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Getting Sober at 17: John Lieberman on 40 Years of Recovery and Leading Visions Teen · Finding New Waters

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  From a recovery point of view, in a treatment program, you
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  treat things kind of like family.
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  There's this connection, support, being willing to sit
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  down with somebody at 1:00 in the morning, not just the
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  clinical you're going to do this, this and this.
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  So I think that that had a has an impact on how we respect the
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  kids, treat the kids and require family involvement.
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  All right, all right. Welcome back everybody to
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  another episode of Finding New Waters.
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  My name is Bea Reeves. I'm the Director of Business
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  Development here at New Waters in Raleigh, NC I'm sitting here
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  with our CEO, Justin McClendon. And our very special guest today
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  is John Lieberman, who is the CEO of Visions out in
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  California, which is the premier treatment Center for
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  adolescents, definitely the gold standard.
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  Welcome, John. Thank you so much for having me.
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  Yeah, man, thank you for doing this.
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  Yeah. Thanks for coming on.
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  Yeah, we really, really appreciate it, man.
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  I know this is the middle of your morning, and it's a Friday,
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  so thank you. Love Friday.
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  Yeah, well, I hear you. You know, the weekends and
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  Fridays don't have quite the same weight they used to, you
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  know? But this time, 7 1/2 years ago,
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  I would be chomping at the bit to get going here for all the
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  wrong reasons. But just a quick back story.
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  You know, I, I started working in this field just almost a
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  little over five years ago in the height of early COVID where
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  everything was shut down. You know, pretty much every
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  meeting I had was, you know, not quite this professional, but,
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  you know, was virtual and conferences weren't really
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  happening. And then a year later, the first
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  conference I ever attended was up in not Montree, but one of
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  the one of those retreat centers up in Asheville, Kanuga, I think
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  actually. And John was one of the, I think
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  you were the first speaker I ever saw at a conference in this
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  field. And so I have a very, you know,
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  you have a special place in my heart there, man.
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  Thank you. Yeah, well, how did you, you
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  know, I know a little bit about you, but I want to keep it a
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  little fresh. I mean one, the main thing I
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  know that I've always found so amazing about you is you got
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  sober at 17 years old. I did, yeah.
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  So March, March 25th, 1985, yeah, sober and, and it wasn't
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  my first treatment, you know, experience either.
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  I, I went through as my second program was called ASAP Family
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  Treatment programs, great name right as adolescent substance
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  abuse program. And it was on the third floor of
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  a psychiatric hospital in, in Pasadena.
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  So, you know, it was a, it was a, an experience and I'd been in
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  another program before that like August of 1984 and stayed sober
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  for a little bit. But really got my gut kind of
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  the bug and the excitement about recovering what my life could be
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  like. You know, going through that
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  program and seeing people and meeting people who I felt like
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  maybe maybe my life could be different.
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  Maybe this could be a different experience than what I had maybe
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  envisioned for my life. And I remember this guy, his
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  name was Kerry. He came walking down the hall
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  and he was in cowboy boots. He had long hair, a beard and
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  drinking a big cup of coffee and rode an old knucklehead to work.
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  And I was like, that's my guy, you know what I mean?
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  Like there's, there's a little bit of hope because my parents
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  were very conservative and, and I, I didn't, I didn't look at
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  the world that way necessarily, especially at 17 years old.
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  So so there. It gave me a little bit of hope
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  that sobriety could be something exciting and fun.
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  Got a question for you? What's a knucklehead?
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  I was thinking the same thing. I'm like.
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  A knucklehead's an old motorcycle.
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  I think the first one's probably in the 40s fifties, but it's a,
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  it's a, you know, like a kick start Harley-Davidson that leaks
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  everywhere it goes kind of a thing, you know, So I and this
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  is a good story. I was, I remember we, we were on
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  our way to Palm Springs, sitting in the back of the car and this
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  motorcycle comes kind of this group of motorcycles goes past
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  us and I remember this guy, he had a beard wearing like a tank
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  top. So this is probably in 19,
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  seven, early 70s and he was riding, it was a big chopper and
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  he's riding like this. He wouldn't even have his hand
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  on the wheels like this. And his his girlfriend, I think
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  that they, he would have said his old lady was on the back
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  asleep like this. And my parents, the, the disdain
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  in their face for this part of culture was so evident.
