Hello and welcome to addiction truths brought to you by country road Recovery Center. I'm your host, Chris Rosenbrin, in this podcast series, we delve deep into the profound impact of addiction on families. We share insights, experiences and advice on navigating this challenging journey before we begin a gentle reminder to our valued listeners, while we deeply appreciate your engagement and encourage you to reach out with questions, comments or concerns, please refrain from posting the names of family members who are currently in our program or who have been in the past. Your discretion helps us maintain the privacy and safety of all involved. We're here to offer support, answer questions and build a community of understanding and healing. So let's start the conversation and bring some truths about addiction into the life. Thanks everybody for joining us this month on the addiction truth podcast, we have a very special guest, Amy LaRue, it's the first time that we've ever had a guest on this podcast. And I thought, Who better than Amy? Well,
01:07
thank you. I'm honored to be the first guest. Thank you guys. It's going
01:11
to be a lot of fun. I'm really looking forward to our conversation, so I know we'll go into a little bit more in depth towards the end, about, you know what? What organization she's from, she's from finding hope and and we're really we've been country road has been supporting finding hope for several years now. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun getting to get into ride this recovery journey within and getting to see them grow. There's a lot of good things happening for finding hope. A lot of fun, cool. Um, I'm just going to jump right in. Go first. I want to get to know you a little bit better. Yeah, we've had several conversations off, off the cut off the recording, but it should be a good time to really take a deep dive. So the first question I really want to ask and and dive into, and dive into, I want to learn a little bit more about your experience. What has what's been your experience with addiction? And has addiction been something that is that that you've struggled within your own
02:12
absolutely so just to back up a little bit is, I married my high school sweetheart in 2005 and you know, we started our life together. All the things started a family did all that. We moved from Kansas to Oklahoma City, and, you know, both started our careers, had two girls, and then all of a sudden, I felt a shift in our home. And I didn't know what that shift was. I just knew it felt uneasy. I felt like I was didn't know what I was going to come home to with my husband. I felt like I had to walk on like the egg shells I was trying to keep calm and the peace and all of that. And I started to see some shift in his behaviors as well. Again, not knowing what it was, he would come home, he'd be asleep. He wasn't joining us for dinner. He just wasn't a present dad anymore, her husband and so, you know, we I did what I knew best is I started trying to figure out what was going on. You know, I thought he had something wrong with his stomach, because he was getting sick a lot. I thought he had a brain tumor because he was slurring his words all these things. And then in March of 2015 I finally got my answer, and I had found him out in our garage, and in his workbench was a bunch of empty Doctor bottles he was trying to so that's when I realized, okay, he's been using alcohol. What does that mean, though? Like, is he an alcoholic? You know what? I didn't know any anything about it at the time.
03:52
Yeah, so when you when, when leading up to that, when you're having these feelings and and you knew something was off, did you ever question at times,
04:03
yeah, absolutely. I thought, well, if, if I did this, if I did that, all these ifs, if I was a better wife, what am I not doing as a wife, and if I kept the house cleaner, if I, you know, kept the girls quieter, if I stopped asking him all these questions, and not questions about, like, what's going on, more questions along the lines of, like, you know, normal everyday life, like, Hey, can you take the trash out? Type of things, you know, those, maybe if I stopped, what I felt like was nagging. It wasn't necessarily looking back now I wasn't nagging, but thinking about I nabbed too much. Maybe that was what was driving him to act that way. So I'm
04:44
going to take a quick pause. I just got a phone call. I want to make sure that I started recording, so I'm just going to add that this little, this little time frame, but I don't want to go the rest of okay, sorry we were doing so. It there, what I thought was the whole recording for So, sorry,
05:10
um, you, I wanted to ask a full question, because you had said that, especially in hindsight, there was some sort of shift in the energy or the home. How? Did like thinking about that shift? What were the things that changed in your relationship with him during that shift, before you found out about the alcohol abuse, and what were the ways that you saw relationships change between him and your children
05:39
so the first one was like, he just wasn't asking. He wasn't like, to back up like I would. I had that as a school, school teacher at the time, right? And he wasn't always asking me all the questions like a husband would ask. I saw that shift like it was all he was just in his own world, in a sense, and doing his own thing. And I would try to get conversation going, or try, and then I kind of just like, it's not worth the try anymore, like maybe there is something like Pierce was asking, like, something I was doing wrong, so I was trying to figure out, what can I do to fix this shift? Because I didn't feel like we were, like we were like a husband and wife anymore. We're more roommates, in a sense. Does that make sense? Yeah. And then with our kids, he wasn't doing like we would. We were very always to family dinner like at night. That was something that's really important to us, to make sure we all sat around the table and had dinner. And he stopped doing that so much he would need to go to bed and lay down during that and so he wasn't always taking our girl, taking reading stories to our girls, or taking them to bed, or coming and watching some of their activities, their extracurricular activities.
