dude michaela dude what is this we're seeing more and more prescription  medications and opioid-based narcotics affect   our community a large number of overdoses our  officers are using narcan to save people's lives   on on a weekly basis i firmly believe there's  not a street that we could drive up and down that   someone on that street doesn't have a connection  to this current ongoing problem drug use   overdose it does not matter who you are where you  come from it doesn't matter how old you are what   color your skin is how nice your house is how much  money you make if you go to church or not if your   family is divorced or not i've seen it across  every demographic you don't take hydrocodone   or that knockdown i think we're just in a crisis  situation in our country um opioids there's it's   like there's no end there's no there's never  gonna be enough like when drugs are involved   like it's never gonna be okay never it never  will as a parent you know nobody prepares you   for what to do when your child's struggling  with addiction when people are little kids   they do not sit and say i want to grow up to be  an alcoholic or an addict they don't people never   know when it's going to hit them a lot of times  they find out with that first hit that they take   it's probably the scariest time in my 26 year  law enforcement career right now with fentanyl   but what are we going to do these drugs are out  on the street how do you get it off the street   there's just no easy answers someone will say something to the effect that  you know if i didn't know your story i would have   you know never known that you had  that kind of a history that passed and   you know the way that i respond to those types  of questions like what is someone that struggles   with substance use or mental health look like  i answer the question like it looks like me it   looks like you it looks like your mom your  dad your grandma your neighbor your pastor i was a freshman in college and i had  my wisdom teeth removed and they gave   me a prescription of oxycodone  and so that was my first like   real exposure to opioids where  i had my own prescription   i had it for an extended period of time and that  was where i really fell in love with the pills so an opioid's a painkiller probably the most  commonly known one that people would be familiar   with is hydrocodone then what we figured out  was that pain pills worked really well for pain   and made the patient not care about the fact that  they were in pain and so we kind of went into this   go see your doctor get a prescription and that's  what you that's how we're going to deal with your   chronic pain once everybody thought that doctors  were prescribing the pain medicines that if the   doctor prescribed it it was okay of course there's  been a great deal of education and information put   forth about how that's it is not as harmless  as what we would thought the amount of opioids   that were used dramatically increased and as  those numbers increased we really began to see   a large number of patients develop opioid use  disorder which is colloquially called addiction   after that prescription every time i could find  the pills i bought the pills and the way i was   able to fund this habit because opioids on  the street are very expensive was through   my scholarship money i'm actually a quarter  native american and they were paying for my   college which was a blessing but i was using the  excess aid that i was receiving to fund this habit   and so i i didn't really have to scrounge and try  to find where i was going to get them you know if   i if i was able to come across my bomb and i'd buy  them in bulk and i'd buy as many as i could find   and so i you know i don't think i set out to you  know start using drugs and become someone that's   homeless by the end of when it was all said and  done put a needle in my arm no that wasn't the   plan the plan was to have fun with my friends with  this drug that's been presented to me that changes   the way that i feel that i enjoy doing but in  that you know it becomes the center of everything   that you do and it became the  center of everything that i did   and if patients are given seven days  of opioids just seven days they have   a one in ten chance of being on opioids in  a year and those opioids may not be written   by the physician who gave them that initial  prescription but i think that really speaks to   the power of opioids and the danger of opioids and  it is all-consuming addiction is a very difficult   thing to break it is a difficult cycle from which  a person can find you know when i opened up that   prescription of oxycodone i took that very first  pill it never came across my mind that that pill   was going to turn into a syringe that i would  then start putting in my body for many years   until it destroyed everything in my life but  the reality of is that's exactly what happened this dr martin it's okay it's okay   i as i said i know the nurse practitioners  have tried to reach you you're what okay can you can you make it  somewhere to get some help okay   what else have you had today you got out of  detox what day yesterday what have you had since okay well i'm sorry about the loss of your child  i can understand that that would be devastating no there's no shame there's no shame in it um it's  a matter of you know however people get into the   doors to get help it is what it is i'm sorry  you've had to suffer that trauma and that loss   but we're here to help you you're welcome  you're welcome we'll see you tomorrow okay   i get calls like that from all over the state  every day that's different people that they   get out and they just don't have the resources or  