Featured Write Up about Better Life in Recovery from Addiction Professional Magazine's November/December 2014 Issue by Gary Enos

In his role as an addiction counselor, David Stoecker figures he can have an impact on possibly around 100 people a year. As director of the community organization Better Life in Recovery (BLIR) in Springfield, Mo., Stoecker is looking to influence the lives and thoughts of thousands.

The community events that BLIR sponsors might seem modest when looked at in isolation, but Stoecker sees them as building local traditions and putting a public face on recovery. Maybe a river cleanup event will strengthen a recovering person's resolve to continue to give back in her daily life. Maybe seeing an elected leader throw out the first pitch before hundreds of recovering individuals at a ceremony preceding a minor-league baseball game will give a fan in the stands some pause to think about how substance abuse affects his world.

“The idea for BLIR started on a bike ride with my wife,” recalls Stoecker, 42. “I felt that I wasn't doing enough, but I wasn't sure what to do.”

He started the effort four years ago, around a year into his own recovery. “I was kind of letting things come to me at first,” he says. He knows exactly the moment when it became clear that he needed to turn up the intensity on his work in recovery advocacy: It happened when he read online comments posted by ordinary citizens reacting to the death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman.

“They disgusted me,” Stoecker says of the postings. “People were saying things like, 'See, these people never get better,' and 'Who cares? It's just another junkie.'”

 

Uncovering opportunities

Stoecker has recruited subcommittees to work on extending BLIR's mission, which its website describes as an effort “to deal hope and decimate stigma” surrounding addiction through educational and awareness events. The momentum for bringing on more assistance started when around three dozen local treatment and recovery leaders accepted his invitation to a meeting to discuss ways to change the language around addiction and recovery in Springfield. At that meeting he shared data about relapse, and his own resolve that the community could do better.

BLIR, which two years ago became a nonprofit organization, has been seeking closer partnerships with community entities such as the Springfield public schools. A group of people in recovery recently completed playground restoration work for the schools. Stoecker has even visited his 7-year-old's elementary school class, but he'd like the chance to speak before state legislators soon as well.

“We're reducing lengths of residential stay in Missouri,” he says. “We're going to create a revolving door and keep people mired in their addiction.”

Stoecker's wife is a videographer and has assisted in raising BLIR's visibility. Stoecker is also featured in a public service announcement that is frequently broadcast locally, and he is working on a documentary for which he is seeking grant funding, with the goal of being able to show the film in local schools. He says the organization that employs him as a counselor, Alternative Opportunities Treatment Services, has strongly supported his efforts in the greater community.

“Community awareness and education, that's really my passion,” he says. “Fighting stigma head-on.”

Gave faith a chance

Stoecker, who grew up in Illinois, says he had started using substances by 7th grade. Moving to Missouri in part to escape the drug culture, he instead became introduced to methamphetamine and dropped out of high school during his senior year.

“I was in and out of jail,” he says. “I turned 21 in prison. I would end up getting my GED in prison.”
Stoecker experienced his own revolving door of treatment stays and life in the community, usually with little recovery support during periods at home. He had been abused during childhood and considered himself agnostic, but would later experience a shift toward the spiritual.

“I figured I had tried everything else, so I would give God a chance,” he says. “When I focused on recovery and faith, I never looked back.”

He attends 12-Step meetings at least once a week, usually gravitating to those that his counseling patients are unlikely to select.

Participation in BLIR events continues to grow, with 300 people involved in the ballpark event in Springfield in late August and 125 people running in a 5 and 10K event in town the following week. Stoecker is no longer willing to wait patiently for a community response to develop. “This all made me realize I couldn't sit back,” he says. “I had to be proactive.”

Wrapping Up Recovery Month

September was Recovery Month. It was a momentous one, too, as it was the 25^thanniversary of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s (SAMHSA) very first declaration of Recovery Month. This was also the month Better Life in Recovery (BLiR) decided to really roll out and begin trying to tackle stigma and ignorance head on.