06:57
So like, definitely, like a shift in the feelings of emotional embassy, yes, with everybody in time investments and the communication, or kind of three things, yeah, it's tough,
07:14
yeah, and I didn't know what was going on. Like, you don't know. And I tell people a lot, like, you gotta give yourself grace you don't know what you don't know, and until you do know. And then it's like, I was trying to, I went on that path which I'm going to figure this out. I'm a fixer, right? I'm going to fix this going on. And then when I found the alcohol, I'm like, How do I fix this?
07:37
I was thinking you probably had a huge increase in your own anxiety.
07:41
Oh yeah, oh yeah. I was, I tell people all the time that's year, that school year, too, was one of my most challenging school years here. I had a very challenging class, so I just like to put in perspective, like it was challenging at school, it was challenging at home, all the way over around, right? And I wasn't telling anybody, you know, I knew my husband was doing some anxiety and depression during that time and but so was I. I think I was dealing with more the anxiety side, and the way I coped with it was I couldn't eat. So I got super skinny. I mean, I would try to eat, but I couldn't. So I was, like, probably the skinniest I've ever been. And I also stopped, you know, doing things with my friends, like, take because I was afraid, if I leave the house with my husband, with the kids, are they going to be okay? Yeah? Like, I just won't go. I just won't take care of myself. I'll make sure everything's okay at home, and then I make sure all my students and we're okay in the classroom, yeah.
08:42
So throughout this, you know, I've got, of course, I've got family that's that's in recovery, still struggling with addictions, lots of friends that are both on both sides of the spectrum. But I'm primarily going to speak on just my struggle with addiction and and kind of that correlating side with what you're talking about. Because there were a lot of times where I hid, I hid this from my family, and I can think back on all the ways that I tried to hide it and all the excuses that I made up of like I just don't I just don't feel good today. There's not I'm not myself today. I'm just just a little off. That's what you're seeing. My eyes are red because I haven't gotten any sleep. You know, that was another one that I did, but a lot. And within that there was a lot of shame and guilt. Yeah, there's a lot of shame and guilt, because there's part of it where it's like, I don't want to do this. I don't want to be living this way. I don't want to have to tell these lies. And there was another, there was another part that was, I think, a little bit stronger than that, where it's like, I have no other way. I have no other solution to the problem. You know, this is just, this is the way life, this is the way life has been for me for a long time. I realize that it's accelerating, but it's hard to stop. And, you know, there was, it was really like it was tough. You know, being on this side, it was tough. I can certainly hear the pain, though, and and what that was, what that was like. Trying to control the chaos at home and the classroom and, you know, balancing all these things. I'm sure, it really put a stop to self care
10:08
absolutely like, and I felt like I was carrying such a heavy weight on my shoulders, like I couldn't, didn't know how to lift, take that heavy lift off my shoulders. Yeah,
10:21
what was, what led you up to that point where you saw the need for recovery
10:28
Absolutely. So when I found the alcohol in the garage, right, I didn't know what to do. I just, I rose, to be honest, like I was like, Yeah, what do I do with this, right? Like I said earlier, he was seeing alcohol if you're not, and he stopped counseling at that point, and he got sober for about a month, and I was like, Okay, we're gonna this is gonna be fixed, right? Like, he admitted that he was drinking. He's seen a counselor. It's all gonna be fixed. Well, I started seeing those behaviors again after about a month, and this was at the end of the school year now, so I was stressed on survival mode. Gotta get through the school year, and then I'll worry about whatever's going on over here in the summer. Well, that summer came, and it was miserable for me. I would escape to Kansas, where my family lives, and take the girls with me and escape. But I also remember one night, my husband, he did join us for dinner, but he had group counseling that night, and so I he was in bed again, which he still is denying that he was using. And I was like, you gotta get up. You gotta and I actually started writing, I'm gonna call your dad like, maybe I threatened him like me, I think as loved ones don't realize that we're manipulating as well in that sense. And so I looking back now, that's what I was doing. And I finally got him in the car and took him to his group counseling and came back, and I just saw called my mom because I'm like, my mom will fix it, right? Mom, fix the girls. And I tell people that was when I feel like I hit my place of desperation, or my rock bottom, whatever terminology you want to use, because I knew at that like what I was doing wasn't working, wasn't working for him, but it wasn't working for me and my family, the girls, right? And so that was the moment I was like, okay, maybe I need to seek counseling myself too. And so the next day, I actually called my husband's counselor, and he recommended someone else in the office. We weren't seeing the same one, and I started going to counseling, but again, I went more I thought I was going for myself. I also skating for like, how do I fix my husband? And I just continue to think, Okay, if I take counseling. But I was at that place, like, I am miserable. I was, you know, you're talking about how you were feeling. And I did actually some research and just taught about it last night. Like I have the guilt, I have the shame, I was isolating. I was going through all the same things My husband was going through. But then I was finally at the place where I was sick and tired of being sick and tired myself as a loved one. And so I started seeing getting counseling. And then there was this one weekend my husband ended up at the ER and he was over like, three times the legal limit, and my mother in law and father in law were once actually took him and tried to give me his keys, and I said, He's not coming home. And I think that's when I finally learned what a boundary was. I didn't know that at the time, and I told him that he was in a sober state, like you can't come home and tell you are healthy. And I didn't know what healthy meant, yeah, but I knew what I what was happening wasn't good. His counselor at that time recommended rehab for the first time, and so I had called when it was laying he had come to our church, and I called him for some recommendations for rehabs, and that's when he flipped it on me and said, Here's some stuff for your husband, but you need something too, and to be honest here, so I was like, I don't need help. I'm not going to pour the roots down. But I did. I was so sick, and I hated the way I was feeling, and I hated how our family felt, like if it was like the kids and all of that. So I watched my first time in COVID and started this journey on my own recovery, whether my husband over here got sober and in recovery or not, I started the path of recovery for myself.
