white knuckle it, and I was able to get, like you know, a couple months or a month at a time and, um, inevitably I end up back using um. My mom tried to intervene on us several times. Uh, even hired an interventionist. Oh, really.
Speaker 2Um, we're actually really close friends at the interventionist now, but we didn't Except treatment at that time. So, um, but yeah, it was a long road to get to finally accepting treatment. Um, we had to basically go homeless. Uh, we were living out of a truck that wouldn't start and then that truck got towed.
Speaker 1Um, we were both addicted to heroin and meth, so, uh, so you guys active in your addictions together at the same time, like okay, so we were together before active addiction.
Speaker 3Okay, so my activity started way sooner than Dylan's, like he was kind of the adrenaline junkie guy. Yeah, you know, didn't really use anything until he was in his late teens early 19, 20s, um, but I started using when I was, I think, 14.
Speaker 3Gotcha, um started smoking pot because my brother smoked pot and my parents smoked pot and it was the cool thing to do, um, and start drinking really heavily. Um, my disease didn't really progress past that, like just kind of more casual using, until I was how old was I? I think I was like 21 or 22 and I had my wisdom teeth removed and they prescribed me, you know, percocet, and that's where my opiate journey kind of took off.
Speaker 1Is it because, even as a masking question, sometimes it's difficult, because I'm not sure if you guys are this way, but there's almost that, the revelation of like, oh man, I'm an addict? Which sometimes comes a long time after the addiction actually started. Oh right, it's almost like there's two dates. The one is like the when you realize, and then you go back and like I think I might even been an addict at like nine.
Speaker 1I just was escaping. Whatever I was addicted to it could be in video games or whatever I was using to escape it just changed. One thing I love about valiant here is they teach you about the coaddictions that happen and what happens beneath and how. From childhood you know it's like these things are going to be, but you guys were so, so you were an act of addiction Before you were the adrenaline junkie, which may have been a part of the addiction.
Speaker 2Yeah and, to be fair, I think there's just different manifestations of addiction and I've had to kind of like look at that. Like I, I definitely drink a lot more than Like. At that time, like I would say, like, oh, you're in addiction because you're using like heroin or percocet or whatever and I was, but like, meanwhile I'm like using like, like I would drink a lot. Like I would drink a lot more than like. I noticed Like with some of my other friends I'd be like 20 shots deep or something.
Speaker 2Yeah, I was like I don't have a problem because I I can stop, I can just do it on the weekends or I can just, you know, but like, ultimately, like when I look back, it's like from the time I started, just even like, was it which was like 19? I was using like Something, even if it was just like on the weekends or whatever, I was using it to an extreme degree right, it wasn't like a normal like oh, let's have a couple beer like I never really had a couple beers or right.
Speaker 2I mean, maybe there might have been.
Speaker 3That's how I was too, though, like when I found marijuana. It was like I was smoking every single day from when I found it. Dylan mentioned maybe his first addiction being porn. I was also Introduced to porn young. I think that's part of just being an addict is like that extremist Whether it's adrenaline or sex or drugs or shopping, like whatever it is, you're just trying to do everything you can to fill that void, so it's really hard to say when right addiction started.
Speaker 3I think To some degree I was probably born an addict. My parents are addicts, it runs in my family, sure.
Speaker 1So so it runs deep.
Speaker 3Yeah, it runs pretty.
Speaker 1What was it like for you guys just living in that, in that kind of lifestyle, both being addicts? Were you at different places at different times, like as, as like she was using? Were you and like? Were you thinking, well, I'm only doing this, she's doing that, or how did that progress together in your relationship? She's smirking, so feel like there's something behind that.
Speaker 2I'd say there was like so we moved back from Boulder, we that was probably our most stable point. We were both working, both paying the bills. Then she got addicted to Percocet. We moved back to Denver and it was like she started slipping like really hard she's trying to find a job when it wasn't able to find a job. So I was kind of taking a lot of the financial burden. Okay, just like paying. Yeah, I was like working a lot on this like online chat support thing. We weren't around a lot of friends anymore because we were it kind of like lost our parkour community up in Boulder, yeah.
Speaker 2So I kind of started acting out like kind of codependently, like I was drinking a lot and then Kind of trying to chase her around trying to figure out what she was doing, because I didn't really know what was going on, right.
Speaker 1Were you curious or were you worried or what was your emotion around that time for her?
Speaker 2when you say codependently, you were trying to manage her Addiction a mix of just insecurity, wanting, like she was, like talking to people I didn't know all this other stuff. And I was like what's going on? And, yeah, just like a, I definitely concerned too, because it's like, and also just Selfishly, I wanted to be able to not have to pay all the bills and work as much as I was working.
Speaker 1So, yeah, that's kind of like coming on yeah definitely resentment.
Speaker 2Yeah, so I'd say that was kind of the beginning of the more toxic side of our relationship. Like we've been through phases where, like you know, just like emotional, like we've even been through like physical abuse periods where that was like yeah, just we're, we were just not on the same page and like yeah but, yeah.
Speaker 2But I mean it's kind of weird because that didn't really carry over into the like last years of our addiction. It was more like we early on in that phase there was lots of just fighting verbally, sometimes physically, but like it was later on we kind of just mellowed out into like just using heroin and meth every day and just kind of like Coexisting Wow.
Speaker 1So not much connection between the two of you outside of just like this is not really it was.
Speaker 3It was like we were just single-minded Together at that point because Dylan had tried to get clean. He had Kind of quote-unquote fought his addiction. Um, I guess I can't say that, for he was trying to fight his addiction, he, he wanted to get clean. I could see it. I had no intention of getting clean at that point, no, no. I never went to Costa Rica, was not interested in treatment at all, and that created kind of a power struggle between us.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 3I think the turning point. Um, is it okay if I talk about your dad?