Don’t get me wrong, BLiR has done several events already. BLiR did an outreach in Ash Grove for the youth and community warning of the dangers of addiction and wonders of recovery. There was also the Back to School Bash at New Life Church, which reached over 100 youth and adults. This year was different, this year was bigger.

In January, multiple organizations and individuals joined BLiR because they too shared the same vision. The vision was to deal hope and decimate stigma surrounding addictions and mental health issues through community service, education and awareness events that celebrate people in long-term recovery. That first meeting, several committees were formed and the ball started rolling.

We opted to have 4 subcommittees. Each subcommittee would have their own leader, who would ultimately report to the founder of director of BLiR. We decided on 3 events and an ongoing service arm:

1.       Recovery Day at Hammon’s Field  

2.       Getting Dirty for Staying Clean 5K/10K Trail Run and Family Fun BBQ

3.       Getting Dirty for Staying Clean Float and River Clean Up

4.        Community Service events

After finishing the last recovery event, I have learned several things. For starters, dream big. We sold 300 tickets to the ball game. State Representative Eric Burlison showed up and threw out the first pitch of the game to support us. We had 125 people register to run the 5K/10K. We just finished the campout and had 75 people join us. We had a proclamation for recovery month presented by Senator Bob Dixon for the State of Missouri and another presented by Councilman Jerry Compton for the City of Springfield. For Springfield, it was the first time that the proclamation had been made!

We found some amazing sponsors who contributed goods that made the events successful. We received food, drinks, paper supplies and prizes for giveaways. We sold naming rights and various other things at the race, and we made some great partners in the community. Now we meet in two weeks,on Saturday October 11^th at 1. The location as it stands is the Champion Center and I am super excited for it.

The next meeting we have there will be discussions about what we plan for next year. We will talk about what went right and how we can make it even better next year. We will also talk about the things that did not go as planned and that we were not prepared for so that we can learn from them. We will discuss what events we want to do next year and begin planning.

I am most excited about the prospect of writing the paperwork for BLiR to become a 501c3 and forming a board of directors. We have had a great foundation laid this year, and I would argue that all of our events were very successful. There were some learning experiences, but those are growing pains that are expected this early in the life of an organization.

Personally, I am exhausted. This is a run down of my last 30 days:

1.       August 29^th: Recovery Day at Hammon’s Field

2.       August 30^th: Race Walkthrough at Rutledge Wilson Farm Park and meeting on float trip

3.       September 5^th: Set up for the 5K

4.       September 6^th: The 1^st Annual Getting Dirty for Staying Clean 5K/10K Trail Run and BBQ

5.       September 12^th: Taught a lesson on recovery at Glendale Christian Church for Celebrate Recovery

6.       September 13^th: Emceed and helped set up and break down for the 4^th Annual Recovery Outreach in the Ozarks

7.       September 14^th: Shared my testimony at the Church at the Center’s Kids Festival and Benefit Concert

8.       September 25^th: Final Float Meeting

9.       September 26^th: Shared my testimony for the Say NO to Drugs Virginia state campaign

10.   September 27^th-28^th: Set up, Camp out and Float Trip then break down

When I say breakdown, I don’t mean psychologically, but today I am feeling shot. I am tired, because on top of all of this I have a wife and 2 children, a full time job and a lot of people that I meet with and talk to who are struggling on a weekly basis outside of work. I have learned several lessons, but I think that I will share those later.

Today, I just want to say that I am grateful for a wife, friends, coworkers and recovery community that support what I do! I am blessed beyond belief and as well as we did this year, I can’t imagine what next year will look like!!

Last but not least, if getting involved with BLiR sounds interesting to you, send me your email address. I will make sure you are added to the email blasts that go out several times a month! If you have not hoped on the train yet, you might want to hop on board now before we leave the station for another amazing year!

Dealing Hope and Decimating Stigma through Recovery Events

Better Life in Recovery (BLiR) is off to an amazing year so far. Things are really starting to come together. I have been in discussions with the web developer, who is creating the new BLiR website that will hopefully go live in April. We are trying to create a unique yet easy to navigate website and it is starting to come together.

