New to Recovery, Grateful for Help

BURLEIGH – Kaitlin is a 27-year-old single mother. She wants to rid herself of her heroin addiction to regain custody of her son, now in her parents’ care.
“I started using opiates when I was 16, and started using IV (intravenous) heroin by the time I was 18. It started as a product of my environment. I’m from North Jersey.
“It stumbled out of control,” she said, nervous at telling her life story.
When she was 21, Kaitlin was “clean for a little while.” When her son was a year old, “I started using again with the person I was with, in a relationship, and things got really bad really fast.”
Kaitlin was getting dope, and getting sick. She wound up in jail. As a result, she was “kicked out of the house by my parents.”
Her parents took her son, then, “Things got really bad. I became homeless. In 2011, that was my life.
Her life was a blur from around age 23 to 26, “in and out of jail, detox, and homelessness.”
Then, in 2011, “I was in jail, and my parents called DYFS (now Division of Children and Families) because they had had enough. They didn’t think I could care for my won. They wanted me to get help. I have this DYFS case and I could not get clean,” she said.
She went to rehab, stayed “clean” a little while, but continued to relapse.
“I could not understand that my love for my son was not enough to stop me from using (heroin),” Kaitlin said.
She realizes now that her addiction had nothing to do with loving her son or not.
Out of another rehab this January, Kaitlin entered Emily House in Woodbine. She termed it a “three quarters living house.”
“In April this year, I was there by myself. My son was with my parents, and the girls were not in the house. I relapsed,” Kaitlin said.
“Mom saw my condition and said, ‘You have to go to the hospital,’” she recalled.
The director of the program she was in had worked for A.R.S. “She told me I was a perfect candidate,” Kaitlin said.
Kaitlin, like Ryan had, noted the “stigma” many people on those using methadone to “get clean.” “I didn’t want that attached to me,” she added.
She found A.R.S. was “not just a clinic where you go to and leave.”
Urged to “give it a chance,” Kaitlin met the staff, although she admitted she was a “little reluctant” at the outset.
She soon learned the staff was “willing to go the extra mile” to help the recovering addict.
“Life is not perfect now, but I feel better than ever. I’m stable in my recovery. I love coming here. The individual counselor…is helping bring my life to a place it’s never been,” she said.
She doubts without the counselor’s extra attention and care, she would be where she is at present.
“I love coming here. They know my name. They know my situation and they ask me about my son. I feel like there is a genuine care and concern that allows me to open up. I’ve told things I held back in other places. They made me feel so comfortable.
“Things are not perfect, but I feel good. I’m not embarrassed to come here. And of the stigma, I learned not to judge because of the way this facility is run,” she said.
While she is unemployed, Kaitlin believes recovery is a full-time job.
“It feels good though. It’s worth it,” she said.
“I wake up happy. My mother sends me pictures of my son before he goes to school. I love my life. There’s new direction,” she concluded.
Kaitlin is in the first phase of treatment.