Speaker 2Oh, yeah, sure.
Speaker 3I think the turning point was in 2018. Dylan's dad committed suicide, um, and that's when I saw Dylan just kind of stopped fighting Maybe a little bit before that, but that was really like. That was a blow that just kind of shook Our worlds, especially Dylan's world. Um, things out really bad. We made the decision to move into Dylan's dad's apartment, um, because Dylan had a roommate at the time and we wanted to be able to just use and not Be disrupted, and his dad had paid rent for like a month or two out.
Speaker 1So we moved into Dylan's dad's apartment and things just got really Really dark, yeah so that trauma kind of it sounds like I hear what I'm hearing you say like went into, like almost a numbing out, like yeah, I don't know how to deal with this, so we're just gonna Dive even deeper into our addiction.
Speaker 2Yeah, I gave up fighting to try to figure out how to get out of it and it was just like I'm gonna. I'm just gonna numb it all right, and I, I think we yeah, we moved in. I Mean I I'm still working through that on my fourth step right now and it's like sure, there's just a lot to unpack there.
Speaker 2That was when I first Started experiencing like meth and do psychosis, so I started thinking Just like kind of the world was out to get me in general. This later progressed to thinking that people were like spying on me with cameras and shit and this like. But at the time it was, like you know, I inherited a bunch of guns from my dad so I thought people were gonna come in and steal them and there may have been some merit to that, because people came through the house to like inspect. After he died there was like 20 30 people that had to come through because he killed himself on that like porch. Yeah, so it's like. Yeah, I mean it was a period of complete like chaos.
Speaker 2It's like a war zone, like having to open that back up like in my fourth step, and I'm even doing like some therapy around it, just To like look at all the different layers of that and see, yeah, but yeah, that was kind of where it all. That's where we both kind of were on the same page. We're like we're in addiction. We're not trying to get out of it. Fuck, you'd all the help right.
Speaker 2Right, my mom tried to intervene at that point, tried to, like, you know, stop paying me so I couldn't pay for drugs, that, things like that, where it was just. But we were just like isolate, isolate, isolate. Push everyone else away.
Speaker 1Isolating together. You know what? Yeah, up for me when you sharing your story which I'm really grateful that you would Be willing to share, that, because that's I mean it's so tough, I mean there's so much sadness and loneliness that I feel that comes up for me. It's like man, that at that point, like even the mental picture I have of you guys were treating together, but kind of not together, right like together, just I still felt loneliness. I mean, even though you guys were together, it's like man, how lonely that must have been to be in that apartment and just be like man. We're just we're the apathy of yeah, just done.
Speaker 1I just can't fight anymore.
Speaker 3And you know that's, that's extreme Sadness and loneliness right, I mean, wow, yeah, yeah, we would have like sometimes we, the only time we weren't isolating was when we'd have fellow addicts over using, or if we were picking up or something. But Looking, you know, looking back, you could be in a room full of people and feel completely alone. You know, you're like oh, there's people here, cool. You know, I'm not connecting with them. There's no real connection, you know, um.
Speaker 1I imagine that would resonate with a lot of the people listening right now, where Loneliness sometimes is masked with activity and people, uneven relationship. And how many people are lonely in a relationship because there's just there's not a connection? That's the like you guys were saying, the escape or the isolation You're like well, how can I be lonely when I'm in this relationship? Or how can be lonely? I'm surrounded by all these other people, but without meaningful connection. It's just superficial, right? I mean, that's that's so. So walk us through like what happened next. So you guys are in this apartment you're using how do you come out of this season? Because that I mean, oh, candidly, a lot of people don't. Yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, I mean I think it got. I don't know if it got worse. I'd say that was a bot, it was a one particular type of bottom, but it wasn't our rock bottom, like you'd think that would be.
Speaker 1Yeah, honestly, without knowing your story, I'm thinking well, that's the rock bus.
Speaker 2There's more wait, there's more, there's actually there's three years more years more since that point, I think, yeah, and it was kind of up and down. Yeah, like I said, I think my meth induced psychosis got even worse. So I I mean this was even more isolating for me. I mean like to the point where, like I thought that there were people like these people who were spying on me from like cameras in my walls I would like dig through the walls to try to find them To believing that they were in my head, right, that they had it somehow infiltrated my head and that I was like.
Speaker 2That they were just constantly narrating my life and just like dogging on me and Chiding me and like you're doing so shitty.
Speaker 1And what are you thinking when he's experiencing that you're?
Speaker 3just doing Um.
Speaker 1I you out of it to even know what's going on.
Speaker 3I know what was going on, he was he was driving me crazy too, but I also had. I was also in my active addiction, so I was like starting to kind of get pulled into it too, like not knowing what was real. This was when cove it. So this is now moving into 2019 when cofit hit. So the whole world was losing their minds, um, us especially just being. I remember Dylan digging through the walls. Um, he flooded our apartment.
Speaker 2He set off the sprinkler and we flooded our apartment.
Speaker 3Yeah, he was looking for cameras. Yeah, so you're all in. Oh, yeah, yeah, he was all in. I was a little bit less, but I had my own kind of craziness going on.
Speaker 1You're more disannoyed like come on, man.
Speaker 3Yeah, I'm like dude, come on. Yeah, I didn't understand why he couldn't just Not yeah, just chill, you know. But I also didn't want to like, I Didn't know what to do, so I didn't do anything. I just kept using and we just kept on about our yeah, mary, little ways. Um, I had kind of a different kind of psychosis going on, where I thought like demonic spirits were trying to Come after us and they were. I mean, it is. It's kind of like a. There is like a really just like Evil. Yeah, energy to that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1Um, and, by the way, when I just want to clarify for me, because this just came up for me, like we're talking about this stuff and it's, it's very serious, like you know, I know we're laughing and we're in a good place sitting here today, but for people listening, like the laughter is not meant to cover up the fact like this is, like this is painful, yeah, this is traumatic. When you're in this thing and I think you're looking back and you're able, you're in a different place today and we're in a different spot. But I don't want to I don't even my laughter to indicate that there's making light of something that is life threatening, right, and so I wanted to clarify that on my end like and I know, I know we laugh, but I want to be sensitive like this.