14:47
Were there points along the way through restoring me? Were you like felt super angry the
14:54
whole time? Yes, I think, I mean, I was very angry. I i. Especially once, I think once I found that alcohol, I that I was very angry, and then when he had this relapse, and I thought, Oh, he's gonna be fixed, right? And then it started again. And he was lying to me, but deep down, I knew he was using and at that point, even had, like, a little breathalyzer to use at home, and he had learned how to trick that, of course. And so it just that the anger just built up. And that's why I, in the summer, I would escape to Kansas, because I was so angry I wanted out of it, and that was a place I could retreat. And actually, my mom and dad could take care of me like, you know, I that was the place I can kind of just let him go. And I was honestly angry when he went to rehab, yeah, to be honest. Like, I mean, I remember driving him down to rehab and like, what are we doing? What? What? What? This isn't how I visioned our life, right? And looking back, I was great. I was doing that, the grieving through it all. Um, so absolutely, I had
16:02
somebody ask me group today, is it okay that my wife is angry that I'm here? And I was like, I would expect her probably to be at least on some level, like, and that's okay, and you need to be okay with that, like this is the whole part of the dynamic and the process that happens. Because one thing we talk about, I'm sure this was your experience that, like, we want to honor the fact that, especially with treatment centers like ours, it's 90 days that's a long commitment for somebody to step away from family, away from work, away from home and come in and put in the work for 90 days to be here. But the flip side of that coin is that's a really long time for family members to say, I need you to go do this. I want to hold the fort down. And I would think as a spouse, I certainly would have that my first instinct being, oh, you get to go do your little spa retreat for 90 days, and I'll stay here and take care of everything while you're gone, that there would be potential for alarms. And
17:08
they're they're so it's just a weird feeling, because I talk to a lot of people too, and it's like you're angry, but you also, in the sense, is like I can breathe, yeah, at the same time, because it's like the chaos isn't going on, but yet, and I felt the same way. I'll never forget my husband called me every half and he had just had a second massage. I was like, you had a lot,
17:32
and I'm here with the
17:39
two. The first one was free. This is funny, I pay you for I'm like, Come on, dude. So I got a bit more angry at that. But, yeah, but what? And I have a and I tell white of this, and all the time is, this is a short time. Yes, 90 days feels like a long time, but like after rehab, my husband also went to a silver lining, and he was actually angry at that where I wasn't and because he thought he got to just come back home and so but you gotta process it at treatment with his counselor and all that. But I always said, This is a short time to have the rest of our lives together, right? Um, even though I didn't fully understand it when he went to treatment for 30 days and then he went to sober loot, I still didn't know. But I started to learn, like, if I want to have the rest of our lives, we have just been married 10 years like it was the worst anniversary ever. Our 10th anniversary we celebrate was the worst one. And to have 2030, 4050, more years, I had to let that happen, and I That's why I needed my own recovery, my own support group for I could share in a safe environment, non judgmental with people about how I am billing and all of that. You touched
19:09
on some really important things. And I want to, I want to backtrack just a little bit. And when you had, you had said that your husband went to therapy or and he was getting better for a month, and then it all fell apart. And then you found, you found Finding Hope, right? And did you find Finding Hope before he got sober?
19:29
I so when I called Lance about finding rehab, so pretty much the same time when he went to rehab, I was my first finding hope gotcha.
19:40
Gotcha is one thing that I see often in my in my experience with working with families at Country Road and seeing the experiences just across the spectrum, a lot of loved ones don't get sober, but that doesn't mean that there's not hope for the loved ones. To find like, to dive into their own recovery and find hope for themselves. You experience that,
20:04
yeah, I see it all the time too. And I mean, like, it's like, like I said, I used to be a teacher instead of like, I got to always see the light bulb come on. And I loved that about teaching. But I get to see that up finding hope too. I get to see like, when I walked into my first time in hope meeting, I was very angry. I was very like, like Lancelot told me, like Amy, I didn't even want to talk to just how I, you know, because my face, even though I pretended like everything was okay, because I made sure my hair, my makeup, my clothes, are perfect. Going into that meeting that I saw people smiling, and that made me even more angry, because I was hurting so deep down, like, Do you not know what I've been going through? My husband just went to rehab. How can you guys be smiling? But they have started to find healing and that community, and they have learned how to like, detach from that chaos that was going on and learn how to lean on the people in that room, to be able to smile again. And I knew I wanted that so bad, I wanted that, so I kept going and kept going and kept going. Yeah, so
21:14
as you begin, there's one of the scariest things that we can do is walk into a meeting where we don't know anybody, we don't know what's going to happen, we don't know what we're going to see. And we walk in there, we see a whole bunch of smiling faces, and we're told to come back. And you know that first meeting, it's a lot to take in. It's a whole lot, and maybe you're not even really listening. You're just kind of there, yeah, and then you come back, and you keep coming back. And so as you're as that, as that first initial brush with it was over. What did the recovery process look like as you started to walk in to find a boat?