We have been working on the mission statement and here is where we are currently at with it: To deal hope and decimate stigma surrounding recovery that men, women and children face every day through education and awareness events that celebrate people in long-term recovery.

This brings me up to what I am most excited about this year, the events that will be occurring here in southwest Missouri later in the year. We had our first meeting in January and our second meeting in February. Our goal is to reduce stigma by hosting major events in the community combining treatment providers and recovery groups which will help us build a united front to support long term recovery.

Meetings have been well attended, with representatives from: Celebrate Recovery, Victory Circle, Living Free, AA, NA, Alternative Opportunities Treatment Services, Higher Ground, Hand Extended Outreach, Jericho Commission, Ozark Counseling Center, Glendale Christian Church, Ridgecrest Baptist Church, Greene County DWI Court and Drug Court Programs, the Regional Partnership Grant, the Recovery Coalition of the Ozarks, Better Life in Recovery, Missouri Recovery Network, Missouri State University, Evangel University, as well as an attorney and several local business owners.

Our unity will allow us to have larger events that will make it easier for the community to see that those with a mental and/or substance use disorder live healthy and rewarding lives while rejoining and giving back to the communities they live in. Together we will spread the message that prevention works, treatment is effective, and people can and do recover. In turn this will promote the message that recovery in all its forms is possible, and encourage citizens to take action to help expand and improve the availability of effective prevention, treatment, and recovery services for those in need.

Here is what happened at our last meeting:

We began with introductions of the group. Then the primary purpose of the events we are doing was discussed. That purpose is to celebrate people who are in recovery, educate the community better on all the great things that people in recovery are able to achieve and reduce stigma for those who are in recovery. We are proud to be a part of the recovery movement and plan on making National Recovery Month this September a month of celebration in southwest Missouri.

Then we did updates on where each of our committees is at:

1.       Recovery Day at Hammonds Field - The date isAugust 29^th. We will have a parade around the field; the scoreboard will have information about recovery month and advertise for the 5K/10K while we are walking around the field. We have already had a $500 donation to purchase tickets for kids whose parents cannot afford to buy tickets for them. Tickets will be $10 and we should have vouchers that we can give to people who purchase tickets available within the next 2 weeks.

2.       1^st Annual “Getting Dirty for Staying Clean” Run– It was decided that the Run and BBQ will be combined so that they are done on the same day and location, but they will have separate committees. The date we have set tentatively isSeptember 6^th. Location is yet to be determined. Several places have been contacted and we are waiting to hear who has the best deal before we decide which one to use.  We may have an event sponsor, but it will have to be voted on by the coalition during their next meeting the beginning of April. We may also have several other possible sponsors for the event: one may sponsor the start/finish line and the other may sponsor t-shirts.

3.       Recovery Day in the Park BBQ - – See above for date and location. We have a volunteer who will do the cooking. We are starting to reach out to multiple stores in the area for donations of goods and services. Several bands are being contacted to see if they would volunteer to play at the event.

4.       Multidisciplinary Forum at Missouri State – This project has several professors at Missouri State who are currently working on it. Date is yet to be determined.   

5.       “Keeping it Clean” Float and Fun Day – The date is tentatively set for September 29^th and Hooten Town is the tentative location.  We may have a sponsor for the cost of the campsite rental for the day. Camping will be free if we get the sponsor and the canoes will be $20 each.  We will also need to have sponsors for random giveaways, raffles, event prizes, as well as food for breakfast and lunch. Bands are being contacted for this event as are speakers. We will have 3 speakers the night before the float sharing their recovery: one from NA, one from AA and one from a faith-based organization.

We had a discussion regarding the direction and name for all of the recovery events we are planning. We talked about the possibility of me joining the Recovery Coalition of the Ozarks as an individual and then being their events chair and doing all of this under the direction of the coalition. We also discussed doing it under the name Better Life in Recovery (BLiR), which is an existing organization that focuses on sharing recovery and hope. BLiR will then have the opportunity to join the Recovery Coalition of the Ozarks as a member. The committee moved to use the organization Better Life in Recovery for the events and begin partnering with other organizations in our communities so that this event can be successful.

