New Bern drug problems worsens: Addiction program offers support for recovery

Ron Nichols can tell you exactly where and when he bottomed out. It was the moment he knew, after a decade and a half of sobriety, that one bad decision had cost him everything.

“I was sitting in my house with no power, no food, no money,” he recalled matter-of-factly. “Unfortunately, that’s how bad it had to get before I admitted I was powerless and needed help.”

Nichols said he began drinking and smoking marijuana when he was in his early teens. Back then, he recalled, it was just what you did if you wanted to fit in with the cool kids.

But by 2016, Nichols had put those early choices behind him. As the owner of a successful roofing business he was earning around $4,000 a week and had 15 years of clean living behind him. Then it all fell apart.

“I made the mistake of going to a party one night and that turned into like three and a half years. I pretty much lost everything I had,” he explained. “I had two work trucks, all the tools I needed and they slowly got siphoned off for drugs.”

Nichols tells his story while sitting at a kitchen table in the immaculately kept house where he’s lived for the last two years. Nichols remembers the exact date – Nov. 7, 2019 – that he became a part of New Bern’s Reviving Lives Ministries, a long-term drug and alcohol recovery program that operates two houses for clients, one for men and another for women.

The houses can accommodate up to five residents at a time.

After entering the Reviving Lives Ministries program, clients are required to attend counseling at PORT Human Services, New Bern’s drug and alcohol addiction rehab center, and go to Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous meetings daily.

Residents are expected to work the 12 steps of AA and NA and must find a sponsor within 30-60 days. They are also drug tested randomly at the houses and at PORT on a regular basis.

Reviving Lives Ministries residents are often referred through detox facilities such as Dix Crisis Intervention Center in Jacksonville, Wilmington Treatment Center, and PORT Health in Ahoskie.

“People will come in pretty shaky off of detox. Sometimes their facility will set them up with an intake here at PORT in New Bern and they’ll get evaluations and then get processed into classes,” explained Lainy White, executive director of Reviving Lives Ministries.

The program also offers financial and psychoeducational therapeutic classes once a week. Since many of the residents have lost their license, transportation is provided to court and medical appointments.

“The format changes according to the needs. We also offer a yoga class once a week. There’s a meditation meeting also. We have a lot of focus on self-reflection and developing self-discipline because that’s a big part of it,” White explained.

After two six-week recovery sessions, Reviving Lives Ministries provides vocational training, often through Craven Community College. Though residents are required to walk or ride a bike during their early days in the program, once they have a job they can begin driving again.

Those who enter the program are required to live in one of the Reviving Lives Ministries houses for at least six months. And while the paperwork says they can stay up to two years, some remain even longer.

“They need at least six months just to give their brains a chance to heal," White explained. "It just takes time to develop a new mindset. Our house manager at the women’s house has been here for seven years.”

Nichols, who works as the manager of the Reviving Lives Ministries men’s house, also decided to stay beyond the two year limit.

After trying out a different program that he described as “too faith-based,” he ended up in New Bern at Reviving Lives Ministries after being referred through the HOPE Initiative in Nash County.

Despite his very real struggles, Nichols laughs easily as he discusses his past and his present “one day at a time” recovery efforts.

“From the time I was born I was going to church every Wednesday and every Sunday but I didn’t necessarily agree with my parents' idea of a higher power. I just felt like this program was the best fit for me, they keep you focused on recovery,” he said. “You’ve got that structure to where you’re not left to your own devices, which can get me in trouble.”

Battling the ‘god of our misunderstanding’

White understands all too well the kind of trouble that can come from drug and alcohol abuse. Before she became the executive director for Reviving Lives Ministries she was one of the program’s clients. A recovering alcoholic, she’s now two years sober.

“We come into the program kind of immature and blaming other people for our problems and slowly we come to realize that our problems are sitting in our seat and we come to learn how to deal with them,” White said.

“If we didn’t have this community,” she added, “then we would be back out there doing what we know doesn’t work.”

Reviving Lives Ministries started in May 2013 as an effort by local volunteers to address addiction issues in the community. The program, which was named by New Bern pastor Robert Johnson, began with a United Way grant for $833 a month to rent both houses. White said the program is now funded primarily through grants and support from local churches.

Residents also pay program service fees, or rent, of $300 a month. Programs such as the HOPE Initiative and Tommy’s Foundation of Goldsboro often assist with the payments until the clients are back on their feet.

Reviving Lives Ministries serves about 45 people a year, though more apply for their services.

“My first couple of months here I turned away close to 20 people,” White said. “We’ve had an opening in the men’s house for about two weeks now and that’s the longest that it’s been since I’ve been here. We definitely need more residential programs in our area.”

Though Reviving Lives Ministries is a faith based program, White described it as more inclusive than many others.

“One of the catch phrases I hear is that we come into the program with the god of our misunderstanding and it takes a while to develop our own understanding,” she commented. “There’s enough room in the AA and NA 12 steps for that. We regularly talk about spirituality, that’s a daily topic, but not everybody needs to be Christian.”

The future of addiction treatment

White said treatment needs have only grown since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has exacerbated an already spiraling opioid addiction crisis.

“We’re going to be dealing with that for a long time to come. In our houses we have a 50/50 split in the men right now between alcohol and opioids. In our women it’s about one third not alcohol,” White noted.

White said she believes a more compassionate approach is gaining acceptance for the treatment of opioid addiction

“It’s just hit so many people, just because they got a surgery or had a tooth pulled, where people will just fall down this hole (due to prescription painkillers," she said. "It’s becoming so common and people are understanding that they knew this bright shining person and then here they are really needing a hand.”

White said Reviving Lives Ministries needs to grow if it plans to keep pace with the area’s addiction issues. She said future plans call for the addition of several transitional homes that would provide a less structured, and more affordable, environment for those in recovery.

“The work that’s involved with getting out of a mindset that’s been in active addiction for a long time, that cannot be done alone, it just can’t be,” said White. “We need more of these communal spaces where people can do this together.”

A county detox facility is also needed, said White.

“Hopefully we can change that soon,” she commented. “We do have some people that just hear about us from family members or past participants and they can just give us a call. Our application is on our website.”

As for Nichols, he said he owes his current good health to just the sort of addiction recovery approach through Reviving Lives Ministries. Though he has bigger plans for the future, he said he’s trying to take a more humble approach to life these days.

“I used to own my own business and now I’m making $10 an hour working at a restaurant but I’ve got money in my pocket and I’m sober. I’m not going to say it’s where I want to be but I’m perfectly fine with it,” Nichols said. “I’m definitely more at peace than I’ve ever been in my life, that’s for sure.”

To learn more about Reviving Lives Ministries, visit www.revivinglivesministries.com/ or call (252) 624-9826.

This article originally appeared on Sun Journal: New Bern NC addiction program offers communal approach to recovery