21:55
So when I first walked in, I tell people all the time. I don't know what was said the first probably six to nine months at those meetings, just because there's just so much going on, you know. And I did my I my world had flipped upside down, you know. And I talked about that grief, you know. I was grieving. I went through the anger. I was grieving what I thought our advice were going to look like. And now here I am. I used to say that, like, I have to give up my Tuesday nights now, like, and I say that, but now I'm like, I get to go right and and so those first six to nine months I was there. But then, you know, people would use these terms codependency. I'm like, okay, enabling, okay. I kind of knew they talked about boundaries. They talked about all these different things. I'm like, That's too over. It was kind of overwhelming, to be honest, but I kept going because I wanted what other people have, and it was a place where finding hope at the beginning of our meetings, we get the chance to actually share how we are doing. And these people understood how I was doing, where my best friend over here truly probably didn't understand what I was doing. She meant well and all of that, but she didn't understand. But I was able, I knew each week, each time I went in, I would be able to get to share how I was doing and why, and so that began my healing process, and this was my starting to become my new family. And, you know, like I said, I was going to sober living, and then when he was transitioning out, that was another very scary time, because it's like, Okay, I've learned I am no longer his therapist. I am no I cannot be his AA sponsor. I'm not his doctor or nurse and all these things I took on. And so it's like when he's in the sober living they helped keep him accountable, and did all that, you know, and so that's what I thought was so important that, like, I got to continue to work on myself while he went to rehab and to sober living so that when he came back home and transitioned back home, I would be a healthier version of myself. I don't know if I answered
24:11
one of the things that I think people don't understand about any type of support group before they go is that it's you can get help from people without the lived experience of something like I'm a prime example of that. I work here. I've never had an alcohol or drug problem, right? So I'm not saying that you can't get help from people that don't have the shared experience, but in a support group setting, one of the most powerful factors of that is the shared common suffering that you've experienced really builds cohesion and unity amongst that support group, and feels much different than support you would get from somebody that doesn't have a lived experience and. Think having that and balancing that with other types of professional help
25:04
well. And one other thing Derek is the one thing I have found too, and I talk to people all the time, that that I talk to on the phone is like I knew that would be the place I would have start to open up or in with my therapist, that sometimes you just don't want to always be talking about it. And so I knew this would be a place that I would can talk about it, you know. And sometimes I tell people, at night, I don't know if you agree with this, like doing all those readings, doing everything at night makes it almost harder to sleep at night, because your brain is going like a hipster wheel. And so I even tell people, find a different time to do the reading, or have a boundary when you're going to do all this research no time. And so sometimes, when I'm with my friends, I just want to be their grant. I know they mean, well, yeah, and so, but sometimes I just don't want to talk about it. And so, like, I know that I can be with people, and I know this is going to be the time I can talk about
26:00
- Yeah, I think, I think we all go through that experience, whether we've we've lost a loved one, and we've been through a divorce, or whatever that might be, that we feel like every time we see somebody power in a champ, and at some point you're kind of like, can we just hang out and watch the game or not talk about, yeah, you know, it's funny, because you're addressing a couple things that have come up today with clients that we have here, because another one is super living. And I'd like to get your opinion on this, the biggest, maybe not the biggest. That was probably a little bit hyperbole, some of the larger barriers that we encounter with trying to get our clients motivated to go to sober living are people who have spouses at home and have children at home and feel like a sober living commitment is is further abandonment of what I've got going on at home. What was that decision making process like for you and your husband to decide Sober Living versus not? And we're, did you guys feel a little bit of that, or what was that
27:09
like? So I have got, like I said, it's my first finding hope meeting while he was at rehab. And to be honest, that's the first time I had heard, you know, we talked about the basis, the detox, the treatment, and then the base is so reliving, and I might be in the minority on this. So when I heard like there's a sober living he didn't have to come home, I was like, what? It was almost relief. It was scary, because here I am a school teacher in the state of Oklahoma. We don't get paid very much with two young kids, one still in childcare, we're paying a mortgage, we're paying all these bills, and then the extra expense of paying for a sober living, that was stressful and plus paying for counseling and all the other things we're doing. But once I started as I was about learning about this and knowing the biggest thing was knowing, like I didn't have to keep my husband accountable. Where through that. And so once I had heard about sober living, and started doing some talking and asking the questions at finding hope and talking to other members and learning more about what that looks like. And I'll be honest, I thought it was like, not what soberly was. I thought it was, I was just gonna be a house right? Like my old, old Amy thought, yeah, right. And no, I didn't realize they would go to meetings. There have been House meetings. They would, you know, drug test and do all these things. Yeah? So what I did, I called his counselor at his rehab and just kind of said, what's the aftercare? Because I'm learning all these terminologies, right? Like, what is aftercare? Like? I really don't want him to come home. So I actually had the conversation with his counselor, and that's when she was like, Okay, I'll talk to him and schedule a phone call if I need to, because he wasn't able to have a cell phone where he was, and so he was very angry at me. And she like, I was really anxious for that phone call, and when I saw the number, when I thought, assumed it was because we don't know the number, and she was like, he's there, and he doesn't want to talk to you right now, but I knew he's in a safe place. So he had to come to the realization after talking to others in his rehab and in the small group that had gone to rehab a couple times, like, what was the missing piece for them? You know, continuing, you know, having that relapse and having to come back, and a lot of them were encouraging to him to go to sober living. Now he went like, I let him decide which sober living. Yeah, you know, I didn't know very much, but his counselor and him did their research together. I talked to his counselor up here in Oklahoma City, and they found a place for him to go. Of here.