they can't get into people quickly enough in order   to be taken care of and you know that's one of my  great concerns with people is i know what happens   whenever people don't get connected with  resources in a timely manner um they   do things to help stop the pain stop  the um physical pain the emotional pain   and stuff like that and too  often they go out and use again and so we started out with about 30 or 40 that  were from our area in that time we've gone   from our 30 to 40 people that we  were kind of learning with um to   now we have about 500 patients  that are in our practice i drive back and forth then several days a week  to see our patients here and people in that area   that need help whether they're in dardanelle  or danville or up what i call the i-40 corridor   says we have lots of the small  communities here and there's only   a handful of providers that do what we do is the internet working today so what's going on this morning oh i just can't  get comfortable yeah at all so right here a   little harder than it usually is i did want  to ask you about uh you know switching over to   something that may help with my pain there's lots  of stuff that's out there that's new or different   things like that having somebody evaluate you for  that and kind of see what they can come up with   and because it feels like i've done that for the  past 20 years tried everything that's new and uh   it ended up costing me a lot more money but  i haven't been able to find relief from it   except for they say the cheap stuff which seems  to work the best but of course that's also the   most difficult to work with right we're a  very opioid-dependent population because of   our over-prescribing that we have  had for years probably 16 or 17   years in our state so we realize that a  lot of our population is opioid dependent   opioids do more than just stop pain they also  make us comfortable they often have been used   incorrectly to stop many types of pain so that can  be psychological pain emotional pain because they   do bring about a certain level of euphoria  but because of that euphoria we can develop   mechanistic changes in our brain that take us to  the point that we desire or crave opioids and we   begin to desire and crave those opioids more  than we desire and crave other things that are   necessities in our life and that in and of itself  is what opioid use disorder is it is a disease uh   rather than a moral failing that then make our  brain think that what we need to survive are   these substances over anything else like oxygen  like food like family love and then as we realized   boy we have this huge problem and doctors need to  prescribe less of this we had so many people that   were already dependent on the medication so many  patients that had a problem with the medication   and then so many patients that  were addicted to the medication   and when you decrease the supply then patients  have to turn to other sources and that's how   we got to the patients turning to things like  heroin and now unfortunately things like fentanyl you know friday nights most people want to be  somewhere else friday night there nowhere else i'd   rather be on a baseball field my my dad coached me  growing up as a kid and i i mean we from t-ball to   fast pitch babe ruth we always played and we  were always good and i played in school and i   i had a good opportunity to go play in college  if i wanted to but drugs just got in the way my mom died when i was three and i  was mad at the world because of it   and i use that as a crutch i mean that's  pretty much what i did and i was just   that was my excuse to be mad the first opiate i  tried was hydrocodone and i was probably 11 or   12 years old and i did a lot of pain pills in my  life you know morphine hydrocodone oxycontin then   i gradually moved to harder things the last of my  addiction i was a heroin addict and heroin dealer when i graduated 2013 it was  real fast of a downhill spiral   couldn't afford the drugs anymore so then  i'm having to steal then i discover heroin   and how this drug is essentially the  same thing but it's cheaper i switched   you know and i always heroin was one of those  things that i was just like i'll never do heroin   but when it was all said and done i i was  on heroin i was shooting up heroin i was   shooting up pills and uh everything in my life  was centered around driven and fueled by opioids and so with heroin or just any hybrid especially  heroin it felt like a warm blanket coming out   of the dryer and somebody wrapping you super  tight in it so it just stopped all the problems   for that moment it made me just slow down i don't  know it was just a calming feeling i guess but   also it was killing me took my love took it  down climbed a mountain and i turned around   when i found it and i first started doing  heroin um it was that like i was surprised   at how amazing it made me feel i guess i  was kind of expecting it to make me sick or   to be really scary but it was not it was  incredible and i remember thinking i can   understand this is how i want to feel for the  rest of my life you know the feeling of trying   to change the way i felt that was what i was  searching for something outside of myself to   make myself feel comfortable that's what i was  looking for it was a constant search and chase yay but i used to talk about it like stepping into  a hot shower after being in the air conditioning   all day so it's that warmth that goes from the  top of your head all the way down to your toes   of just that full body warmth that's how it felt  to me so of course it was again romanticizing   that feeling of being high making myself  feel completely comfortable and okay i   