Ep62 Addiction Treatment Peer Recovery Coach

Ep62 Addiction Treatment Peer Recovery Coach

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Hi. Welcome to Addiction Recovery Place Podcast, the podcast championing addiction treatment professionals around the world. I'm your host Chris Langley, and I'm very pleased to introduce today's guest, Renee Lewis from Maine. Renee is a Peer Recovery Coach for the OHH program at Assistance Plus a service, which is located in Maine. Welcome to Addiction Recovery Place Podcast, Renee, it's so good to have you with us today.

Thank you for having me. I am excited to be here.

I'm really excited to hear about your career and your work and what the great work that you are doing in your state. So we're just gonna kick off with the first question, Renee. So can you tell us about yourself, and your journey to becoming the Peer Recovery Coach at Assistance Plus.

Yeah. my peer coach journey basically, passion for that began when my trouble began. I am a person in long-term sustained recovery. I celebrated nine years in February, and at that time I had some education that I had dropped off I decided to pick that back up and go for Mental Health and Human Services so that I could help the population that I was part of.

'cause there's so many resources out there, but. people in active use tend to not know how to navigate those systems. They don't know where to find the resources so they fall off. So that really began my passion and, because of my battle with, addiction and recovery, it just felt right in, line with the universe.

Yep. Yep. so what were you doing before, before you started this career, Renee?

prior to that, I was, going to school for Business Management. I was a substitute teacher raising children, and some medical things got in the way of that.

But I did lIke to work with the at risk, the teenage population that couldn't fit in general schooling. They had to do like vocational education.

I found that I really connected with those kids that were struggling.

Wow. firstly, congratulations on nine years of sobriety.

That's that's wonderful. That's, amazing to hear, and big congratulations to you. So I'd just like to talk to you about your training that you did for your role, because I really want to just tell our listeners as to what the Peer Recovery Support workers have to go through to get to that position.

Can you tell me about your journey from, the training and what it involved and how long it took and, where you took the training at?

Yeah. To actually get to be able to be a registered, certified coach, you have to take what they call a CCAR training. And, that's a intense five day 8, 9, 10 hours a day. a long day. it's a lot of training so that, this is high burnout rate field, so we really have to prepare ourselves to go in

Did you find the training helped prepare you for the work that you were gonna be doing? Obviously you've had your, your own personal history with

addiction, but did it prepare you for other things that you might be facing with, clients?

It did. I feel like with the lived experience that I have with the education of the bachelor's degree, and with that training, it really brought together the full picture of what client centered based treatment should be like from the eyes of a peer recovery role instead of a counselor or a sponsor or a mentor. Because those roles are all very different.

Yeah. So did you, find, when you first started the role, did you, ease into it generally or did you find it quite easy to just get in there and help your clients?

I came in more like a bowl in a China closet, but felt very comfortable in that space.

Yeah. Excellent. Yeah. Yeah. Good stuff. And you, you get good supervision, do you,

with your, with your work? Yeah.

a little extra supervision. I like to utilize that, a whole, every week I like to meet with my supervisor and discuss the things that are going to make sure that I'm, not carrying the burdens of the people that I work with. Because as you can imagine, they're massive.

There's lots of struggles.

yeah, yeah, So self care is very

important.

It's extremely important.

And I'm really pleased to hear that you are taking the opportunity for supervision. Because I think supervision is sometimes lost as well.

I've had Yeah. personal experience that myself, and it's very frustrating. It's lovely to hear that you're able to meet with your supervisor once a week.

So it sounds like you're getting the real support yourself as well, which is awesome. Can you tell us about some of the main services that you and team, you and your team provide at Assistance Plus.

In the OHH side, we, we have our MAT provider who is also, medication management, She can help you make sure that you're in compliance with taking your medications when you should, if you should be taking these ones, what the risks are with all that. She's great. We have a.

Fully, C-A-D-C, so that's a certified alcohol and drug counselor.

She's also

a, client, patient navigator. So she'll help you with all those systems, connecting with providers that you need, connecting with certain resources there. Then we have our nurse. That is, a lot of experience and she's pretty highly trained in like acute medical needs. when you have a lot of those systems failures inside too, when you have, when you're just newly into recovery and she can really help with that

And Yeah. myself as the peer recovery coach.