Speaker 1Yeah you know it's it's not funny, it's something that's like very, very serious for people like there's people listening right now who might be like that's, I'm in that right now, yeah, you know, and so I want people to hear like our laughter is more probably gratitude of like looking back, of how far you know that you guys have have come, so walk through that.
Speaker 2Yeah, that process for yeah, and I don't want to dwell too much on the war stories.
Trauma, Addiction, and Finding Hope
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah like I do. It was an important. That state of mind of feeling like there was, I was with no, like no one close to me, no one cared about me, and feeling like there was people that literally hated me, like living in my own head, yeah, was such an isolating experience that I thought the best solution was to kill myself. And so I had a gun, I held it to my head, I considered killing myself multiple times. Wow, and it seemed like a good option too, just because, like my dad had done it, like maybe this is the right way out for me to Wow that's what was modeled for you.
Speaker 2Yeah, and you know, and yeah, like I do laugh about this stuff now, kind of because it's Fucking painful and it's probably a protection mechanism and it's like, but I, yeah, it's also kind of how I live today, like I just my life is beautiful today. I don't have to live in that, like I'm just incredibly grateful that I don't have to live in that headspace. Yeah or in that place anymore.
Speaker 1Well it's interesting just meeting you guys this morning, coming in and With your beautiful daughter. Like you would just never and I get goosebumps as I'm saying this like I Would never have imagined the trauma and the pain that you guys have walked through and the addiction that you've walked through.
Speaker 1There's this beautiful couple, beautiful family coming in that just looks, yet you guys exude peace and joy and, whatever you'd be like, oh, they've got all together. I've always had it all together and the reason why I'm saying that is because there's so much hope in this, like there's so much hope of what is is Painable if you're willing to work the steps, work the process, work the you know, get the help, do the thing. And I love that you're honest about. I've tried everything. I tried everything you know, and I want to kind of get to that, like what was the catalyst? And I don't want to bypass the parts of your story because, like you said, it's like not dwelling, but I want people to know the depth of the addiction and of the pain. So, what was that rock bottom moment for you guys? If you were to say this was like the moment where, like we have got, was it in 2020, during COVID or so yeah, I think first of all a big catalyst was Faye being born, right.
Speaker 1Okay.
Speaker 2That. But yeah, we didn't know. So she got pregnant with. Yeah, we got pregnant.
Speaker 3I got you pregnant.
Speaker 1whatever, however you want to say it, we yeah, we got pregnant like I don't know when, but we I know when.
Speaker 3I know, of course.
Speaker 1So I gotta be like-, so let her handle this part of the story.
Speaker 3I got. I became with child in February of 2021. We were living in apartments, hotels, hotels, yes. So we were in and out of hotels. You know, we do the whole stay, get kicked out, stay, get kicked out. So we were just kind of existing, if you want to call it that. But February 2021 rolls around and we have like one slip up in all of our time together and I took precautionary measures.
Speaker 3I took the plan B pill, assumed it worked. I had taken it when I was in high school and it kind of made my cycle not come for a little while. So when my cycle didn't come for a little while, I was like oh, you know what, whatever, I was also just using so much that I was like everything's fine, whatever, this is normal, I don't even care. But then a few months go by and stuff starts to change and I'm like something's not right here. You know, there were just a couple of signs of different things that I was like, yeah, something's not right. So I decided to take a pregnancy test. I think at this point it was like May of 2021. So I was like, probably already out of my first dry master, my pregnancy test comes back blaring hot. And I'm like, oh, oh, no. I was like you know, here we don't go.
Speaker 1I was like no.
Speaker 3I was like this is not happening. I waited a little bit of time to tell Dylan. I think I waited like a week. I took multiple tests, even though they were all like so positive. I'm like so in denial. I'm like no, this isn't happening. So we agreed that the best way to move forward would be to get an abortion, and I actually scheduled three of them and I just couldn't do it. I just couldn't bring myself to do it and I wish I could say that this was the part of the story where we got our shit together, because it's something I still have. Some shame I'm working around.
Speaker 3But I used throughout my entire pregnancy with Faye and that was just like. That was the newest low for me. It was just like using, like I had like my big pregnant belly and I'd be using and I was like he's using against my will and just felt this low, just this deep, deep low. That was really a dark chapter for sure. So Faye was born. I had to have an emergency C-section just due to some complications with like using and stuff.
Speaker 3So we go to the hospital to have Faye and this unfolds a couple different ways. I'm not even 100% sure how it unfolded. I know that my mother told the paramedics that I was using. Dylan's mom told some people that I was using, so it kind of just got through the vine that I was using and they tested Faye and she did come back positive. This is like all a blur. So we were still using in the hospital, using in the bathroom in the hospital, and they searched Dylan one day and he had some like paraphernalia on him and they told him he wasn't able to come back to the hospital. So my options were to stay in the hospital without drugs, without my partner, or to leave. But they would not let me leave with Faye because she had tested positive. So we left.
Speaker 3We left the hospital and my sister ended up coming into the picture as Faye's foster guardian. So Faye ended up in the foster system. My sister had custody of Faye. So a couple weeks pass and Christmas passes. So we were kicked. Dylan's mom moved us out of. We were staying in her business like on her property. She moved us out of the building while we were in the hospital, packed up all of our stuff in the storage and was like sorry, this is, we're done, understandably so. So we were living out of our truck still using. Really, that was like just such a low point. We had just had our daughter, we were so lost, we were homeless, we were just. We just reached an end. And then December 26th I think it was this 26th or no, it was the 27th we were arrested.
