My fiancé was arrested, and I started living with his brother in Auburn who was using methamphetamine and cocaine through IV use. He started becoming verbally abusive and I connected with an emergency DV shelter in Auburn through DSS. While in the shelter housing, I was isolated because I wasn’t allowed to have contact with anyone for safety reasons. I started using again and I had a train ticket sent to me to see my family for Christmas. At this point, I was connected to a recovery house owner on Long Island who informed me that I can come to Long Island, attend a 28-day treatment facility, and then engage in women’s recovery housing. I changed my train ticket to Long Island and was able to be admitted to NUMC for detox.
While in NUMC, I connected with FCA’s Sherpa Program to help find placement in an inpatient treatment facility for Substance Use Disorder. Sherpa worked with me and my Social Worker at the hospital, who was relentless. She had sent several referral packets to facilities that were unable to accept me due to my medical comorbidities and need for walking assistance. I was told I needed a hospital level of care due to these comorbidities, but there were no beds available at the appropriate facilities and many had a wait list for bed accessibility that was longer than a week. FCA’s Sherpa Program connected me to CHAMP to help find alternative facilities for my treatment. Sherpa, CHAMP, my Social Worker, and I worked as a team to find placement in a treatment facility. My Social Worker also reassured me that I would not be discharged from her care without a place to go.
RC Ward ATC and South Oaks were my two hopeful prospects for treatment. Both ended up accepting me into their programs and I was able to decide that RC Ward was more appropriate for me due to the nature of their all-women’s program. When I was attending treatment at RC Ward, I was informed that my lack of mobility would exclude me from being able to engage in many recovery homes on Long Island. I met a woman in treatment who told me about Mainstream House in Riverhead.
I connected with the owner of Mainstream House and was informed that I would be able to be accepted to their recovery home. Medicaid informed me that they would not pay for a taxi to transport me to Riverhead, so the owner ended up driving 3 hours to pick me up and then back to the house to make sure that I was able to get settled.
Since living in this recovery home I have been able to make progress in my recovery utilizing outpatient treatment as well as mutual aid and other community recovery supports. I am so grateful that I did not give up because I can see the change in myself today.
I encourage anyone seeking Recovery to not give up…to them I would say the following:
“Have patience for the process. If I wanted it really bad, I had to keep making phone calls expecting rejection, and keep trying until I got a yes. You might get 15 ‘Nos’, but if you keep at it, you will get a ‘Yes.’ Don’t give up.”