Chairs were selected for all of the subcommittees. The chair will:

·         Give progress reports at monthly meetings

·         Establish goals and develop a plan of action to insure successful implementation of their event

·         Assign duties for their subcommittee members

·         Follow up with each subcommittee member and insure they are doing their part within the subcommittee

·         Pick up any slack that could slow down the subcommittee’s progress in making their event successful

Our next meeting is set for March 22^nd at 1. If this is something that you are interested in becoming a part of, please let me know so that I can add you to the mailing lists I send out to remind people about the date, time and location of the meeting in March.

Weight Loss Wednesday Month 1

Here are my goals:

1. Lose 5 pounds by June 1st (240)
2. Lose 10 pounds July 1st (235)
3. Lose 25 pounds by October 1st (220)
4. Lose 50 pounds by May 1st (195)
5. Walk a 5K this year (no idea about time because I have never done one)
6. Run a 5K next year (no idea about time because I have never done one)
7. Do the MS 150 next year

So, I  have already missed my first goal, to be down to 240 by the 1st. I weighed today and I was at 243. That means that in the last month I have only lost 2.2 pounds, not 5.2. There are some good reasons for that, so here they are in no particular order:

1. I went on vacation for 10 days and ate horribly the entire time. There was cheesecake and BBQ, chips and sausage, ice cream and fast food plus a lot of frozen cokes and sodas!
2. I hate cardio, so I have done none.
3. I am too exhausted by the time I get off of work to do anything physically other than lift weights.
4. I love chocolate........and fried foods...............and Hardee's shakes and burgers..........and sweets.........and red meat.........and grease. 
5. I am lazy!!!!!!!!!!!

As you can see, they are honestly not that good of reasons. In fact, they are poor attempts at to justify staying how I am and that is not acceptable. I am going to not let myself fall into their traps again. Instead, I will tackle my excuses one at a time.

1. First, when I go on vacation there are always healthy alternatives to eat. I am challenging myself to do that when I go on vacation in July.
2. I may not like cardio, but I am going to like not being able to keep up with my kids as they get older and want to play even less. I have to do this, and there are no really good excuses.
3. I do enjoy lifting weights. I also like riding my bike, which is fully functional and gathering dust in my garage. I need to start walking at least twice a week, to eventually turn into jogging. I also need to ride my bike, and if that does not work then I need to show my wife how much I love her and do some Zumba with her. She loves it and I can handle the embarrassment.
4. I also love fruit, fish and chicken. I just need to eat them more. I am even beginning to enjoy vegetables.
5. I was also a drug addict, alcoholic, smoker, etc and I no longer do those things. I just need to get more motivated.

Part of being more motivated means that I need some constant reminders. One reminder is that I don't ever want to be a hypocrite, yet I am being one. I am sharing with others the love, hope and grace of Christ I talk about how the Holy Spirit can transform us and cause us to sin no longer. Then I engage in sloth and overindulging in food. Those are sins as well. My body is a temple of God, and I need to treat it as such. Why is this so hard?!?!?!?!?!?

Then I remember that unlike drugs, alcohol and cigarettes which I only wanted I NEED food in order to survive. It is on the bottom of the pyramid in Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs because food and liquid are vital to our survival. Unfortunately, it seems that the better most food tastes the worse it is for you and that stinks!

I just have to be smarter, which has never been one of my strong points. So, I  need to focus on my kids and the fun we can  have if I get into better shape. I need to remind myself that being in shape is spiritually, physically and emotionally important. I give a message of hope that a better life exists when I am in shape. I will remember all of this, and I will not relapse on bad food and laziness. This will not fail, but if I can not meet my next goal in time I see a Daniel Fast and a lot of meditation in my immediate future. I will meet my next goal, which is to be down to 235 by July 1st.