Speaker 2Yeah, maybe I'll take over from there.
Speaker 3Yeah, take over from you.
Speaker 1And before you talk about that, could you go back just a little bit, Because I'd just love to hear from you, like what were you feeling during that? Like you're just a beautiful baby girl, you know your partner that you love and you're using in the bathroom and you're saying you can't come back. I mean, help us process through so much Because I'm feeling a lot, as you guys are sharing this. What's your emotions during that season?
Reaching the Point of Desperation
Speaker 2I think I was just so stressed out by the whole situation, Just feeling like, yeah, I don't know, I don't think I could feel like the sad. I was just pushing all of that down. I was mostly just scared out of my mind Like it took. It was like 48 hours of trying to give birth at home or at work really. So that was really stressful than like getting her there to like an emergency C-section. I was just trying to like survive.
Speaker 2I was in survival mode. I mean that kind of characterizes my whole addiction in general was just survive, get the next hit, survive, get the next hit, just constant, like just that's all that mattered and like I don't know. I think that was like you were saying, it's kind of a blur. I mean I've been able to piece together all that stuff. That happened.
Speaker 1But like, first of all, so you weren't actually feeling much during that time, no, you were just trying to survive it, get through it. Yeah, we're both in active use.
Speaker 2I mean we're just pushing all that shit down. I'm just trying to get like desperately survive. So I actually got arrested trying to get Faye out of the hospital first. So I got arrested twice in the same week. First was trying to I tried to get a police escort to help me go get Faye from the hospital because I still technically had custody. So I was going to go in there and get Faye and that was I was going to save the day right.
Speaker 2And I get in there, I call up the police escort. They're like they call the hospital, the hospital's like, oh no, she tested positive for drugs, so you can't give him her to him. So they came to me and they're like, yeah, we can't escort you. So I just was like, ok, whatever, I'll just go up there and get her myself. So I went up there and my own police escort ended up arresting me.
Speaker 3That really backed quite a lot of you.
Speaker 1It was just how I planned it. It was just not how I planned it.
Speaker 2Yeah, it was so like the universe was just saying like, no, this is not the path, this is not where you're just no.
Speaker 2Like everyone, every person, every situation that was happening was just like no, this ends here. So I went to jail. I got out, we kept using in the truck. This is when it broke down and we were living in our broken down truck outside of our work and so we would break into this little cargo trailer to use and to just sleep we had put our own mattress in there and so they had already kicked us out of the building at this point. So they finally called the cops on us. They called them and they came into the chair, knocked on the trailer, like get out of there. And we got out.
Speaker 2And, yeah, I really complied. I did not. So I resisted arrest to the point where I hurt an officer. I got hit with an assault of a police officer charge and so that's a felony. So I, at this point, I get to jail. We're both in jail at this point. So we both went to jail because she had a warrant and we both get out. And this is sort of the turning point for me. I went to try to find drugs. I walked from jail all the way to Glendale, which downtown to Denver in like 20.
Speaker 2It was freezing, it was so cold it was like almost zero degrees December or something 27th, when I had December yeah yeah, I had this coat that was only buttoned at the top, or no, the zipper was stuck at the top, and so it was just like open, like this and I was just wandering around looking for drugs.
Speaker 2I walked up to the Crossroads Motel, which is aptly named, and I was looking to see if anyone had their door open. And this one guy had his door open and his name was King Are you addressing? He had these rings on, I don't know, it was really cool. But yeah, he didn't have any drugs, he only had a dab, and I hadn't smoked marijuana in a long time. So I did a dab of marijuana and that was the moment for me. It amplified, like I was looking for heroin, I was looking for meth, I was looking for something my DOC.
Speaker 2This just made my anxiety that much worse and it was like that for me. That was the moment of desperation where I was like that panic, that dread, that emptiness, that like I can't go on anymore. You know, like that feeling of just there's nothing left here, there's like I'm fighting for nothing, there's literally nothing to gain from this situation anymore. That was my moment. So I called my mom and I asked for treatment and she, yeah, she obviously was very eager to hear me say that and you were ready at that point you were ready to.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, I mean to be fair. I think I might have just been ready to be out of that panic state, but it was. There was a. I did think on some level I was ready to do something different. I just didn't. I don't know, I didn't really have a lot of hope that I could succeed Because I had tried all these other things I had heard.
Speaker 2treatment was just a place to like go hang out and you know get clean for a little like long enough and I assumed that I would just go back out and use. I didn't assume I would actually be successful and like stay clean, because I didn't really know there was a way to do that.
Speaker 1So what were you doing during this time? So he's has this moment.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, so I get out of jail. I don't have my phone because it was in the trailer when they arrested us, so I don't have my phone. I have no money. I have nothing. I had to walk most of the way. I think I caught the bus. I think I begged the bus driver. He looked at me and was like just get on, and I didn't know where else to go either. I assumed Dylan was still in jail.
Speaker 1Ok, so you didn't even know what he was doing.
Speaker 3I didn't even know what he was doing. So OK, so I'm going to rewind a little bit, because my one of my other rock bottom moments was in jail. So we both only spent a night in jail. Wasn't my first time in jail, it was my second time in jail and of course, I told myself the last time that I wasn't gonna be there again. So I go in, I'm like detoxing, I'm withdrawing so heavily.