And, the one fascinating thing is we are an all woman team.

Yeah. Wonderful.

Wonderful. Mm-hmm.

to all aspects of addiction. So

Yeah. Yeah.

something we really set ourselves a little aside for.

Yeah. So you're not just office based, are you? You also can go to the

client's home and,

Yes. Yes. It's opioid home health. It basically does start with the client and their environment that they're living in. Sometimes that is homelessness, but we will meet them truly where they're at.

Yeah. Yep. So do you help refer them onto other services you just

mentioned someone who's without a home. So if someone needed some housing, you can refer them to the right services and to

management through that.

yes. Our CADC, so our counselor, she is also the or patient navigator,

help connect them to, their highest level needs and those resources.

Yeah. Yeah. So how are you funded?

We do accept main care

and there is private pay as well.

I see. Okay. So if, a client wanted to, access your services, how, what's the, procedure

for, for that?

It's easy. It's www.assistanceplus.com and there'll be a request services link on that page, and you can just click on that and you will fill out that form and someone will get in touch with you like very quickly. It's usually within 24 hours.

Wow. That's incredible. So you seem like you've got your referral process nailed down there nicely. That's great to hear. Obviously there are many, challenges that come to work in this sector. so what are some of the, challenges that you've experienced in your work, Renee?

What are the things that are the most difficult, would you say?

Some of he most difficult things, would probably be maintaining my boundaries, right? I have to be very mindful that some of the people I'm working with have lots of systems that are just either incomplete failure or disarray. Sometimes people are not as punctual or as dependable or as honest as they could be. And those are the things. So boundaries are probably something that are the biggest struggles in this field.

So when you say boundaries, do you, you mean what you are doing for your clients or just the services you are providing or,

probably in sure that you are not taking on yeah. struggles and, transference and countertransference and all of those things. and also maintaining that you are not a 24 hour service. Nobody is. We have lives, too.

Mm-hmm.

So as much as we want to be there for everyone at all times of struggle, we might not be maintaining that

has been, that's also hard too for people.

Yeah. Yeah, that's a very, another very important message for anyone who's considering this field is to, self-care

Yeah.

boundaries.

Very important. I don't think many people have actually touched on that, no. That's really important for anyone, any professional in this work. I've had to deal with that myself in the past. I know how difficult it can be and how sometimes taking clients problems home can be something, you've really gotta learn how to just detach from that when you're

at home with your family as well. That's very important for your own health, that's for sure. I'd just like to talk touch base with you. I ask a lot of, podcast guests because the opioid crisis is just running right through the country, very sadly, and it's now going to the rest of the world it seems. I speak, to people in England and it's now the fentanyl crisis is now hitting there. So how is Maine dealing with the ongoing opioid crisis? Are they dealing with it head on, would you say?

Are they actually addressing the problem?

I would say that for the most part, right? as administrations change

of course. funding, but for the most part, Maine has, offered fairly decent amount of resources for people struggling with addictions. They have limited methadone clinics. We have almost all providers are offering, suboxone and or Sublocade injections, which has been great people.

That's been lifesaving as well. We have free Narcan, vinet almost any. outpatient therapy hospital,

your local pharmacy and get it with a small copay. there's so many resources to give out free, and we also have some, opioid, OPCs, so overdose prevention centers.

also clean needle exchanges, and Oh places like

wow. That sounds very progressive.

It is,

Having needle exchanges as well. I've not come across many states that, I'm here in Iowa and it's a big no-no. Needle exchanges just don't happen. And it's nice to hear that there are states that are actually doing this

the, for the right reasons.

so No, that's great. And so free Narcan as well.

Yes.

It's wow,

that's,

around Narcan with me everywhere I go and I give

it to everybody who wants it.

If anyone asks me, I just give it. You can. There's, websites you can go to get the free Narcan. I'm not exactly sure what any of those are at the moment. I didn't write those down.

is that just statewide with the free Narcan? Would could you, is it avail? Say if someone was outta state, could they apply to get Narcan from outta state maybe? Or

I

do you know? There's, websites online that you can go and get free Narcan To any shipped to any state. I do know that if you are living in Maine, you can walk into, in my area there's their hospital in Waterville has a harm reduction program. You can walk in there as a person and get free Narcan

Fabulous. That's, great to hear. That really is. I, love hearing about that.