don't know if it continued to be like that i  feel like i was constantly chasing that warmth i've been kicked out of school i sold pills  in school got kicked out had to go to another   another alternative school started going down this  road i was a heroin addict i mean you name it i've   done it when we started all the people i did drugs  with there was 20 of us there's four of us left   three of us are sober one of them is on his way  to prison right now i buried so many friends   it's not even funny guys i mean because of drug  addiction overdosed my kid was five years old my kid had to go next door neighbor  and tell him i can't wake my dad up   i was on the floor i threw up you know it got so  bad that i'd caught wind to something the funeral   director called me and he said your grandparents  had called and made your funeral arrangements   can you imagine your parents going and making  your funeral arrangements for you because they   knew it this is about it but i mean i'd i  took over 600 milligrams of morphine that's   deadly levels shows how what drugs  will do to you it ruins everything so this is so so recovery center right  in jesseville um so i provide psychiatric   evaluation addiction medicine evaluations for them  to kind of see where they're at because i'm also   a primary care physician and i also provide  primary care so people with chronic back pain   i try to help them get to doctors like the  neurosurgeons if they need help with that   diabetes hypertension all those different  other medical problems that everybody has   but maybe hasn't been cared for well  while they were in their addiction   before you got here how many times do you  think you overdosed before you got here   i think seven i think it was seven times i  woke up in an ambulance or in the hospital or   almost an ambulance seven  times seven times and and   you know when i'm living like that i push away  everything good the good people that want to help   me so brad got a hold of me said casey for six  months the only thing your mom knows about you   is the hospital bills she gets  in the mouth for me overdosing and um that was a tough pill to swallow   so i made the choice right then that i was  i was gonna do something do you make me cry just the worst feeling you know because i  never thought that'd be me right i thought   you know i know people overdose drug addiction  is terrible but not me i had a good good parents   and a good church and i was good at sports and you  know i didn't even think about stuff like that so   it doesn't matter who you are addiction doesn't  matter because you don't want to be sitting i'm 39   you don't want to be sitting you don't have to  be sitting in a rehab when you're 39 you can be   halfway through with your career and have a family  and be so careful because it's a poison you know this is it this is my this is my room yeah i'm  like a nerd basically i like comic books and   star wars cartoons um also if you notice though on  all the stuff that i have up on the wall there's   a little thing over there by the window that my  son like brought me some random pieces of candy   home from school and on the bag he wrote i love  you dad and i taped that up to the wall my my   childhood was actually awesome i had a really good  childhood i was raised by my grandfather who is a   successful you know business owner so growing  up uh i didn't need or want anything you know   christmases were awesome i know a lot of people  you know sometimes believe that people who have   suffered from an addiction had some sort of  childhood trauma and for me that's not the case   the the issue with the opiates started when i  was an adult i was like 21 right before my son   was born and that was it i was taking prescription  pain pills you know i was just taking pain pills   i took one somebody had gave me one one time  when i had you know i was like really stressed   out you know i i was having trouble paying  my bills because i was horrible with money   you know making just bad decisions you know i was  making life hard on myself and uh i had a really   bad migraine and somebody gave me a hydrocodone  i was like here this will get rid of the headache   and i took it and it not only got rid of the  headache but you know it just made me feel great   you know so all that stress and everything went  away and something like clicked in my brain like   it was like a solution to all of my problems you  know so from then on that that was that was my   solution for everything any emotion i didn't like  anything i would take pain pills i was one time   i went to work my stomach was upset i kept having  to go to the bathroom and i was like work kind of   worried about it and it turns out i talked to one  of my buddies when i was getting some pain pills   from i was like yeah i don't know my stomach's  messed up every day you know and he's like well   what happens when you take these pain pills and  i was like it's fine it was like you might be   like withdrawing from them so it's  like i started to become physically   addicted to the stuff before i knew it mentally  i didn't even know that's what my body wanted you   know i was just like why am i sick every day and  then it got to where you know your body builds up   tolerance you know so those smaller pills weren't  strong enough i had to get stronger ones and   it just progressed from there and eventually uh  one day i was sick and couldn't find any pain   pills and somebody had heroin you know and  i tried that because they're like it's gonna   make you stop you're not gonna be sick after that  you know this was way cheaper way easier to find   and way stronger you know so there  was no reason to go back to pills   you