Speaker 3The jail was full I guess Christmas is like a really popular time for people to get arrested and I had to sleep. Like the bunk beds were full so I had to put my mat on the ground and there were holes in my mat and it was the floor been wet cause they just mopped it. So I'm laying on this wet floor. I saw my staples in from having fey and I was having like postpartum depression, like all these pains and like all this stuff from my C-section. It was like there was this moment where I was like this is I can't do this anymore, like I can't do this anymore. But of course you get out of jail and you're like drugs right now, please, I'm hurting. This hurts emotionally, physically, like I can't do this. You leave so raw. So I made the big trek back to the building, to our work, because I just had no idea where else to go even though they told us not to go back there.
Speaker 3I was like I don't know where else to go. Somehow Dylan magically got out of jail before I did, I think maybe cause the jail was full. I was not facing felony charges, but he. So I go up to the building and Dylan is there and he doesn't have his phone either. So we get into an argument with Dylan's mom's partner. We get into like a big fight, little scuffle, and Dylan's mom shows up and she's like what's up, guys, are you gonna sleep on the street tonight? It's like 20 degrees out or are you gonna go to treatment? And I looked at Dylan he's a little stoned and we just kind of looked at each other and we were like all right, we just can't, I can't sleep on the street tonight anymore. We can't do it, we're done.
Detox, Treatment, and Reunification
Speaker 3We just kind of surrendered Wasn't really like a let's get clean thing, it was more just like a oh please somebody yeah it was like just just we give up anything but this We've reached our final stop of desperation and like let's go somewhere, let's just do it. My intention was also to like leave. Maybe we'll get our shit together just enough so that we can go back and we can like get a blip, whatever crazy plans, ideas that we have when we're in our attic brain and like we're just insane, like there's just no yeah.
Speaker 3Absolutely insane. So she drove us up to Fort Lupton and we shook it out in a motel room that night and then we went to detox together.
Speaker 2Yeah, they were supposed to. So my mom told us that they had a spot of detox for us. So we drive up to Fort Lupton and like, on the way, she's like asking, and they're like, oh, we don't actually have a spot for you. So we spent our first night just detoxing in a hotel room oh my gosh. And then they had a spot open for the next day. So we both went to Valiant detox. Okay, yeah, we just Valiant detoxed, together, yeah so I don't know if they've switched the policy since we've been there, but we may have caused some trouble while we were here.
Speaker 2Yeah we may have done inappropriate things and got us in trouble.
Speaker 1Yeah, you guys have created. There's policies named after you. Now, Thanks to you guys.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, I'm joke, I don't know.
Speaker 2Yeah, no, they're probably, they're probably they might be yeah, so you did detox together about a week.
Speaker 2Yeah, it was about a week. So I decided I wanted treatment about five days in there at the detox. Like I think I was in the shower or something, I just. I had a moment of clarity, like I've had like kind of I think of it as phases of surrender, like I surrendered to go to detox, right. But I wasn't like, oh, I'm gonna go do like at that point, I wasn't like I'm gonna do a 90 day treatment, right, right, right.
Speaker 2That was even on your radar, not even close, like I was, like I'm gonna get like a few, I'm just gonna get the monkey off my back for, you know, five days a week whatever, and then we're gonna go back and figure it out.
Speaker 2I didn't know what figure it out meant, but like I was gonna try to figure it out. But yeah, by about five days in I was like this is I don't know what to go fix. Like there's nothing left, like I don't have a place to live. I don't have like like my daughters in, not like the custody's been taken from us. We would have to literally kidnap. And, by the way, this was an option. We were like maybe we should kidnap her Like you know and like.
Speaker 1Just get her back somehow, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2So we were like, maybe we'll kidnap her, go like run away somewhere and hide out, or like I don't know.
Speaker 2But, like, as I started to get some clarity and like the drugs were coming off and I was like just sitting in the shower, I was, like what do I have to lose here? Like this? There's just so many things, like in felony charges too, like and like if I don't go to treat, like I'm not gonna get help with any of that, like I'm just gonna, I'm gonna be up against felony charges, I'm not gonna have custody, I'm not gonna have a place to go. There was just so many reasons in my head and just the emotional feeling of like what to fight for, what? Like to just be alone and like longer and to just using and isolating longer, like why? Why like draw this out? And so I chose to like go to treatment before. She was like thinking that that was a good idea and so we had this. I always tell the story. You can tell the story for probably better, but I hear like down the grapevine once I'm in treatment that she threw a chair when I left and was, yeah, at the detox.
Speaker 3I lost it so you're pissed.
Speaker 3I was so pissed because they, they took down Like he, he just left. We didn't I at the time, we were, we were a team still. You know we had been teams, we had been, you know, partners in crime. And so all of a sudden he's just gone and I'm like what the hell? We didn't discuss this, this wasn't part of our little devious plan, and I thought that they had made him leave without saying goodbye. That was my big thing was he didn't come and say goodbye to me. I was like I have no idea when I'm going to see him again, I have no idea what's going on. And he just dipped out. So I thought that they didn't let him say goodbye. Little did I know that it was going to be too difficult for him to say goodbye.
Speaker 3So he chose he chose that, which I'm so glad that he did, cause I might have talked him out of it. I'm pretty persuasive, but I just got so mad and I threw a chair isolated in my room for the rest of the day. So this is when the like court custody stuff starts coming up for Faye. So we actually had like a zoom court custody thing that came up. So I did Dylan left for treatment and so I was there still up.
Speaker 3I needed a few extra days at Valiant and the nurses there just like carried me even though I was really volatile. They really helped me a lot. They set up the zoom for me. They were like get your butt in this chair. We're going to like figure out what's next. So we had a court case go on, and I reached the end of my limit too, where they're like you're not getting her back anytime soon. You need to do some stuff. A good place to start would be treatment. A lot of the people at Valiant talked to me and they were like is this kind of your only option, unless you want to go back on the streets, which at that time was still kind of an option to me, like I called some friends?
