- Drugs
- Faith
I got married and had a few children. I opened up a moving and storage company in 1990, and I made, through the grace of God, tons of money. Life was beautiful, and I had everything a man could want, but I didn’t have any passion or hobbies or anything. One night I sat down with my wife for dinner, and she told me I really needed to find something to do other than work. I would work all day, come home, go to my office and continue to work. Life was all work no play. My wife told me to find a passion, and I said, “I love helping people.”
I’m in recovery, and I’ve been in it coming up on 11 years. I wanted to open up a treatment center in 2006, but I wanted to do it for the money, and God didn’t let it happen. It wasn’t the right time. Last year I decided to do something to help. I have a couple of children that smoke pot and drink, and I can’t help them until they want help. I made a decision to open a treatment center, and it happened.
I am a kid from the Bronx who was pronounced dead almost 30 years ago. I overdosed and was pronounced dead. They put me in a body bag and everything. When they went to lift the body bag, my body hyperventilated. I got a slow pulse, and they rushed me to the hospital. I was dead again on arrival, and 10 minutes later they brought me back. I remember waking up two or three days later with my whole family around me crying. I was in this plastic tent with tubes in my mouth and nose. I remember trying to ask if I was going to live. That opened my eyes, but I went back to New York and got right back into the same thing. Luckily I got arrested and went to jail for seven months. I just didn’t want that way of life, and I moved to Florida, where my sister lives.
I opened a treatment center because I love it. I feel that I can give back what was freely given to me. 12-step support groups tell you, “You can only keep what you have by giving it away.” I have an open-door policy, and we’re always there. I’ll love my patients until they love themselves. We’re a 16 bed facility, and we work on it a little differently than most. We’ll call you for your crap. We don’t discharge you, but you’ll experience consequences like not going to the beach with us, not playing paintball with us or not going on a boat ride with us. I think that has more of an effect. If we kick patients out, they’ll go use. These kids are 19, 20 and 21 years old, and they don’t know anything except what they know on the street, and that is all wrong. Parents sometimes give up, because they can’t handle it anymore. I know, because my parents did it to me. They just weren’t able to help. Tough love works, but you have to show them you love them first. I tell the kids, “I’m not here for the money.” I love the kids in my treatment center. I love hanging out with them. Everybody has to share, as there’s no hiding. I take my clients to an outside meeting every single day, because you need to hear how everyone else struggles and how bad it is out there. Getting someone to quit drugs is easy, but keeping them off drugs is not.
I don’t throw you out, if your insurance runs out. We had a kid who came in without insurance, and we kept him 88 days. One of the therapists put him into our transitional living program which is only a couple of apartments and only for my clients. If you graduate, you get to go there. Graduation takes as long as it takes from 30 days to 70 days. We try to give clients a foundation that won’t collapse. You can’t build on top of a foundation that isn’t steady. We keep in touch with our clients, and they all have my cell phone number and are welcome to call anytime.
I stay in the middle of my recovery, because, if you get too close to the edge, you risk falling off. I go to my meetings, but I should do more. My sponsor told me that two meetings a week is good, and I’m not very good at getting to more than two. I spend a lot of time with my clients and in my facility. I love it, and I love being with them. I guess I’m like their big brother, and it’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done in my life. I’ve made millions of dollars and had everything a man could ever want, but nothing is more rewarding than one of these kids hugging me. People look at me like I’m nuts, but I don’t care. If I make money, I give back. I take clients to the thrift shop, and I let them go crazy. I take them three at a time. A lot of these kids having nothing except their parent’s insurance. I tell them I want to be their last stop, and I don’t want to see them back.
Recovery is a wonderful thing. God is good. If you have a higher power, He’s going to take care of you. Have faith.
I got clean, when I was 44, and I love where I am today. No matter how bad my day is, it’s wonderful. It doesn’t matter what happens; it’s a great day. All three of my children have hearts of gold. Both my wife and I love to help out. I’m the happiest guy in the world.
Life still shows up, don’t get me wrong, but at the end of the day I love my life.