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  And all I thought was, I don't want to do that, you know, So I
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  didn't tell him that at the time.
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  But it put a seed was planted a. Seed was planted.
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  Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, that's so, you know, not
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  to dwell too much on, you know, you getting sober young.
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  But I mean, I always find it fascinating.
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  And to me it just seems like, you know, it's easy for me to
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  say there's no way that would have worked for me when I was
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  that young. But, you know, there were times
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  where, you know, I got in trouble and DUI's and, you know,
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  drinking things happen where I wonder if I if the message were
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  presented to me at the right time when I was kind of, you
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  know, licking my wounds a little bit.
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  Because I just feel like we all have these kind of windows, a
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  finite number of windows of opportunity.
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  And I don't think I missed a window.
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  But I mean, if if the window had sort of, you know, been
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  presented, if that makes sense. But what?
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  You know, what was that like being 17 years old and
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  California sober when your friends and peers are not even
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  thinking about it? Yeah, Well, I think a few
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  things. I think, like you said, what,
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  you know, what's that message? That kid, How do you give the
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  message to kids? First of all, it's being
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  authentic and real. Kids are when you're young,
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  you're kind of altruistic. It's like, you know, just
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  wanting things to be right in your world and then being
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  completely defiant and angry and shaking your fist at the world.
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  And it got it. Everything else when something's
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  not right in somebody else's world, Right.
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  So when so treatment for me, one of there's a few things that
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  that were like these glimmers, these these things that stuck
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  with me through this process. One of them was that, and a lot
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  of people in in young people's programs, we talked about like
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  first it starts with fun and it's fun with problems and it's
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  just problems, right? The other part that was that
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  impacted me when I first went to treatment and when you go to
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  treatment for the second time, anybody knows once after the
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  first time when it's just, you don't know what's going on.
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  The second time, it's just good Lord, how could I be in this
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  again, right? How it's just, it's a very, it's
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  it's a defeated, frustrating feeling, especially with an
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  adolescent program where the door locks behind you and you
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  were told that you're just going for a drug test and essentially
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  you've been gooned into a program, you know, and, and, and
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  there's a few things that happened.
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  So as I was walking down the hall that the, the counselor was
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  walking me says you got to meet the kids.
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  There's 35 kids in this program and the door opens and three
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  guys are walking out. They had just done a panel, they
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  were in recovery talking about their experience when one of the
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  guys walking out was in the first treatment program I had
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  been in. I don't even remember his name,
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  but the experience was as he walks past me to go out the
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  locked doors, he goes, hey, John, what's up?
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  And the, I don't know, the shame, the impact of that.
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  And at the same time, I had this glimmer of that should have been
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  me, that should have been me, that could have been me.
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  I could have been here doing that.
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  So that was the first thing. And then that kind of set me up.
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  I didn't talk to many people at first.
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  There was a lot of younger kids in there.
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  I didn't talk much. I also my drug of choice was
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  methamphetamine. So I was coming down and and not
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  doing well. I also had I was living on the
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  streets basically, you know, kind of couch surfing a little
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  bit, but my parents essentially hadn't seen me but maybe once in
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  three months. So from like early December all
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  the way into March and, and I'm listening to everybody complain,
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  they're complaining. And this is an interesting
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  piece. I think it's really important
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  from an addiction point of view is that and parents are affected
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  by this and loved ones where the person with the problem is keeps
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  pointing the finger outward, right?
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  It's you, it's the parents, it's the authorities, it's my job,
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  it's the college, it's whatever so from.
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  And I was just listening and all I thought was I'd already
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  graduated from high school, which is a weird thing.
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  I graduated at 16. So I had all the things at my
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  disposal and meanwhile I'm driving it into the ground,
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  right? All the opportunities in the
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  world and what I what I was listening.
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  I remember about the thing, first thing I shared in Group
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  was what the fuck are you talking about?
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  You're here, sorry about my language, but what are you
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  talking about? You're here, I'm here, it's
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  about me, it's about you, and you're complaining about
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  everybody else that you have no control over, which is from a
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  recovery point of view is such a good foundation because it also
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  interwole for me with surrender. Like it's me.
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  I'm the only one that's going to make a difference in this thing
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  no matter what happens. Yeah.
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  Well, then eventually we learned that when we're pointing the
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  finger, then the three are pointing back at us.