Speaker 3and I was like hey, can I come crash at your place? And my higher power was like nope, nope, nope. Everything was like nope, this is the path. So I ended up starting a. It was supposed to be a 90 day treatment, but I went up to Glenwood Springs, so I went up to a women's PHP inpatient Okay, how long did you end up doing up there?
Speaker 3I did a month. It was really really expensive and we kind of reached the limit with finances and I found a Medicaid facility that I could go to, where they were like, oh, we'll let you take care of Faye there. So it's like a mother program where you can have your kid there.
Speaker 3And I was like this sounds great. Cause all I wanted to do at that point was be united with Faye. So I go to this Medicaid facility and, granted, I went to a wonderful program up in Glenwood Springs. It was wonderful. We had therapy and groups and sessions and like zoom meetings and everything. It was great to being in a Medicaid facility where they were like here's a packet, fill it out, you know it's it was. There was like no care and I ended up leaving and I was like this isn't enough for me, as much as I want to be united with Faye, like this isn't enough. It was like kind of a higher power moment where I was like well, and everybody was so mad at me for leaving treatment. They were like no, and I had had an original offer for a 90 day program but I had chose the Medicaid one and higher power guided me to this other new program in Denver. It's called Denver Women's Recovery. Little plug there, yeah, yeah yeah, shadow.
Speaker 3Yeah, shadow, they're the best. And I got to be near Dylan and I got to be with Faye to do our visitations, cause we were at that point which is another reason I came down from Glenwood I was like I'm so far from Faye. I only got to do one visit, I only got to see her one time in the whole, like first month that she was alive and it just kind of like things just kind of started happening. You know, I just put my nose to the grindstone and just started showing up and just said kind of like Dylan said like what, what do I have to lose? At that point I wasn't committed to recovery, but I was committed to getting Faye back and I was like this is the way and things just kind of started happening and I kind of you know, you start to get that clearing of the fog and I started to like kind of see where things were going and that things were starting to like slowly get better.
Speaker 1What was that emotion that came up for you just now, when you're talking about one month?
Speaker 3Yeah, that's just. One of my biggest regrets is that I didn't get to be there, yeah, with Faye for her newborn phase. You know, I'd like carried her for 10 months and it was like that's all I wanted was to be with her and to be with Dylan and to be a family and that was just stripped from us because of her addiction. Yeah, and that was a big motivator, like Dylan was saying before, like Faye was really just kind of the catalyst of things. Of course higher power came into Dylan's higher power and my higher power, everybody's higher power came in and was like all right, these, these are the roadblocks. Now you can't go anymore without this going dreadfully wrong. Like this is your moment where you have to decide. And that pain was a big motivator for me. That pain of like never wanting to be away from her again. You know the pain of her being out in the world without a mom was like this doesn't work, this isn't fair to her.
Navigating Recovery and Life After Treatment
Speaker 1Yeah, that's amazing. My codependency right now wants to jump to affirming how wonderful parents you are to this moment, but I think sitting in this for a second and just being like man, that's hard, that's painful, that's that's tough. And what's also true hopefully this is not my codependency is seeing the way you guys are showing up for Faye now, cause I remember having painful moments myself where I miss some really important moments in my kids' lives, but they just kept saying you're missing these so you can be present for all the rest.
Speaker 3You know, and it's so worth it.
Speaker 1I mean the shame and regret of missing certain moments. You know that'll always probably be something I no-transcript deal with to some level, but I'm present now you know and that's that's the beauty of it Dylan's hot and thank you for for sharing that. That's really powerful. And so you're in detox. You end up, so you go off to the Valiant Men's Program next. I'm assuming, is that what happened? Okay?
Speaker 2Yep. So I went to a Valiant Living and, um, yeah, I mean I think that like once I, once I arrived, just like at the sober living house, um, I just kind of like I was like, all right, I'm just gonna do this. I just, I think I just surrendered to whatever they wanted me to do, except for my electrocunicycle, which I insisted upon having two weeks into my treatment. I was like, I'll do everything else, but I just want my electrocunicycle, that's my one condition, so my one condition.
Speaker 1I'm not budging on it.
Speaker 2But yeah, I mean it was just like. I mean there were multiple points along the way or it was like, and I don't know, I guess I just started asking for help Like from the moment that I asked for help to go to treatment. It was just like this continuous chain of asking for help and being willing to take that help and like like, for example, one thing that comes to mind was like when you left treatment, right Like I, you were calling me and we were, I was coming back from. I think Colt brought me to, or Colt, sorry, colt brought me to a meeting, um, an NA meeting.
Speaker 2I think it was my first NA meeting and I was like I remember I was in the car and she was like blowing up my phone while I was like on my way back and she left treatment and I was like, what do I do? And I just started asking other people. I was asked Colt, colt. I was like what do I do here? Like do I? And like through, just like asking my therapist, asking my case manager, jr, and like just asking different people Shout out to JR.
Speaker 1Shout out to big, shout out to JR. Jr is amazing dude. Yeah, he was my case manager.
Speaker 3Yeah, I do yeah he was.
Speaker 2I think of him as like kind of a pseudo sponsor at the time, right. Like he served that role for me, like helped me with court cases, helped me with just everything, every little thing. Like he took me to like all my court cases for, as I remember, just like just really supported me in like in such like a beautiful way.