30:00
How long did he do sober living before he eventually came back
30:04
home, three months, three months. But when I get how
30:06
did it be totally different? Yeah, but that's still, I mean, that's almost the exact same thing that I said to clients, like, hey, even a three month commitment Sober Living eases the transition, versus not going at all. Like, commit to three months, see where you're at, if you need if you need more, if you're ready, you're ready. But to to bypass that, I think, makes things a lot harder. Well, I
30:31
think, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, like he was in this safe place, in his place only 30 days. Yeah. So his rehab is only 30 days, and kind of like, out here in middle like, yeah, I felt like I was in middle of nowhere. Okay, thank
30:47
you. That's why I was on. It's really hard to walk, yeah,
30:50
but that's where he was, right? He didn't have a cell phone. He but, and so it's like, Okay, we're gonna go from this nice, structured, I've learned these tools, going back to real life with a wife, two kids, a dog, dogs, plus dress sometimes, and a job, right? And it's like, yeah. And for me, it it was just a relief, because it's like, Yes, I wanted him to continue to go to AA meetings and do all this stuff, and I was scared he came home. He wouldn't, yeah, and so, so it's good for him to go and do that. Was it? Was it hard sometimes, yes, did my kids come down with the stomach bug while he was there? It was blood dyed tears, because mama doesn't handle stomach but absolutely, Were there times I wish he was home, yes, but then in the back of the line, I had to keep reminding This is a short time for the rest of our lives. There's
31:45
a very important component to sober living that certainly was my experience. It was because treatment is that, is that like step one and step one into changing the rest of your life, but it's a very short period of time. It's 30 days for your husband, it was 90 days for me. And then we get put back into the real world, where we're expected to get the therapy, go to counseling, we're expected to have the job, we're expected to know what recovery, you know, kind of what recovery, long term recovery program we're going to get into. But with all that's very confusing, and it was for me, you know, I didn't understand a lot of the lingo that these guys were using. What, you know, what's, what is aa, what is, what is, what are these things? What does it mean to to have this for the rest of my life? What I got when I went into sober living was examples of that. And so I got, I got to kind of grab one of the coattails of the men that came before me and follow them to the meetings that they were going to, the higher quality meetings that they knew of, yeah, and then get introduced to the people that they knew. And so I kind of had a shoe in to where, if that, if I hadn't have been with those guys, it would have been a very lonely process of going in there, you know, being being a little freaked out, maybe even sitting in the back, because I don't know anybody yet, but going in there with buddies I had, you know, I already had people to talk to, so it wasn't most instant
33:09
community, yeah, instant community, yeah, yeah. And community is hard for us to build, yeah, like, it's like as adults especially, I think sometimes that's what I miss about being a kid and teenagers, how easy it is to, like, meet people and friends and do all those things, but the further you get into adulthood, it's like you throw yourself into a room full of strangers, and our natural instinct is just to kind of sit back and for ourselves, yeah, and going from treatment like all the way back home, I think You miss opportunities to develop that community as quickly as you live in silver living, I kind of, as you guys were talking, I was thinking about like having, like an orthopedic surgery, right where it's like, if I had a knee surgery, I'm not going to have a knee surgery and immediately go back to life as I knew it before my knee surgery. I'm going to have to go to physical therapy in between. And like treatments of kind of like surgery and silver linings, kind of like physical therapy, and then you're ready for it really is things back to normal. That's a very good, yeah, that's, that's really, you said two of the things I thought were really important. One is, well, one is that you guys are just an example, that a barrier to silver living is just a barrier it's not a block. And if you're wanting to make the decision to do that, it can be done whether you're married or whether you have children, or whether, you know, I had another client of mine when I had my outpatient office who was married and had two teenagers, and, you know, lived in Evan, and he went to silver living, I think, for maybe eight months or so before he eventually made the transition back home and work for him too. So it can work no matter what your circumstances are. But the second one is, as you said, that he talked to his counselor and he talked to the people that he was in treatment with and had community with, and that's one of the things I was telling people in group today, any decision. That we make on our own has a high probability to be a poor decision. Make decisions in the context of your community. Make decisions with the people in your life that care about you and that you're doing life with, whether that's in a treatment setting or even at a setting back home. Like if you're in treatment, like the people that you're in groups with listen to their feedback. Like, if everybody in group is telling you you should go to sober living. You should probably listen to them. Yeah, right, like, but even if not like, I want to, if I have an important decision to make, I want to talk to my wife and my dad, my brother and people that I go to church with, and the people that I do life with, and if all of them are telling me, hey, I don't know if that's the right job for you, even if I think it's the right job for me, I should probably listen like use those resources and those things.