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  And like you just said it, it's it's it's a me problem.
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  I can't change other people. And, you know, I don't.
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  I know that from knowing you. And, you know, reading, reading
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  about you, you've kind of done every job in the treatment
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  space. But what did you do?
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  Like, you know, when you were 17 up to when you started working
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  at it and what, how, what was that like?
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  That's a great story. So first of all, I'm, I'm really
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  at just basically the anniversary of 40 years working
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  in the field. So, so I yeah, I mean, really
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  it's, it's pretty exciting, especially as as young as I am
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  to be 24 years old and have done it for that long.
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  It's great, isn't it? So the what?
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  So this is where I think part of my commitment to treatment
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  excellence for kids comes into play is that I didn't know what
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  I was going to do originally. I was going to go in the
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  military. That was my plan.
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  My mom thought I just got to get him out of here.
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  I'll sign him up the day he turned 17.
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  He's already got a diploma. I but when I went through my
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  first treatment center, my mom was like, and we're going to go
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  sign you up now. I said, mom, I can't go in the
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  military. She said, Oh yes, you can
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  because you can't be at home. And I was like, well, OK, let me
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  explain some things. What I at, at that year in 1985,
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  if you had a military ID, you could drink on base, you could
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  get alcohol. That was my motivation to go in
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  the military. So I told her that and she said,
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  Oh yeah, you shouldn't go in the military.
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  She was very quickly understood that this is not, not not a
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  great plan. So I didn't know what I wanted
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  to do. My parents were like, when you
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  get out of here, you got to go work at Wendy's or Arby's or
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  whatever place, just get a job, right?
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  And all I could think was, and if I work at one of those
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  places, I'm going to be doing meth again so fast, right?
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  And I was afraid and I, I didn't get to go live back at home.
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  So there's a lot of like things kind of fears and concerns,
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  right? So my doctor, Doctor Jim Keener,
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  sweetheart of a guy, he said, well, let's get an aptitude test
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  for you. You know, everybody back then,
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  they got an MMPI, which is basically a personality
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  inventory to show where you have strengths, weaknesses if you
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  have like depression, anxiety, psychosis.
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  But he said, let's do an aptitude test.
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  So I did and it came back with you really like helping people.
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  And anytime I did have a job, I worked really hard.
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  But I could see very quickly that my motivation, even working
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  really hard, whether I was, and I grew up out in the country,
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  whether I was, you know, building fences or do, you know,
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  hauling wood or whatever it was, I wanted to do a good job for
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  whoever I was working for. And so I looked and I said, what
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  does that mean? And Doctor Keener said, well,
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  John, what that means is if you stay sober till you're 18, she's
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  about 90 days away or so, a little more, 103 days away, you
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  could get a job working like as a tech, a floor tech.
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  Cause back then, if you had somebody who's 18 years old, who
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  had 90 days were more sober, that's such a big deal.
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  They would hire us, especially if we'd been through the
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  program. So literally July 29th, 1985, I
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  got a job, you know, and, and the guy, the guy who hired me
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  and his name was Lou, he'd been sober seven or eight years,
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  which I thought was just, you know, he was everything.
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  He hired me call part time for graveyard shift, which is the
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  lowest of the low. I started working there in 85.
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  I left there in about 2000. So about 15 years I was there
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  and I started as a tech and I left as the director of national
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  outreach. And while I was there, I went
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  back to school and I got initially a degree in business
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  management. And a lot of people asked why
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  didn't I get a degree to be a clinician, you know, and, and
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  somewhere inside of me, I thought, I meet a lot of great
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  clinicians, right? I meet, I meet, I meet
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  clinicians and a lot of programs.
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  But what I don't see is places where the programs are designed
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  to support what the clinicians do that that's the focus.
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  And, and this isn't a criticism. It was more like, I think we can
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  do a better job supporting the clinicians and the work that
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  they do. And from a culture kind of
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  overview, I mean, later I did, I got some more education, but
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  that was kind of my that was absolutely my motivation in
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  going to school from a business point of view was to have that
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  impact, hopefully in the programs I was involved in.
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  And also then I kind of start, if you hear me talk a lot, I try
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  to spread that message to, to leaders and to, you know, people
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  in the industry and just any kind of business, right.
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  If we think about how do we support our the, the skills and
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  the the work that our employees are doing?
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  John, there there's. Have you?
