Cultivating courage at the crossroads: addiction and recovery | Janalee Stock | TEDxStroudsRun

The many contributing factors to the addiction crisis highlight the need for a comprehensive approach to solving this complex problem. In this TEDx Talk, Janalee Stock shares lessons learned by someone who has experienced firsthand both mental illness and addiction. Her personal journey to recovery inspired a passion for listening to others with similar stories and, in turn, speaking up and taking action. She shares difficult questions she has had to ask herself as she has become increasingly involved in the lives of other women struggling to free themselves from the grip and the stigma of addiction. They are questions we can all ask. Janalee Stock retired from 38 years of nursing in 2016. She looked forward to sleeping in, long trail runs, reading fiction, and trying many new recipes. Most of that hasn’t happened. Instead she has devoted much of her time to the start up of a non-profit organization, Women for Recovery. Additionally she is a mother of 4 adult children, a grandmother of eight, a personal trainer, a political activist, and a big sister with Big Brothers Big Sisters. She has been on a number of boards over time: AID Task Force, Appalachian Peace and Justice Network, and the American Cancer Society. She bides by the saying, “to those who have been given much, much is expected." She is grateful for all she has been given, especially a supportive husband, who has never questioned why she hasn’t slowed down.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

I'm guessing that most of you

have heard the advice
so often attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt:

"Do something every day that scares you."

I got a big check mark right now.

(Laughter)

I'm not a fan of public speaking.

But just to add to my angst,

I plan to tell you
a little bit of my own story,

and it's kind of rough around the edges.

But it leads directly
to a much bigger story,

that of a small but mighty group of women

who came together with a deep commitment

to being a part of addressing
the addiction crisis in our community.

I don't pretend to be
an expert on the subject,

but I have been to a place
where many people have gotten lost,

some to never return.

And it is a hell that reminds me

that while it's really important
that we talk about things

like Vivitrol and detox

and needle exchange programs,

and so forth,

that it's just as important

that we talk about where healing
intersects with hope and purpose.

So I'm going to begin

at what was almost the end
of my 10-year romance with alcohol,

occasional love affairs
with other substances.

It was the first Friday of September 1978.

My doctor entered my hospital room,
and he said, "You're going home today."

And I thought, "Well, I won't go
to my home away from home,"

which was the local bar,

not because I thought
I had a problem with alcohol -

no, I was just totally humiliated.

I wasn't that tough chick
that I projected to my friends,

or so I thought.

You see, on that previous Monday,

I had woken up

to the most beautiful,
brilliant blue sky,

with great big billowing clouds
stretched across the horizon.

And it was the kind of scene

that at one time in my life
would have given me such a surge of joy.

Nature has always been my sanctuary,

my place where I sense a higher power,

the magic, the mystery of the universe,

a healing balm in troubled times.

But on that morning,

I couldn't even feel
the tiniest little drop of awe.

That connection had been
unraveling for some time.

And on that morning, it was like
the final thread had been snipped

and untethered from any kind of hope

that I could pull myself out of the rut
of my own dark thinking.

I decided that my life
really didn't matter,

that my four-year-old son
would be better off without me.

That's hard to say.

And I went into my brother-in-law's room -

the house was empty -

and I removed his loaded
revolver from a drawer,

and I placed it at my temple.

And I can't tell you how long I sat there
with my hand trembling,

my finger on the trigger,
ready to pull it,

but it was enough
to make me shudder still today.

And I want to stop
because so many times

people I know that have struggled
with severe depression will say,

"I didn't have the guts to do it,"

when they talk about wanting
to kill themselves.

That is not guts.

That is despair and hopelessness
and impulsivity.

I did not do the thing
that would have required guts -

I didn't go and call for help.

I went into the bathroom instead
after putting the gun down,

and I removed a bottle of aspirin,

and with the beer I was drinking
I washed the entire contents down -

my roommate came home
sometime in that period -

and I took out another bottle of aspirin
and took the entire contents.

And then came a razor blade.

My last memory that morning in that house

was of blood splattering
across my son's bedroom wall

as I was wrestled to a gurney.

And now, on the fifth day in the hospital,

I was going home

with no clue, Why I am even here?

What is this insanity about?

And that night I did go to the bar

because that's what we do
when we're addicted -

we keep doing the very same thing
over and over again,

causing our own self-destruction.

And we lie to everyone around us,

but the biggest lie
is the lie we tell ourself -

"It's not that bad.

Tomorrow will be different."

And the biggest, saddest,
most tragic thing about that

is we believe it.

We believe our own lies to ourself.

It wasn't until several months later

when I was introduced
to the recovery community

that I began to understand

that alcohol had become
the centerpiece to my life.

It was that the relationship to alcohol
was the common denominator

to connect the dots.

I thought back to when I was 14 years old,

when life was difficult at home

and alcohol was so much fun,

and it seemed like the answer.

It was the solution to all my problems,

but that solution had become my problem.

In recovery I was handed this blueprint,

a kind of road map for how to navigate
my way through life,

not just how to not pick up,

but how to enjoy the journey,

how to be at peace inside my own skin.

And I've been involved
in that community ever since.

Now, I'd be remiss in jumping
from back then to now

like, okay, everything's hunky-dory now.

(Laughter)

You know, live happily ever after.

No, in the last 39+ years,

I've had more challenging situations
come up in my life

than in the previous 10.

I think Forrest Gump put it so aptly:

"Shit happens," right?

to all of us.

It's just the nature
of the beast - life, you know?