35:44
Yeah, they can say something that you don't say. They almost always do. Yeah,
35:52
I'm so happy you're here. Yeah, it's so good. They just catch up with you and talk. You know, I guess really, what we've we've gone out, oh, oh, I was thinking at one point your story, you were talking about books. You're talking about reading books. And then you also mentioned how, like, you're not the therapist, you're not the doctor. It sounds like there were some tools involved in that, like some spiritual tools that you were learning along the process. Well, a lot
36:21
of it all came down to going to these support groups, signing up support groups, and I did Al Anon at the time. So I did, like, a mix, and so I haven't really talked about what finding hope is, but, like, I knew I needed stuff, I needed to learn, and I'm a learner, like, that's money, I mean, by nature, yeah. And I'm a fixer, right? But I learned new at this time I was the student, like I need to be the student and learn this is all new. And so, you know, I did. I again in my groups, listening to the people around me and learning from them. And, you know, just taking in what I was learning at both Al Anon and finding hope and then applying it to my my own recovery and my own life. And, you know, a lot of it, though, not just the things I've learned isn't just for my husband. I've learned it for my group of everyone, like my own family, my co workers. All of it like I've learned I don't need to go in and fix other people's problems that codependency of me like, you know, I just sometimes we just forget. We need ears to listen, right? Um, I've learned I need to set boundaries for certain people in my life, whether that's a boundary on my phone, like I've started setting Do Not Disturb from 10 to seven. I need that for myself. Um, learning, you know, like I can tell I call it crazy. Amy starts to come out. Like I can tell him crazy. Amy starts, is about to come out. I can know my triggers, but this is stuff I've learned. It's like, okay, what do I need to do? Okay? Like, I need to start walking again, right? And actually, just this week, I reached out to my therapist. I'm like, okay, I can feel, I can feel her coming back out. And so it's like, and that being transparent with you guys here, you know, been doing this for nine years, and it's like, Okay, it's time for me. I need my counselor right now. So I have appointment next week with my counselor. So, you know, it's one of those, and that's what she's there for. Like, I'm with her. And then when I feel like, you know, I can go walk away, but I know she's just a text away saying, hey, I need to come back in. Yeah. And so knowing that is really important to me, and, you know, I'm a believer of faith, and so that's got me through a lot of that this as well. And then, like, Just think, if you're like, that was my prayer through this. Like, like, how, what am I going to do with this, right? Like, how I was scaling initially, like when I was in my I before I went to the ER with my husband, I dropped our kids off, and I told my friends Sarah, like, I don't want another wife to feel like I'm feeling I don't want someone to go through this all alone, like I was going through it all alone, and I didn't know what that looked like, or any of that, if my husband's gonna get sober or not, but I knew, like, what I was feeling. I didn't want anyone to feel that way. And so, like, I just prayed, like, how we're gonna use this. And then, you know, I started going to the meetings, and now, like, I'm crazy leading these support groups like across the country. Let's
39:18
dive into that. Let's see what what was your
39:21
before? We didn't, because I knew that that's going to move us in a different direction. I just wanted to ask, yeah. I would regret not asking, yeah. You mentioned it. You mentioned being a person of faith. Through a process like this, it can be particularly challenging, whether it creates spiritual doubts or those type things. How would you say going through all this has actually changed your faith now, as opposed to maybe what it would have been before all this happened?