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  So you've always worked with the adolescent population it sounds
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  like. Is that correct?
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  Well, OK, so I did for two years.
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  I went in the early days, I went to work for Promises treatment
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  center and, and so I, I left, I left the program I had been in
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  and went to work for Promises for two years and doing, and I
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  was their first national outreach person.
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  And so I was just on the road all the time.
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  And, and so for two years and then I, my first contract that I
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  got, I, I did like four or five contracts for about a year and a
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  half. But my first contract was with
• 15:48
  visions where I am now. And I came here because, well, I
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  knew the adolescent market really well.
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  And when I I was meeting with Chris Schumer, we were having
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  coffee and we were just talking about, he didn't know a lot
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  about adolescent treatment. So I was kind of his ear to
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  bend. Then I came on as a contractor.
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  And then I was sitting out in front of the facility one day.
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  I'm waiting for a meeting with Chris.
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  And I have kids. My kids are now 37 and 38.
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  In fact, my oldest daughter and her husband and father own a
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  treatment center up in Utah. And she said, I will never be
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  involved in treatment. But so it's really fun.
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  I get the teaser now that they're running a program for
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  men up there. But I was my kids at that point
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  were just going into middle school and it was it was tough.
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  I was on the road every other week.
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  And when you get a phone call from the school that says, we
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  just found your daughter in the parking lot smoking pot.
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  And I'm like in a conference, you know, eating pralines in
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  Savannah, GA. And I'm like, I got to change
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  this. And so I kind of was writing a
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  letter to God sitting out in front of the facility.
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  And I walked in because I was trying to find we, Chris and I
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  had tried to find a new director for the program.
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  And I just walked in and said, I think I need to be the director.
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  And Chris said, it's about time, you know.
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  And so, so then I, I started, I worked out of the contracts and
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  basically came, you know, started working at Visions full
• 17:23
  time. I think that was in 2004.
• 17:26
  Awesome. That's fantastic.
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  The I mean, there seems to be an obvious connection in between
• 17:31
  like when you got sober and what your own personal story is and
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  like maybe a desire to work with adolescence.
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  Is that a? Is that a safe assumption or?
• 17:38
  Oh my gosh, yeah. So because.
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  So that's part of my mantra of. OK, so first of all, I went into
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  treatment when I was young. That connection with it's my
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  responsibility, not anybody else's kind of everybody else
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  can fuck right off. It's about me.
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  And I say that in a spiritual way.
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  And then and, and what would happen when I first went to
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  meetings, I was still at that group that I would hear from
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  people. You're too young, you know, how
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  can you how can you know? Do you are you a real alcoholic
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  or you're a real addict or or whatever real is, you know, and,
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  and, and I absolutely was and my friends were dying and I tried
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  doing it on my own. And and so a little bit of that
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  is my continued rebellion against the system that
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  respecting kids ability to connect spiritually, to connect
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  emotionally, that there can be changed in their lives, that
• 18:40
  their families can change all of that, because I see it and have
• 18:44
  seen it. And, and that I also just
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  considering the impact that just one young person, like just if
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  we just took it financially speaking for the for the, the
• 18:57
  world as a whole, that somebody's not going to jail.
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  They're not ripping you off, but they're actually giving back and
• 19:02
  supporting the community. It's amazing.
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  And the adolescence, the young people I see when they get
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  clean, they are a different breed of people when they're
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  sober because they are working through very complex and
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  foundational decisions that a lot of people don't get to till
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  later on in life. They're thinking about what do I
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  do today to be a different person?
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  What do I do today to make sure the things that maybe if I have
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  a resentment from yesterday, how do I deal with that?
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  How many 17 year olds do you know that that's the way they
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  get up in the morning? But that's what was taught to
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  me, you know, one of the biggest lessons that I learned in the
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  first program I was in, I didn't know how to pray in the morning.
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  My counselor said, just pray in the morning.
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  Who do you pray to? Doesn't matter.
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  I was like, what do you mean it doesn't matter?
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  What if I pray to the wrong? You know what I mean?
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  Like, what if I what if I pray wrong, you know, and but I would
• 19:58
  always forget. He said, all right, try this.
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  Throw your shoes under your bed at night.
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  So then you get up in the morning and then when you're
• 20:05
  grabbing for your shoes, you'll remember why you're doing that.
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  So I did that and I had a roommate, his name was Jordan.