know and withdrawal is interesting  because it's like the flu times a thousand   if you do have the flu there's not a whole lot you  can do about it right get get plenty of rest drink   a lot of fluids and maybe take some tamiflu and  maybe instead of five days it lasts three days   if you have an opioid problem and you have  withdrawal you have an instant answer to your   withdrawal or your flu problem you take an opioid  and it goes away my life was lived on a timetable   where i would use and i knew i had six to eight  hours to get something else before i got sick   and so it was just always never ending clock in my  head uh you gotta get something and then you just   use you don't even enjoy it because it's just  to not be sick anymore it's not about getting   high anymore it's just about okay i'm well i feel  normal you know i feel like i can you know walk   around and do something today but then what you're  doing that day is finding more of what you're   trying to use because you know just hours down  the road you're going to be sick again withdrawal   from heroin feels like you are dying and that's  what kept me out on the streets even longer i   think because i was so scared of being sick and  withdrawing and i always used to get when i knew   i was about to withdraw when i had this feeling in  my throat like i had to clear my throat and so i   would always like that was like when that happened  i was like okay it's time to go i gotta get more i   gotta figure out how i'm gonna get money i'm gonna  figure out whose stuff i'm going to pond whose gas   can in a garage is going to fill my car up that's  when the excessive behavior started happening   my dad put um gps on my phone and my car um  so i would always try to go to places that   looked like i could be doing something  there um so i picked park plaza because   i could go shopping and we would come here and  we would back up into a parking spot here in   the parking garage and we would turn the car off  because we had no money no gas we had to share   cigarettes because we had no money um and we would  have everything laid out like i was in my old car   and so i would have spoons behind here i would  have spoons in the sunglasses thing we would have   heroin and fentanyl and just mix it all together  and the whole process of shooting up michaela michaela can you hear me hey can you hear me mikayla please please wake up michaela so there  was like towards the end of my addiction there   was a period of time and there was drugs  that were currently hitting the streets   that were cut with fentanyl and i  was so sick in my addiction that's   what i needed to get hot like straight  heroin pure like heroin didn't touch me   so i overdosed 13 times all together on heroin  and fentanyl kayla hey hey all right kayla okay michaela opioids tear at the fabric of american life they  are incredibly caustic to the american family   they consistently pose a problem  for those people who are left behind   as a result of the death of those that have  either overdosed on them or experienced some   sort of tragedy in their family  as a result of opioid addiction it's a white powdery substance a  lot of what we see on the streets and so you see we've got a positive hit  for fentanyl and it is only fentanyl   and fentanyl is very serious it's  now become our number one drug threat   last year we exceeded methamphetamine or  fatal overdoses with fentanyl overdoses   it's very deadly if not used correctly and these  individuals that are using it on the street   have very minimal knowledge of its  power and that's why we're seeing   overdoses if you kind of look at a sweet  and low package and realize that that is   one gram of a substance and you realize that that  one gram if it was fentanyl have the possibility   if it was pure fentanyl to get a thousand people  high but that same one gram could kill 500 people we waited a long time to have haley we  imagined what she would look like back   when we were dating in college  and she was going to be this   blond-haired blue-eyed girl that's just  what we knew we would have one day and   sure enough we did she was born at one minute  to midnight on the last day of february 1994.   the last baby delivered that night at sparks  hospital so starting in eighth grade she um   she learned how to play volleyball and we started  doing traveling ball in the off season a six foot   tall girl shows up at the net and you just assume  she's getting ready to you know slam it down on   you and and people would back up and people would  be prepared for then she'd swing really big and   then she'd just kind of dink it over the net and  it would drop right down on the other side of the   net or it would go off to the side where nobody  was expecting it and they had actually named that   the haley long special and that that's actually a  play that they teach their their players now to do   makes me realize watching these back  how long we would sit there and watch   these games where almost nothing happened from  time to time played a play in her senior year   it was just a really cohesive group of good  players they went undefeated and they won the very   first state championship for greenwood high school  so it was it was a lot of fun it was a lot of fun   let's see so this was her  high school graduation quilt got her name we've got greenwood we've got  the lady bulldogs we've got a volleyball   um class of 2012. haley was probably sixth  grade when we first took her to somebody   because of anxiety we went and saw a  psychologist here in town a child psychologist   you know she would just she'd get worried  about tests at school she'd get very stressed   out about you know trying to get papers