39:54
Yeah, absolutely. So I grew up in church like i. Probably more I was in church, right? Like, and I would actually say, you know, you hear people talk about this, but, like, it's, I see it go. I see both two ways. People, when they go through storm, they either go away or they dig deeper, right? I was the dig deeper. Like, I didn't know who to talk to about it. And like, at night I was saying, like, when I called my mom, I also just remember crying myself to sleep, crying to God, like, like, literally saying, I don't know what to do, like, I don't know what to do. And so it's actually like I had to cling to Him and His hope, hope in Jesus. Like I had to cling to that. And that is truly what got me through it. Or, like, even today, when I'm like, not sure what's going on, sometimes like, give me peace about it, or open my eyes. And so like, I had to cling to that into my prayer life, through this whole process, you know? And I'm not saying like, it's been easy peasy, sure, like my husband relapsed in 2020, and through that, like, because of finding hope and the tools I had, and I didn't go searching, which would old Amy would have gone searching. I had prayed, Lord, just give me peace if he has or if he hasn't, or opened my eyes, and I just kept praying that, and I found a receipt when I was doing laundry like I didn't go searching. And I was like, Okay. And then I was like, how do I respond to this? Yeah, right. Old. Anyone could have texted a picture and made him sweat, right? Everyone would have not sweat. He would have come home. But I called people. I called my Al Anon sponsor, I called a finding hoper, and I talked through it, I prayed through it, and I had my boundaries in place. And so that evening, I was able to talk to my husband about it, but I actually peace it up, and I think a lot of it came from my faith and leaning on God through it all.
41:58
We do hold a whole separate podcast about this, but now I'm curious that was that a relapse that was stress induced, related to pandemic things? Because 2020, was a crazy year. That's when all that happened. It could be totally unrelated.
42:13
That's his. And so it's hard for me to know, like, really, honestly, I think there's, there's multiple things from my perspective, but he might have a different story, you know, I think part of it was after he wasn't relaxing, he wasn't calling his sponsor. You know, I my counselor once told me, we all have anchors. I have anchors for my recovery over here, and if my anchor starts to pop, I can go into that relapse. Yeah, he has anchors over here for his and I slowly started seeing his popping. He wasn't going, Yes, it was the summer 2020 but he did somehow get a five year chip through his relapse. Yeah. Anyways, that's, yeah, I've worked through that. But, you know, I that was part of it, you know, I think the anxiety and all that, like he was working through all of like he was an essential.
43:07
Yeah, I had my outpatient office when all that was going on, and I had a lot of clients who developed new drinking habitual problems during the pandemic, because all of a sudden they were working from home. They didn't have to go to the office. And what used to be like, Oh, I had some wine periodically here and there was, oh, I'm drinking a bottle and a half a day. And I didn't even realize it for four or five months, because I don't have to work. He was still going to work.
43:38
Okay, do like the Zoom meetings, or, you know, any of that, he didn't stay connected to his sponsor. He wasn't, you know, and he, I had seen him, like, start to disconnect from his sponsor before even, yeah, the pandemic came in. So, yeah,
43:54
okay, excellent. Yeah, absolutely.
43:57
We're, we have about 10 minutes, but I really want to hear what your life has been, like, what's your life like now?
44:02
Yeah, so I would love to say it's like, roses, but it like it is, like, I I'm a completely different person. And you know, if you're listening to this and you're in the middle of it, or like your loved ones, like all the out, like, just, is that rehab or that sober learning? Um, it was said to me once, this was a blessing. And I was like, This is not a blessing. I can say today. Yeah, it was a blessing because I have learned so much. Like I said, it wasn't, isn't just with my husband, with my family, and like, I can now say what I need I can now. And I was, I'm a people pleaser. That's just what who I am and but now I can learn say no and say no and be okay with it, instead of oh no no, because dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, you know. But it is like, it is like I have. Compassion towards people as well those that struggle with substances. When I see someone on the street now, like, instead of judging them, I pray for them, and I pray for their family and all that. So, like, I didn't realize I needed recovery, but I'm so grateful of that, because I have found, you know, my new purpose, like purpose. My I can stand up for myself now and and I've learned the importance of responding versus reacting, you know, and healthy, you know, just I have healthier relationships all around that's
45:36
cool. How's moving back in the house, huh? Now, yes, that's good stuff. What's the relationship? Like, what's the relationship that you have with him? Like,
45:47
I mean, I tell people too on, marriage got stronger after addiction, yeah. But I also had to let him do his roto recovery over here and my rota recovery over here. I mean, he has, once in a while, be like, Hey, Amy, like, he tells me things like, Have you done the serenity for him? Like, you know, but, but I had to let let go of that. Like, I've also learned different communications, like I've noticed and, you know, we try to do checkups every once in a while, and checkups, like for our marriage, checkups, like, how are things going? That was what was really huge at the beginning, too, after we got out, like, our marriage, we went back to marriage counseling. And, like, every Saturday, that was our check in day. So I knew it was coming. I didn't have to, you know. And so like, I would share what I was learning, and he could tell me what he was learning in his meetings. So that was pivotal for us, you know. And it's one of those, I knew it was coming on Saturday evenings after the kids went to bed, so the rest of the week, just try to be his wife at the time. And if something would come up, we would communicate that though too.
47:02
It sounds amazing. Sounds very healthy.
47:06
Well, it wasn't me. I did it. We need it to professionals. Yeah, whoa.