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  And and I would throw my shoes under there and I'd crawl under
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  there, but I wouldn't get on my knees and pray.
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  I just pray while I was under there.
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  So he wouldn't know what I was doing right.
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  Later he said when John would go under his bed that I remember
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  that he was going under there to get his shoes because he was
• 20:27
  supposed to pray in the morning. So I'd pray real quick on my
• 20:30
  knees while he was under the bed so he wouldn't see me.
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  So, you know, I, I think that those types of things like, you
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  know, learning to make amends, to be authentic, good Lord,
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  those are just huge, huge important skills, connections to
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  make. And then my conversations with
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  other people were that early age was about that.
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  And that leads by the time I when I was 21 years old, I had
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  two babies in diapers and I was a single dad at 2122 years old.
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  So, so, and I attribute, you know, the, you know, finding
• 21:11
  recovery and the support I got in recovery is such a big part
• 21:15
  of the created or help with my foundation for stability and
• 21:22
  also to, to trust, trust the process, you know, that I could
• 21:28
  do one day at a time. Even those things didn't make
• 21:31
  sense a lot of times that I was in a lot of pain and fear, but I
• 21:36
  was going to show up for my kids no matter what, you know, and,
• 21:40
  and I, I, I attribute that I mean, my mom also my mom was the
• 21:43
  warrior who, you know, who fought for me as well, but.
• 21:48
  Yeah, You mentioned, I was curious about your family.
• 21:50
  You mentioned that you came from your parents were conservative
• 21:53
  and I'm trying to put some pieces together and you lived
• 21:55
  out in the country, but in California.
• 21:56
  I mean, what was your, what was your childhood like?
• 22:00
  I we lived out in the country, yeah, the people say country in
• 22:03
  California, yeah, we lived in 27 acres, one of the most as a
• 22:07
  child. These there's different times
• 22:09
  that are just I remember, but in 6th grade, I used to go home
• 22:13
  after school, put a saddle on a horse and go riding with a
• 22:15
  friend, you know, and that's just that experience is just
• 22:19
  really special. At the same time, my father, who
• 22:25
  we lost him during COVID, had a significant addiction problem,
• 22:29
  got sober at different times. He was also a physician, which
• 22:33
  you know, in back then you nobody would believe that my dad
• 22:37
  had a problem, right, because he was helping so many people.
• 22:40
  So he and it was it, he was, he was terrifying, you know, so I
• 22:45
  had, you know, addiction in the family.
• 22:47
  My mom is 7 of seven, grew up in Houma, LA, you know, that
• 22:52
  country that's I think where the conservative kind of my my dad
• 22:55
  grew up in Saint Louis. And and so my mom, seven of
• 23:01
  seven, the other six siblings all died with complications of
• 23:07
  addiction. My mom didn't drink at all, you
• 23:10
  know, I mean, basically she had, you know, she'd have a half a
• 23:13
  sip of wine, but but all the other siblings so that I mean,
• 23:17
  it's from a you know, whether whether it's nature or nurture,
• 23:21
  definitely there. It runs through our family in a
• 23:23
  big way. And then I'm also a kid who had
• 23:26
  a significant dyslexia. I just had difficulty in school,
• 23:29
  difficulty reading. I think that impacted just kind
• 23:33
  of my rebellious nature because if you school was miserable.
• 23:37
  So every day, the only time I had any hope was Friday night.
• 23:41
  And then when June came, I still get depressed in September for
• 23:45
  all the kids who have to go back to school just because it was
• 23:47
  that, that kind of difficult for me.
• 23:52
  And, and so I, but I, but I grew up in a, you know, in the
• 23:56
  country And then when I really had a significant substance
• 24:00
  abuse problem, my mom actually basically divorced my dad
• 24:05
  because he wouldn't do anything. And she knew that.
• 24:07
  I mean, the things were coming anyway down the Pike.
• 24:09
  I mean, she's like, she thought she would stay with him until,
• 24:13
  until my sister was older. But when my mom realized that I
• 24:17
  was going to die and she went in my closet and found a loaded
• 24:20
  firearm in there and we didn't have guns in the house, she was
• 24:23
  like, I'm just doing whatever it takes, you know, No matter what
• 24:28
  John thinks about it, no matter what anybody else thinks about
• 24:30
  it. Wow.