I am ready to do this, but I ask for your help. If you talk to me, ask me how I am doing at keeping focused. If you live in the Springfield area and ride bikes or play tennis, maybe we should get together. Give me a call. Thanks for your help, and here is to me losing 8 pounds this month!! I CAN DO IT!!

Weight Loss Wednesday Baseline - 245.2

Not going to lie, when I stepped on the scale and saw that I had regained over 25 pounds of the 40 pounds I had lost I was more than a little disappointed. Not surprised, but disappointed. I knew that it would be bad, as I have not been exercising regularly and my eating has been..................let's say it has been comforting. Translation, I have been stressed lately with various things in my life and have been comfort-eating to deal with them.

I am still struggling with an addiction. That addiction is to food. I have an on again, off again struggle that is getting to a point that I hurt because of my weight. I need to do this and stick to it. I am an addict, and my addiction has switched over the years from drugs to power/money to women to alcohol to food. Now I have one last frontier to conquer and it is now or never!!

My body is supposed to be a temple. I am supposed to make my life a living sacrifice and I am not doing that at all. I have instead turned my body into a shack at best and my daily life is more of an amusement park than a sacrifice for anything. I need to get busy doing what is right, which is taking care of my body and not being a glutton and lazy.
Luckily, the best man from my wedding who also happens to be my workout partner from years ago contacted me about working out again. I told Robert (that's what I call him because that is his name) that having a workout partner sounded like a great idea. It is motivation to go to the gym. If I don't show up, it means that I have stood somebody up and I don't do that anymore. He said something that caught my attention. "I am almost 40, and I want to get back in the gym before it is too late." That hit close to home, as I am 40 and if I don't get into the gym soon I probably never will. So, back to the gym it is.

Robert and I are meeting to work out 4 days a week. We are going really light and slow for the first couple of weeks. We will be doing FST-7, which uses a lot more repetitions and lighter weights than we were using the last time when we did Max OT workouts. I have gotten to the age I can not afford to get hurt in the gym anymore, and lifting low reps/high weights sometimes injures me. So the focus of FST 7 will be great.

I am hopeful that I can combine the workouts with a couple of days of bike riding 10-25 miles depending on the day. I enjoy riding bicycles, and if I  have just an hour I can put in 10 miles and if I have an afternoon once I build up I can put in 25-50 miles like I used to 5 years ago. It is so relaxing, listening to worship music while riding through nature focusing on all I have to be grateful for.

Next week I will start focusing on my eating habits. I am probably going to use the Weight Watcher's points plus system. As an addict, I like to manipulate things and the way their system is set up it will allow me to manipulate numbers. I find that appealing. It needs to be a lifestyle change not diet or I will not stick to it. I feel that with the point system I can incorporate that into my life for good. It allows for cheats and you can eat a ton of fruits and vegetables!

Finally, I do not run, PERIOD! If you see me running, you had better start running too. I run for 2 reasons currently, to barbecue and from spiders. Not any spiders, either. I mean like 8 Legged Freaks type spiders. I bring this up because I plan on walking more now and when I get to 220 pounds I am going to start jogging. My goal is to jog a complete 5K next year.

Here are my goals:

1. Lose 5 pounds by June 1st (240)
2. Lose 10 pounds July 1st (235)
3. Lose 25 pounds by October 1st (220)
4. Lose 50 pounds by May 1st (195)
5. Walk a 5K this year (no idea about time because I have never done one)
6. Run a 5K next year (no idea about time because I have never done one)
7. Do the MS 150 next year

In closing, I could use some help in my endeavore to get back into a shape that is not round. If you are trying to lose weight and would like an accountability partner, contact me please. I would not mind finding someone to play tennis with or take bike rides occasionally. So, if you like to ride bicycles or play tennis, get a  hold of me. If you have any advice, suggestions or feedback please get it to me.

As a disclaimer I am not interested in the supplements out there such as Genesis Pure or Visalus. I know that they have worked great for people and I will not argue that they are good products, but I want to focus on whole natural foods and exercise.