But today I have this tool chest
that I keep readily available.

I keep it handy.

I keep the tools sharp,
try to make sure they don't get rusty.

And one of the things
that helped me so much,

particularly in the beginning

when those other hard things
happened along the way,

it's a simple mantra -

"This too shall pass."

And indeed it always does.

I was told early on

that the best antidote
to wanting to pick up

was to work with someone still suffering.

And several years back,

I felt like that aspect of my own program
needed a little B12 shot,

and I began attending a weekly meeting
at Southeastern Ohio Regional Jail

that my dear friend Cate had begun.

And there we sit in a circle
with women all dressed in orange

at their crossroads,

a roll of toilet paper handy, tossed
as the tears begin to fall inevitably.

In emergency medicine, there's this term:

the golden hour -

that first 60 minutes
after a serious accident has occurred

and how survival and good outcomes,
positive outcomes, can occur

when that intervention happens
in that window of time.

These women have had
a different kind of trauma.

Many of them share with us

that they've grown up
in dysfunctional households,

that their parents
have started them on drugs,

that they've been sexually
and physically abused as children,

and on up into adulthood.

And without any numbing substances
to dull that pain,

they feel it -

those memories,

and the shame and the guilt and remorse
for the mistakes made,

and the grief of being
separated from children,

the fear about the future.

All that emotion

brings some - not all, but some -
to their knees in surrender:

"I can't live this way anymore.

I cannot live this way anymore.

I've got to change.

I've got to break the cycle."

And that is our golden moment,
our golden hour there,

because the psyche becomes fertile

for the seeds of hope, of possibility,
of encouragement to be planted.

It's ripe.

But too often, what makes me
the most sad in these meetings

is when someone speaks
that earnest desire to change,

but she doesn't feel confident,

because she knows she's going right back
to that same household, neighborhood,

where everyone she knows uses.

Sam Quinones did an incredible job
in the book "Dreamland"

of explaining how our neighborhoods
became so vulnerable to the drug culture

because of the breakdown
of our social fabric

because of economic factors.

And many of those factors remain today.

Women getting out of jail,
treatment centers, prison,

homeless shelters,
domestic abuse homes, etc.,

they need a safe, supportive environment

where they can hone the skills necessary

to create this firm
foundation of recovery,

not just to get sober and clean,

but to stay that way,
to get off the relapse treadmill.

There were others in the community
really coming to this realization

that we had a very critical need
for recovery housing for women

in Southeast Ohio at that same time.

When a call to action
went out in May of 2016,

a grassroots effort evolved.

It wasn't just me, as Steve had said;

it was a group of women,
strong women, said,

"We're going to do something about this."

And by March of 2017,

we were a formal nonprofit -
Women for Recovery -

and by July we had purchased our house,
named it Serenity Grove,

and today we are open with residents,

with a paid staff member,

with volunteers committed to helping women

embark on this somewhat scary
journey of change.

The project has been scary for us -

I think I speak for more than just me -

like, "We can make this happen, really?

Wow!"

We've had a lot of bumps along the way,

but the support of our community,

individuals and agencies
have shored up our confidence.

It's been instrumental in keeping us
on the straight and narrow,

to focus our eyes on the prize.

I began by telling you a story, my story,

because I believe that stigma
of addiction and mental illness

creates this atmosphere
where we can't talk openly about it.

It's hard for someone like me
to ask for help.

I was -

In this community,

so many people know me
as "Janalee the runner" -

well, some of the things
that were mentioned -

I'm very opinionated,
write the letters to the editor,

(Laughter)

you know, the retired nurse.

But you know what?

I was Janalee, who as a teenager
was on life support at one time;

who another time woke up in a locked ward,

in a room that did not have a door
that opened from inside out,

on a mattress with no sheet,
no furniture, no windows, no nothing.

I want people like me to know

that radical change
in the brain can happen.

We don't have to be prisoners
to our brain chemistry.

Scientists know so much more
about the way the brain works,

that, yes, dopamine can make us a slave

to food and drugs and alcohol
and sex and gambling,

but there are neurotransmitters
that respond to exercise

and fellowship

and prayer and meditation and green space.

Those are some of the tools
that I keep in my tool chest.

Change is very scary,

but by golly it's worth it.

You have to have
a willingness to work for it.

With the number one cause of death

in Americans under 50
being drug overdose,

it's pretty rare that someone
doesn't know someone who's been affected.

I think when Eleanor Roosevelt advised,

"Do something every day that scares you,"

she wasn't just talking
about running a marathon

or climbing Mount Everest -

things that, you know,
really make your heart go, "Whoa!"

She was talking about the way
we think and perceive

and open our minds and our hearts.

If you don't know anyone
that's been affected by these afflictions,

then the challenge for you

may be just to rethink
how you think about us.

Do you label us?

Are we losers?
Are we less than?

Is someone getting out of prison

destined to carry that label forever?

Can you say to someone,

"I respect you for what you
have been through.

I haven't had the bad luck.

I have the privilege
that I didn't grow up that way.

And, boy howdy, do I respect you
for being such a survivor."

I have a friend like that,
who was in prison for 10 years.

I thought the world of her.

But I watched all
the obstacles beat her down,

and today she's back in prison,
serving her time.

And I respect her,
and I'm rooting for her.

I guess the biggest question
that I ask myself -

I think as a community
we can ask ourselves -

is, "Can we love that person

until they learn
to love themselves again?"

I'm a believer we can.

Thank you.

(Applause) (Cheers)