• 24:33
  So it visions, I mean you is it would you call is it a true dual
• 24:39
  diagnosis where you have people who are coming in truly with
• 24:43
  both or one or the other? What?
• 24:45
  What? Tell us a little bit more about
• 24:46
  that. So the few things when we first
• 24:49
  opened visions, it was a quote UN quote dual diagnosis program.
• 24:54
  And back then that meant that somebody talked about depression
• 24:58
  at some point really. But what we did is Doctor Lewis
• 25:00
  is our medical director. In fact, Doctor Lewis was the
• 25:04
  medical director of the program I went through in 1985 and now.
• 25:09
  So you got to be nice to people because I could fire him now,
• 25:13
  right? I worked for him for 15 years.
• 25:15
  Now he works here. But he was also one of the
• 25:17
  original fellows for a Sam. I mean, just really understands
• 25:20
  that. But he also understands dual
• 25:21
  diagnosis and just not dual. It's just the, the Co occurring
• 25:28
  mental health issues or substance abuse issues that
• 25:30
  people have, right? So we started raising the level
• 25:34
  of our family programming and, and, and clinical support from
• 25:40
  the beginning. And then what happened along the
• 25:43
  way is, and I remember the first person that called and he calls
• 25:48
  me and tells me about his friend's daughter.
• 25:50
  And I'm like, whoa, she doesn't sound like she has an addiction
• 25:53
  issue. And he says there is no other
• 25:56
  place. And, and I said, OK, well, so we
• 26:02
  talked to the parents. We bring this young girl in, she
• 26:05
  was 13 years old. And our, and we talked to the
• 26:08
  clinicians ahead of time and we did a very good job with with
• 26:13
  her. She had a little bit of
• 26:15
  psychosis going on, a lot of family trauma going on.
• 26:19
  And we had, we always had well trained licensed clinicians who
• 26:23
  had incredible backgrounds. But I think it was part of what
• 26:29
  made this work is that from a recovery point of view in a
• 26:34
  treatment program, you treat things kind of like family.
• 26:37
  There's this connection, support, being willing to sit
• 26:41
  down with somebody at 1:00 in the morning, not just the
• 26:43
  clinical you're going to do this, this and this.
• 26:45
  So I think that that had a has an impact on how we respect the
• 26:51
  kids, treat the kids and require family involvement.
• 26:54
  That's the other part of the mental health programs at that
• 26:55
  point didn't require much family involvement.
• 26:58
  And with a 13 year old, it's family, family, family, family.
• 27:01
  So, but at that point, that was the time that we said we, we're
• 27:07
  going to do some things differently.
• 27:08
  So we started, so this is 1617 years ago, we started primary
• 27:13
  mental health programming. So we have separate facilities
• 27:18
  that's primary mental health and then separate facilities that
• 27:21
  are dual diagnosis. And it's not because those kids
• 27:24
  can't be together, It's because the programming is different.
• 27:27
  Like, so the groups that they might have some of the struggles
• 27:30
  that they might have and the kids and, and respecting the
• 27:34
  kids who have primary mental health issues, like say anxiety,
• 27:37
  depression, you know, having, you know, recent suicide
• 27:40
  attempts. Not that you don't have those in
• 27:42
  our, in our substance abuse program, because we absolutely
• 27:45
  do. But that common thread running
• 27:48
  through of learning to fix feelings, fill that hole inside
• 27:52
  from substances, that piece. You can kind of create a flow
• 27:58
  and connection and education for the parents where it's different
• 28:02
  in the mental health. So, so that's we've, we've
• 28:05
  always had really a system of excellence for those kids.
• 28:12
  Another thing that's different about visions.
• 28:14
  We are a, we're, we just treat all genders.
• 28:18
  We treat everybody in the same house, not the same rooms, same
• 28:22
  house. We've always done that.
• 28:24
  It takes more staff to do that and there are of course
• 28:27
  complications that you have, but we think that we don't live in a
• 28:32
  gender specific world. And so we've always wanted to to
• 28:36
  do that. I think it's better for the kids
• 28:37
  and better for the parents. Like I said, it does.
• 28:39
  You have to have better supervision at night.
• 28:42
  You can't just have one staff on, you got to have two.