Speaker 2And I mean everybody at Valiant, like I mean, when I walk into that room, like I just feel I don't think everyone can say that right Like they go to a treatment center they're kind of like pushed around a little bit Like I don't know. I just felt really helped by this like, yes, community here and yeah, yeah, I mean he like he's just a big inspiration to me too. Like I remember he had just lost his mom when I had come in, like maybe two weeks into treatment and he just I just remembered thinking like how do you stay clean through that? And it just like it stuck with me that like, oh, you can stay clean through your like your parents dying or thing like difficult stuff, and like he just still had that kind of radiance and that, like you know, he was there for her in the end, like I don't know it, just that that really stuck with me.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, that's I had. I got goosebumps when you said that being held, because that is that's a really beautiful way of putting it, you know, because that's exactly how it feels. I mean, even someone this morning said something and what was affirming something in me is. It's so difficult for me I'm still learning how to receive affirmation, because I feel like I owe so much gratitude to the people that carried and held me and us through these moments where we didn't have strength to do it for ourselves. So it's it's I'm learning to receive, because I think that's healthy, but at the same time, it's so humbling, like there's no way, like held is. I'm going to steal that from here on out, because that's exactly what it feels like you're being literally carried through this by some amazing amazing people.
Speaker 1So I mean I literally could talk. I feel like I could talk to you guys all day because your story is, I had no idea what I was getting into this with this episode, this podcast, and you guys are so inspiring in where you're at. But I do, I don't, I'm, I don't want to like put a cherry on top, because I know you guys are still active in your recovery and you know working all that kind of stuff. But I do want to talk about post treatment and recovery and how you're living today and what that's like. And just the the raw, honest like what is it? What is it like for you, for you now? Yeah, so you both worked your treatment processes right. You did that, and now here you are facing the world again as a couple fiance, soon to be married, baby girl. That has to be scary right, and here you are living in recovery. So for the person listening that is like man, I would give just about anything to get to where they are today.
Speaker 1What kind of encouragement, advice, even I don't know like, or just you know, talk to us about how you're living today.
Life in NA Recovery
Speaker 2Yeah, basically. So I one thing that I really loved about Valiant is they strongly encouraged me to like that. They're like you're not treated for addiction right, like you haven't been yeah, it's not been cured You're, you've got to. This is something you're going to deal with for the rest of your life. You're going to need to like get in the center of the boat. You're going to have to continue to your recovery somewhere, whether it's a, c, a, n, a, whatever. I identified most with NA. I didn't know that at first. We kind of tried a few different things.
Speaker 2I was going to a, c, a, n, a. We were just kind of hitting like whatever meetings we could find. But JR and Colt, both were like in NA and I was talking to them and they were like and Jill actually was one of the ones who really encouraged me she was like, yeah, you have a home group, yet Do you like who's your sponsor and like all these other things. And you're like a good goal to set is to be a sponsor. And that kind of clicked in my head. I was like what would it take to be a sponsor? It's kind of like a good North Star. It's like well, well, I'd have to do the steps right and for one, I'd have to get a home group, I'd have to actually ask a sponsor to be my sponsor.
Speaker 2There's all these things that are between me and that goal, and so it was a good like reframe for me to just think like how would I do that? And so, yeah, I mean we we eventually ended up in NA and but yeah, like you can kind of talk to, yeah yeah, I mean, there's nothing special about us.
Speaker 3We're just like your run of the mill addicts. We really just I think that hitting that bottom, whatever that bottom, is how many bottoms you have to hit, we, you know, in NA we joke around that it's it's God, the gift of desperation at that time, and sometimes it is a gift to get to that point where you need to absolutely surrender, and just surrendering to that is is beautiful and it's huge. It takes a lot of courage to give up the fight. So, yeah, we are active members of NA. That's a huge part of our lives.
Speaker 3We just kind of you know you can't really build your life around treatment. Treatment gives you that stepping stone to just to get clean, to get your head clear, to kind of figure out what your next steps are. But NA is like a whole life long program and it's amazing. You work the steps. You, you get connection, which is, like they say, is the opposite of addiction, is connection. So you, you really get plugged into a community of recovery, to people who are like minded, who know what you've been through, who can identify with you, who are loving and like I could just plug NA all day, yeah, yeah, yeah, so we, we and we work our own programs.
Speaker 3You know, even though we're both in recovery, like we work our own set of steps, we have our own sponsors. We do have the same home group just for ease. Yeah, but we, we work on programs and we put our recovery first. Yeah, I put my recovery above our marriage, above Faye, because I know if I don't put my recovery first, all of those things are going to go away, just like they did in the past. Yeah, so really making going to meetings, doing the steps connecting with addicts my focus, and Dylan does the same.
Speaker 1Was that old saying anything you put before your recovery, you lose.
Speaker 3Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1That's so beautiful, any any last like parting words. For someone listening right now who's hearing your story like I am and it's just like, wow, this is. It's amazing what you guys have walked through. It's amazing that you're alive. It's amazing that you're parenting this you know, beautiful girl. I mean, it's like there's so much in your life to celebrate and for some people it might feel light years away from where they're at, or it's a family.
Speaker 1they're listening, it's a family member, they're thinking of our friend like man there. Will there ever be a chance for them? What words of encouragement or hope could you give?
Speaker 2Yeah, I mean I, when I think about where we're at today, where it's like we're living in a beautiful house that we like rent in loan tree, in a cul-de-sac with, like with a beautiful baby, like it just looks so different and it feels so different than where we were, like someone brought us cookies, yeah, it's like our name, like welcome to the neighborhood, and it's like to think that, like where we were before is just like a, you know, living out of a truck that wouldn't start like the Methendue psychosis building like suicide, like all these other things. That like I just did not have hope. Back there I was like there's no way I'm getting out of this. Yeah, there's no way I'm actually going to get recovery. This, that's just not going to be for me. Um, and then even just like an early recovery, that feeling of like when is this visitation going to end? Like I remember thinking, like you know, sitting there changing my di like the diaper of you know Faye, and just like someone's looking over my shoulder to make sure I'm doing it right, and having to do that like once a week or whatever, just to like prove that I'm like not a danger to my child. Yeah, like that, to think that, like I was like that's and this is never going to end, I'm never going to get through, like, where, when am I going to even be in my own apartment? Like sure, you know, there was just no, I didn't feel like I was going to get through this.