done  trying to get things done on time and then we   changed schools and we got into volleyball  and so her busyness changed the things she   focused on changed i think that helped for a  while but she still would get stressed around   tests and around you know the things you can't  control which when you have anxiety that's the   thing that stresses you out most is the things  you can't control she was finding ways to cope   with it but i know there was always some  layer of anxiety under there somewhere my birthday was on a sunday i had  traveled to atlanta for business   in the professional sporting world our team had  a big game that day and that was something that   she and john would talk about you know they'd text  about that i was busy that day between traveling   and getting checked in and meeting up with some  of my co-workers that the day kind of went by   and later that evening he and i were texting and  he said you know i texted her about the game and i   never heard back he said did she send you anything  for your birthday and i said no and i kind of just   discounted it and thought you know maybe she  just didn't get around to it i'll hear from   her tomorrow and so we didn't think much about it  and then on monday you know kind of mid-morning   we both said have you heard from her yet no we  called a mutual friend to go over to her house   to see if if he could find out if  she was there or find out anything   i would say that was probably monday  night around around 10 o'clock and   i just i got a text that said you need to come  home right now the police will be calling shortly   they talk about that the call that you dread you  don't actually think you're going to get a call   from a police officer but he was just calling  to let me know that he was confirming that she   was deceased and and i and i said can i ask what  happened and he said it was an accidental overdose   and i said on what he said on  fentanyl it was fentanyl patch i didn't know what that was i didn't know  what fentanyl was i had to look it up   it just everything just was everything just stopped i can't really describe it any other way so this was read on our behalf at her celebration  service we really want to thank everyone for   coming today and sharing this celebration with  us dr seuss said don't cry because it's over   smile because it happened to haley happened to  this world and she truly happened to all of us   we're so lucky to have had her in our  lives she had a positive impact on   all of us and we hope you'll continue to  tell hayley's stories as you move forward   we know the sun will come up again tomorrow for  a while it may not be as bright as it once was   but in time we will laugh more and cry less  of forever holder in our hearts john address i'm sure she knew people who had done  exactly what she did before that didn't die   but now she's never going to know  how many others didn't either on overdose cases we're going to start  taking reports on every one of them   if they're alert after the fact try to get as  much information you can from them if um they're   willing to give up where they got the dope or  whatever it is that they overdosed on by all means   if it's their own prescriptions obviously note  that so we we know that and we're aware of that   anytime we get a medical call life net and it's  somebody that overdose we're taking a report on it   i did get a bag of pure fentanyl the other  day from an overdose death that we had so it   is out there it is dangerous obviously  and then we also are getting oxy pills   oxycodone disguises oxycodone but they're fentanyl  so be careful with pills as well especially if you   see oxycodone on a bottle going forward now on  the other half of that if you have individuals   that are alert after an overdose and they are  seeking help or wanting any kind of information   so i have sean here i don't know y'all may have  seen him around the pd and some of you may have   met him already but this is sean willetts he's  our peer recovery support specialist that's   basically what what i'm here for is to try to  help those people i have a lot of resources   like detox centers treatment centers i have a way  to get people health insurance if they don't have   health insurance so they can go basically just  provide them with resources and help them out so   they can hopefully stop  using drugs or stop drinking   save his number do if you need them call him if  you have questions call him he that's what he's   here for that's part of his job because i you know  i don't know what they're going to say about the   charges that that you have but those two  places that i gave you i think will take   somebody with your history  so i have overdosed 14 times   each time was heroin but with fentanyl you  know if you went back three years and was   like hey one day you'll be working for the police  department helping people i would have laughed at   you you know there's no way you could ever  convince me of that so it's pretty cool i'm following up on a overdose  case that i have currently   as from witnesses and other statements taken from  not only the sister but other people around the   believed cause of the overdose was fentanyl  my end goal is to get closure for the family   try to get a better understanding and give  them an understanding of what took place   and what was actually ingested by her her sister  when i came in here i went towards to her to see   if she'd wake up because she  was sitting up i laid her back   and she went responding and i just slapped  him and asked him what was wrong with her and   he said it was the fentanyl feet now just leave  her alone she'll wake up in here a couple hours   and she