47:12
It's a combination of different things. I mean it, part of it, you guys, part of it. You guys were willing to do the work. You guys were willing to take direction. We're willing to, like, lean into hard moments and stuff like that. It's really a success of the community and your higher power more than it is anybody. Probably, yeah, that's
47:32
good. Well, we've been touching on it. Do you have any other questions before we jump into the next segment? So we've been talking a lot about finding hope your experience and before, during and after. You know all these things. What is people tell our listeners Absolutely
47:53
I can go on forever so you can shut me up. Finding Hope is a support group for those that love someone struggling with substances, or I some your loved one can be in treatment. They can be on the streets, incarcerated, or they can be sober. Is there anyone that loves somebody so whether it's your son, your daughter, your husband, we had a husband come last night to a meeting. His wife struggles with alcohol, and we have a lot of step dads that come with their wives, which I love to see that, and we have siblings that come so it's any one of that and that we're here to support. We are faith based. You know, in our meetings are a little bit longer. They're about hour and a half long, where I know, like I don't know, or not, or like an hour, and so most of our meetings meet just twice a month as well, not every week. We have zoom options. We have 50 meetings across the United States, kicking off a meeting in Wyoming this month, and then next month we're kicking off a meeting in Georgia like so we're growing and expanding. But I always tell people, if finding hopes not for them. Find something that is, yeah, find the album. Find the narma. Find Celebrate Recovery and parents, helping parents, whatever that might be. Find that. And so what else is cool that we do find, we hope that's different, is we also offer retreats. And so we have, like, weekend retreats once a year. Next year, I'll be, I can't tell you guys that's gonna be more than that. Buckle down. I am here right? Get ready. And so I just had, like, Y'all just gave me this vision one day, and I went to Atlanta boss, and I was like, Hey, I think I want to do these retreats for these family members, because they go to rehab and get to learn all this stuff, right? It's like we need to be learning too, yeah, and so we it's we bring in speakers, and it's not stuff that we teach at finding hope. So at finding hope, we have guest speakers like yourself, as I think you can too, have been guest speakers, but we also have curriculum we use. And so what we do at Find a. The retreats is completely different, like we don't we want them to know it's gonna be not the same thing at the meetings. And guess what? We have massages. So we do chair massage,
50:11
massages and treatment so,
50:16
but it's just a time of truly allowing them to
50:20
have self care. Yeah, you guys do those retreat law? I can ask about some questions. Do you guys are those, like, kind of Oklahoma based, kind of all over well, or is that a part of the TBD? Okay,
50:30
so we did two this year. Did one in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and we did one in North Carolina. Yeah, that's like a trial. And they'll just say the North Carolina look really well, so just wait till 2025,
50:41
well, hairstyle will both volunteer to leave retreats anywhere where there's beach we were happy to do happy, but another
50:56
part is that I want to have time still. Yeah, okay. Is our hope after loss? We haven't talked about that either. And so we have a grief support group called hope after loss, and this is for anyone who has lost a loved one. And I say to the impact of addiction, maybe they wasn't necessarily an overdose, maybe instead by suicide, maybe their organs to shut down, or whatever that might be because the grief is different. And we had a mom that went to have lost her child to an overdose and went to a retreat for moms of grieving, grieving your child, that stigma of addiction was attached, and people kept saying your daughter had a choice. Mine did not. And when she came back and told me that I was like, that's not a pay so we started our own hope after loss retreats, which then turned into we also have support groups for those groups as well. We're actually having our next hope after loss retreats coming up in October in Tulsa, Oklahoma, for anyone. And we have dads that come. We had a brother that came. There's some spouse that's great. So just another
52:05
resource for people, yeah, that's actually probably filling a needed gap in the sport room at work. So I just realized that you guys added that piece,
52:14
yeah, it is, and just so that they can truly grieve in a safe environment. And my just hearing the stories and then being able to, like, laugh and share without judgment, yeah, you know, is just huge. And just to see, you know, how I talk about I felt way down, just to see when they came, coming on that Friday, and by Sunday they like, I can't get them to leave. Like, honestly, it's the most awkward thing on Sundays.
52:42
After we're done, I've got two people that are not involved in that I think would be really good speakers or support.
52:54
Well, Amy, I really appreciate you coming out. Well, thank you. This is probably, you know, we've, we've done quite a few of these now, and I think this is by my favorite ones. Because, you know, getting to hear your story, getting to hear the impact so important that loved ones hear the story from somebody else that I struggled with the same thing. Me and Derek can talk about it until our face is blue, but there's nothing like true, lived experience from, you know, all the way from the pain of it all to the hope that's, I mean, it's, it's amazing what you
53:33
do well, not finding hope. Or are you gonna say our motto like that is you're not alone. And we want people to know that you're not alone in this. And I think it's important for us to share stories, and I tell people, it's not your fault, and then there's some point there. So yeah, that's great. Thanks for all the individual Yeah, thank you guys for what you are doing out here too. I appreciate it. We
53:55
do our best, yeah, yeah. We'll take time. Thank you everybody for joining us. See ya.