Speaker 2But a day at a time, right, like it's like, it's like we say, like we, just for today, I'm just going to stay clean, I'm going to work a program of recovery, right, I'm going to. You know, I spend some time every morning praying, uh, doing a gratitude list, like, and working on step work, um, yeah, and so that that practice of just getting connected, going and then going to a meeting. I go to a meeting, like every day. It's rare that I'll miss a day still, even, you know, 21 months. What is it?
Speaker 2Year and nine months clean like still go to like a meeting a day, um, and I find that right. Like it's just that today, just for today, I don't have to worry about tomorrow. Like I can just stay clean today If I can put my head down on a pillow and know that I didn't use today. Like tomorrow we'll, we'll figure it out.
Speaker 2We'll do another day and um that just it's a crazy how much things change Just through that. Just that process, that simple daily process of, of you know, keeping that disease arrested and engaging in my recovery and getting connected. Yeah, it's great.
Speaker 3I would say to get help. Um, it's out there. Um, a lot of the times we don't see the hands that are being reached out to us and if there aren't any hands reaching out to you, I promise your higher powers hand is reaching out to you. Um, if you can't do a great treatment program like Denver Women's Recovery or valiant, I recommend getting yourself to an NA meeting. Um, it's a great way to get plugged in, great way to get help. Um. But yeah, I think none of us do this alone. We do this in community and finding that community is is important in letting them hold you. It's almost saying whether that's treatment center and a meeting, whatever it is, there is help out there. You just have to be ready to accept it.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's good, and um yeah, one other thing I wanted to say. So we actually also started a nonprofit kind of shameless plug right now.
Speaker 1No, this is great, I didn't know, please.
Speaker 2Yeah, we started a nonprofit called the ash foundation which stands for addict seeking help and uh, basically it's just a really simple idea Anyone who's looking for treatment or help with detox, they can apply to get um sponsorship or funding to go to treatment. And so we actually just had, like a golf tournament fundraiser, raised a bunch of money, got some scholarships from different treatment centers um to help people. So amazing, um, yeah, like.
Speaker 1I've, how do we find that? Is there a website?
Speaker 2Uh yeah, it's kind of in its primitive state at the moment but, yeah, ash-foundationcom Okay, um, right now it's like we're still kind of getting the processes underway.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2We haven't taken our first person through the process, okay, um, but yeah, I mean, we are looking to do that really soon here, where if someone is like in that state where they really need help, um, like I, and I really believe in this idea too, because it's like a lot of times you go to treatment and there's just you know, I, I think I like the idea that someone is ready, right, like they come, they have to apply, they have to send in a letter like say, like hey, I'm ready to change, like an, and like I feel like there's something pure about that idea.
Speaker 2And there's like only one other organization I know of they're called a way out and they they only operate in aspects of Aspen and the kind of like that upper area of Colorado. Um, but we we're looking to do like Denver or Colorado as a whole, um, so that like we can help even more people. But, um, yeah, it's just they, they, when I was talking to them and it's like they actually have higher success rates than any other like treatment center, because it's like they they're getting people that are specifically, they're not like their parents are telling them they got to go, or or the you know the courts are like you got to go to treatment. It's like all the people that come to them are. Like people write a letter. They express like I'm going to follow whatever protocol you guys recommend for me, wherever you want me to go to treatment.
Speaker 3like I'll do it right.
Speaker 2That person is, like the, I think, probably the most likely to succeed, and so they have like 75% of their people have gotten to years, so they've got to track track of that, yeah, and I think that's really inspiring and so I'm really grateful that they're going to help me kind of get some of the use, some of their same processes, um. But yeah, that's kind of what we're also working on at the moment.
Speaker 1That's. I'm so glad you brought that up. I wouldn't have wanted to miss that and you know it's not shameless play of like. I love the fact that you guys are now doing that to help other people remove that financial burden, if you can, or at least some of it, if you know, because that's a big hurdle for a lot of people to get help. I can afford it and so, yeah, if you're listening to this, give, give to this foundation. Help other people to have stories like you guys, because this is this is why we do what we do. I mean, this is this is our, your story is our, why this is what we show up every day at valiant to do and and, like I said earlier, we're just so incredibly proud of you guys and so much hope, so much inspiration and, um man, it's just all good things from here on out for you guys and your family and, hopefully, growing family. And you know we're not.
Speaker 1We're not releasing any information here, but there could be more in the future, we never know. But, uh, I tell you what you better let Jill and listen out first.
Speaker 2Yeah, or you'll be in trouble. We kind of want to try another, just to like it wasn't exactly the smoothest experience.
Speaker 3Let's run this one back, yeah.
Speaker 1Plus, he deserves a sibling you know, she would be a great big sister.
Speaker 2She can't be the center of attention, yeah.
Speaker 1Guys, thanks for sharing your story. This has been amazing.
Speaker 3Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2Thank you for having us, of course, really grateful to be here and thanks for having us. Yeah.
Speaker 1Well, we appreciate you listening to this episode of the Valiant Living podcast and our hope is that it helped you feel educated, encouraged and even empowered on your journey towards peace and freedom. If we can serve you or your loved one in any way, we'd love to have a conversation with you. You can call 720-756-7941 or email admissions at ValiantLivingcom. At Valiant Living, we treat the whole person so you not only survive, but you thrive in the life you deserve. And finally, if this episode has been helpful to you, it would mean a lot to us if you had subscribed and even share it with your friends and family. You can also follow along with us on Instagram and Facebook by simply searching Valiant Living. Thanks again for listening and supporting the Valiant Living podcast. We'll see you next week.