• 28:44
  There's things like that and you got to figure out ways to
• 28:46
  coordinate. But I think it makes for a
• 28:49
  richer environment for the kids. And like I said that the
• 28:53
  connection for the parents going through this or are different
• 28:56
  because I'd rather see if the kids, if somebody's flirting
• 28:58
  with somebody else, how do you deal with that?
• 29:00
  Because it's going to happen when they leave, right?
• 29:03
  Or if somebody has, you know, this attachment disorder stuff
• 29:06
  that they cling on, the next person that walks through the
• 29:08
  door, we want to be able to do to address that in a way that's
• 29:12
  respectful and authentic. That's a great point.
• 29:16
  Yeah, that is a great point. I've always been a big fan of
• 29:18
  that, like trying, you know, treatment.
• 29:20
  I think as much as possible we need to try and create or
• 29:23
  simulate environments that is going to bring up real stuff,
• 29:26
  right? Otherwise, it's just we're kind
• 29:27
  of, you know, artificially, you know, creating the stuff and
• 29:31
  we're not really getting at some of those problems right.
• 29:34
  Here's the thing. Here's also just because you
• 29:39
  have the same sex, all the same sex in a building together does
• 29:42
  not mean there's not sex going on, right?
• 29:44
  That's exactly right. And, and and it's like, well, at
• 29:47
  least nobody's going to get pregnant.
• 29:48
  I don't think that's a fair. That's not what we're after
• 29:50
  here, right? What we're out.
• 29:52
  It's any kind of behaviors where somebody is being dishonest, you
• 29:57
  know, hiding, there's a subterfuge going on.
• 30:00
  They're obfuscating, you know, what's going on.
• 30:02
  If they're getting away with something, then they're not
• 30:03
  connecting. So most important I think for us
• 30:08
  as in a treatment program to create an environment where we
• 30:11
  can connect and there's authenticity within the within
• 30:14
  the the community. What do you do if you do see a a
• 30:19
  burgeoning relationship? Way to to, yeah, I mean.
• 30:22
  But I mean like a couple in early recovery.
• 30:27
  I mean, what do? You do you, you, you just, you'd
• 30:29
  call it out, especially in primary residential treatment,
• 30:32
  you know, literally you got to figure, you come up with the
• 30:35
  most creative solutions to make sure that these kids that
• 30:37
  they're not, that they're not acting out basically, you know,
• 30:41
  anyway, you know, I remember one time, like even when I was in
• 30:44
  treatment, I had this, you know, there was, I had a girlfriend on
• 30:46
  the outside and, and my therapist said to me, well, you
• 30:50
  know, so do you really think you know who you are?
• 30:55
  And I'm like, no. And she says so who is your
• 31:00
  girlfriend dating? Great question.
• 31:04
  I was like, that's not really the point here, but it really,
• 31:08
  it really was the point, you know, like if I don't know who I
• 31:11
  am and I'm learning, what kind of person am I attracting?
• 31:14
  You know, and, and, and as I grew, I, you know, I, I learned
• 31:19
  a lot about that as far as relationships are concerned.
• 31:22
  I hear you. I mean, there's a reason that
• 31:24
  it's suggested to not enter into a new one for a while for sure.
• 31:28
  And that's why I was curious. And so, you know, we're, we're
• 31:32
  we serve adults only, but we certainly get lots of you know,
• 31:35
  I mean, if nothing else, I have a lot of people my age are
• 31:38
  starting to have kids who are visions age.
• 31:41
  And you know, what are you like? You know, you've been you've
• 31:45
  been working there for 21 years and you've, you know, you got
• 31:49
  sober as a teenager. What what, what's different now
• 31:52
  than it was when you were getting sober and 1st working in
• 31:55
  the field in terms of what you're seeing in terms of the
• 31:58
  mental health, I mean, the drugs are and the drugs and the
• 32:00
  substances, what's different? Sure, sure.
• 32:06
  So there's there's a few things and these are the things that we
• 32:08
  do we started talking about a long time ago.
• 32:11
  So we started talking about the effect of social media and how
• 32:16
  that is undermining just. All I can tell you, it's like
• 32:21
  parents took their brains and took them out of their heads and
• 32:23
  tossed them out the window. My kids are going to be fine
• 32:26
  with the Internet. They're not going to be fine.
• 32:28
  Nobody's fine with it. That's why we don't give 4 year
• 32:31
  olds drivers license because they're going to drive right off
• 32:34
  the road. And then we think that the thing
• 32:37
  that has people talking about horrible things influences,
• 32:40
  right? At least in the car.