Because it's so important. It's very needed. It, really is. a question I always like to ask because the word stigma comes up a lot in these podcasts, especially when I do the pre-podcast calls.

So why? Why do you think it is in this day and age, that stigma of addiction and mental health is still potentially stopping people from wishing to access a service?

I think, all know what the stigma's at, right? We all know they prevent 90% of the people trying to seek help from getting help. It's only about 10% of the people who actually want help seek help and get it because of stigma.

I think mostly because people are coming from this is a behavioral downfall standpoint or this is a legal failing of some sort, or a moral failing on someone's behalf rather than,

regardless of how your addiction started or your substance use started, there's brain chemistry that happens. There's changes in our, development that will then become an addiction, a disease, an actual brain disease. It can be, you can recover, right?

You may not be able to cure it.

I think that we always, anyone who has struggled with addiction will always have those thoughts.

But it's, you learn to control them.

That's right. That's right. It just, it is just very sad that stigma is still such a thing in, society.

It really is.

It's

Coming from my background, I had, I have a pharmaceutical, so I was prescribed lots of medications, and I was very dependent and tolerant on those. And I felt shame and guilt because I felt like I must be misusing or abusing my medications in some way, shape or form for this to have happened to me.

And I think that a lot of people struggle with that and just, it's not spoken about.

Yeah. Yeah, it's certainly not, it's very sad. I just hope that because we're going through this crisis now, that something good is gonna come out of the, especially around the stigma for people to access services. Because without the services you are providing, people are just, sadly,

Yeah.

it, they're gonna be so badly affected.

T That's the thing. There's medications to help everyone, but oftentimes people aren't, they don't know how to build the support, so they're expected to just, oh, you're in recovery, so you're fine now. But they don't realize that those cycles and those patterns of addiction are so ingrained in your behavior that you can remove the substances and still be stuck in that addictive pattern.

And it's so important for programs like this to come in and, help find those resources and help you find your pathway and what works for you.

Yeah, most definitely. Most definitely. One of the last questions I love to ask is I ask this question to all my guests because I.

get, I've had such a wide and varied response, which is, great, which is what this podcast is all about Renee, but can you tell me your opinion of harm reduction, how it plays a potentially pivotal role in recovery?

Oh, yes. I love harm reduction actually. I feel that almost all pathways into recovery come from a harm reduction standpoint. If you look at it, most people, even if they have chosen that one day to stop their substance that they're using or their addictive pattern, Oftentimes there's years before that of trying to stop and starting again and trying to stop and start again.

And I think that we're more successful if we taper down our use and maybe put some parameters around it, have some do's and don'ts around your drinking or your drug use, whatever it is that you're, the opioids are the ones and, when you have that. I feel like then you can start building those sober supports in place before the, so it's not as such an abruption to your life.

Yep.

So work. Work with someone where they're at

and

yes.

Yeah.

I, also do think that safe places to go and be able to in a program where your use isn't going to get you kicked out of that program is a good way for us to start breaking that stigma.

If you don't recognize harm reduction, then you can't recognize that someone can be on Suboxone or methadone and still use while they're working on not using for the future.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's very important now. Thank you for that, Renee. last question. Do you have a message for anyone who's listening to this podcast

who is going through an addiction?

yeah. So for one, it's never too late to start your journey. And also, it doesn't matter how many times you may stumble or fall, as long as you get up and learn something from that experience and move forward, you'll be successful in your journey.

Wow. Renee, I couldn't think of a better way of finishing today's podcast, than what you've just said. Thank you so much for that. lastly, actually, can you tell our listeners how's best to contact you and to find your service online as

well?

that's that www,assistanceplus.com and that

would be the best way to

and if you call after four or 30 in the afternoon, I believe

have to select option seven to get

us directly.

Oh, I see. Okay. Excellent. Renee, thank you so much for your time today and it's been really interesting speaking to you. And it's lovely to speak to a, peer support worker who's so dedicated to their work and their clients and their service. And it's been a real privilege to speak to you today.

thank you so much.

Thank you.