didn't we moved her from  there to the bedroom because the kids   and we did cpr on her until the endless got here  so once they tell me what all she had in her   system once i find that out i'll let you know but  that takes time obviously it could be a few months   before i even get that back so we were supposed  to be clean almost two months before she died yeah   how'd y'all use we just started it just snorted  it never smoked it never injected it nothing like   that well this is sean willits i don't know if  you've met him but he works alongside me now he   actually is our peer recovery support specialist  so he helps individuals that are seeking help with   getting out of addiction or wanting help like  treatment or any other systems like that so   if you're okay with it we'll leave a card of  his with you and that way if you ever want any   help with your addictions he's here for that i  think i gotta have them benzos and hydros and i   don't you don't you don't need them and that's  the first thing you need to come to to realize   that you don't that was what that was what i  did was opiates and heroin i have 14 overdoses   myself before i got cleaned so sometimes i like  it and think she's just gonna walk in that door   and she's not so yeah i'm i'm already in behavior  counseling my doctor put me in there the other day   she said that if i didn't get some counseling  then i was more likely to return back to drugs   so she put me in behavior center counseling we're  seeing a lot of fentanyl now pressed into pills   that is disguised as either a xanax or oxycodone  or something of that nature that is popular   a lot of times people are taking drugs  thinking they're taking methamphetamine   or some other drugs that have  this substance mixed into it   you know they may say hey i i need a xanax  to help me stay up and study for this final   or you know i need an adderall to keep me going  throughout the day and they have no idea that that   these pills are laced with fentanyl and their  roommates finding them dead the next morning and so really drug use today is  like playing russian roulette   but adding fentanyl to the equation is  like adding another bullet to the chamber all right thanks for being here  and for showing up for yourselves   we have a few newbies this week so let's just um  we'll just go around and if everybody would just   say your name and then just you know one thing you  want um people in the group to know about you just   you know a few words or a sentence just super  brief and i'm just here so i can um pretty much   learn the skills i need just not to go back to  that life yeah um i'd like to figure out how to   enjoy life again you know i mean it's as simple  as that well we're so glad you're here so thank   you for joining and being willing to share and  i'm gina and i am a person in long-term recovery   from my son's addiction and ultimate death to  overdose um lost him four years ago tomorrow so   bear with me these this kind of three days  surrounding it can be a little bit of a challenge here he is with uh you know just such  great memories him with his brothers he was a great big brother tristan was my adventure boy he loved to be  outside but his favorite was mountain biking   um skateboarding wakeboarding  snowboarding you know   all of that kind of the adventure you  know sports unfortunately for tristan   he just once he started using marijuana it seemed  that he just immediately started pill seeking   his junior year's grade started to slip his  senior year he really gave little to no effort   unfortunately when he got out to seattle i think  that's where the addiction really took hold and   i do believe it would have happened you know  the same had he stayed here but out in that   environment without any kind of family support  or supervision or oversight or anything he did   end up getting mixed up with the crowd out there  that just fostered you know that usage it was a   struggle and then on june 16th the last day that i  saw him alive after again begging him to get on a   plane to go to treatment he was definitely drug  seeking that day he left here for the last time   and he went down to his girlfriend's empty  apartment nobody was there and he went there   and according to the text  messages i found on his phone   he ended up buying cocaine from a friend  a kid that he had known since fourth grade   and the cocaine was evidently laced with  fentanyl and i don't know it was a little   bit after midnight and i just sat up in bed  i just knew something awful had happened and i woke up the next morning  and i just knew he was gone i just knew it you know we went to look for him later that day we had  a tracker on his car and driving down i just i just knew that when we got to  the apartment complex if the light   up in the third story window  was on that he was gone and so we pulled in the parking lot and the  light on the wind in the window was on and i just   i just screamed he's dead i told my  husband to call the police he's dead and i got out of the car and i remember running around to the front door  of the front of the apartment and i   kicked in the door i just yelled  for him but he didn't answer and uh i can't even begin to describe how it feels when you find out your child's no  longer here that was the end of it there is nothing harder as a position  um than to call a mother and a father   and to tell them that their son or  daughter is dead from something that um   that could have been prevented and so um i know  that people think that um it won't happen to them   not my mother father not my son or  daughter not my brother's sister   and the fact of the matter is addiction  strikes all people from all different   classes all different backgrounds all different  nationalities all different income brackets you   know i have some of the poorest of the poor  that come in and i have some of the riches of   the rich and most influential it hits everybody  and you never really know who it's going to be to self-medicate to try to make  yourself feel better fast and easy   can have consequences that you don't even imagine  and these these the draw of these drugs is so   powerful that it's hard to make yourself step  back and look at the risks and when you're young   and you and other people are doing it or somebody  offers it to you for free it comes out of a bowl   or it comes out of somebody's pocket you don't  know where it came from you don't know where it   was made you don't know if it's really what  they've even said it is and last of all you   don't know what it's going to do your body you  don't know how it's going to react to your body   this patch that she put on was meant for  people with terminal illness and pain   not a 24 year old girl who didn't feel good you ready i'm ready come on okay let's go  let's go you been doing okay i've been doing   great how you've been doing this question yeah  i've been working in a matter of fact i had to   uh when i i had to take off to come over here  today so as soon as i get down here i'm going   right back to work okay and currently you  said um that you had quit in the math but   that you have used some other opiates from any  oxycodone did you take in the last couple days   two four point six of them six  what milgram 10 milligrams okay um i could probably i probably should say hey that  way i ain't going do you i would appreciate that   it's so much easier when we're honest with you  yeah so i'm going to say eight up okay okay well   i'm a function i gotta go to work every day and  try to pay for mine i don't go sell nothing i work   and try to pay for mine so i'm tired of spending  all my money and uh you get paid friday and uh   it's gone monday that's no good i'm 50 year  old i got to change my ways yeah so and i know   it's a struggle if it were easy kenny everybody  that got addicted to something could be unadded nobody said it was easy so when i got green kids and everything bro i got to make this work thank you you're welcome   you're welcome okay i'll see  you next week okay same time i think the other thing that's hard about  losing your child about losing anybody probably   is we don't have any new memories anymore   the only memories we have are captured in pictures  and videos and i can now only remember or see her   in a way that has already happened and  i don't get any new ones and that's   that's another thing i feel cheated out of  there's a lot of things feel cheated out the truth is we'll never arrest our way out  of an opioid problem in the united states   the reality of it is through education through  care through involvement by family and community   i think that we stand the opportunity or  the chance to be able to to move away from   an opioid-based problem here in the united  states all right well when you get out man   don't hesitate to call me you know if you need  anything you want to find out where a meeting is   or anything like that man just call me and  uh i will stay in touch for sure all right   so we set up speak up about drugs because at the  time people just were not talking about drug use   in our community and we are here to serve  the victims of the drug epidemic and so we   work with families and with loved ones to  help whomever in their family is struggling   with substance use disorder welcome to tristan's  trail who's ridden tristan's trail before   yeah good a number of you the fentanyl  problem in our country and now here in   northwest arkansas and across our state has  escalated you know parents talk to your kids   we want you to normalize this conversation  we teach our kids about alcohol about sex   about all kinds of things gun violence we need  to teach them about drugs as well so thank you   again for being here for this event we're so  appreciative have a great ride have a safe ride and i think there's things that we can do  as individuals as communities as a country   to reduce the rate of addiction  and overdose in our country i've been in recovery for seven  years i had to get off of everything   in order to understand who i am and what i want  to do with myself you know because before i was   just caught in a decision all the time i think  for me i'm i'm one of these people of hope   you know they're saying don't  give up until the miracle happens   and so i would tell them to keep trying keep  reaching out that there's there is help for you   at my rock bottom and i finally wanted help  i finally gave in went to rehab and finally   got the help that i needed then i got the  opportunity my son started playing baseball   and i was scared they wouldn't let me  coach because of my past and i talked   to the league people and they said yeah you're  more welcome to see the difference i'm trying   to make up for lost time now and all i say  is just don't give up yet just keep in there this is a very important night tonight  international overdose awareness day   so the the one thing that everybody on this bridge  has in common is we hate the disease of addiction   it has taken something from us and we all want  to do something to change that it really was   destroying everything in my life and i'm just  thankful you know that i made it out alive because   there are there are many people that that don't  and they didn't plan that they they didn't want   that to happen for their life so i'm grateful for  this life and i don't ever ever want to go back won't sleep tonight you