• 32:41
  There's not somebody else coming after your kid and and there and
• 32:46
  parents, I think there's these they put these blinders on that.
• 32:50
  And that doesn't even include what we know now about how
• 32:54
  gaming and Instagram and discord and how these things are all
• 32:58
  designed to hook, hook, hook, hook, hook, hook somebody and,
• 33:02
  and kids are so vulnerable to that.
• 33:04
  So I, I bring that up to say that especially our parents that
• 33:11
  come to visions, they have sacrificed figured out ways to
• 33:15
  be in the, a neighborhood with the better schools, right, the
• 33:18
  safer places. They spend a lot, invest a lot,
• 33:22
  right? And then they buy them the
• 33:24
  portal to help the worst neighborhood, like the worst
• 33:28
  neighborhood in every city, in every community.
• 33:32
  And they're like, I don't know what happened.
• 33:34
  What do you mean you don't know what happened?
• 33:35
  They're supposed to make good decisions.
• 33:37
  No, they're not supposed to make good decisions.
• 33:40
  They're supposed to make bad decisions.
• 33:41
  We're supposed to be there to take care of them.
• 33:43
  And then, and if you look recently, you know, like the
• 33:46
  recent book Anxious Generation, it doesn't talk about substance
• 33:49
  abuse in there. He wasn't doing research on
• 33:52
  that, but he's just like, our kids are being it.
• 33:56
  It's abusive what we're allowing to happen.
• 33:59
  So, so, so there's that. And you asked about the mental
• 34:02
  health piece. I think part of this is we're
• 34:05
  doing a better job seeing things.
• 34:07
  But there was a study about four or five years ago out of
• 34:13
  Massachusetts and some people have keyed off on this.
• 34:17
  Heather Hayes has, but I, I went back to school again four years
• 34:22
  ago. That was again, again, but to,
• 34:26
  to get a degree in as a MFTLPCC and I did a report on because we
• 34:33
  see a lot of kids with ASD, autism spectrum disorder,
• 34:37
  neurodivergence misdiagnosed. So I wanted to learn more about
• 34:43
  that as far as substance abuse was concerned.
• 34:45
  And they looked at an outpatient program in Massachusetts and
• 34:49
  they just, all they did was do testing on everybody who came
• 34:53
  through the door. Like 680 people come through the
• 34:55
  door, 20% met the criteria for ASD, autism spectrum disorder,
• 35:02
  coming through the door, self reporting, voluntarily going to
• 35:07
  an outpatient program. So that just tells you substance
• 35:12
  abuse and ASD are very in tightly linked.
• 35:16
  But the other part was none of that, none of those programs had
• 35:19
  anybody who was who knew how to assess for treat, intervene.
• 35:23
  The family groups weren't designed for this.
• 35:25
  So those individuals that really need some different support
• 35:31
  weren't likely going to get that right.
• 35:34
  So, and we see that at at an exponential rate at Vision
• 35:41
  because we're having kids who are getting in trouble.
• 35:43
  It's becoming a problem earlier on, especially with kids who
• 35:47
  have problems with social connections.
• 35:50
  They move from like into 6th grade into you like middle
• 35:54
  school or, or what we call, you know, middle school.
• 36:01
  What's the name of 7th and 8th grade?
• 36:03
  Junior high. Yeah, I was losing.
• 36:04
  Sorry. Junior high, the stresses
• 36:07
  involved there, the connections, the requirements to to be able
• 36:10
  to manage that social pressure. We just see a lot of kids start
• 36:14
  crashing right right around there.
• 36:16
  And going into high school about the same time that we see kids
• 36:19
  where substance abuse really starts affecting kids, and for
• 36:22
  similar reasons, Right. So if I have trouble and I'm
• 36:27
  having these stresses and then something will fix that right
• 36:31
  then takes away that stress. Or for a kid who just, you know,
• 36:34
  they just get on there like this so they can zone out everything
• 36:38
  else for to distract them, whatever that is.
• 36:40
  Then I'm not connecting with the world around me.
• 36:43
  Then I'm not connecting with my parents who I need, you know, at
• 36:47
  that time in a kid's life, they need their parents and they
• 36:50
  need, they need their, you know, extended family.
• 36:53
  They need teachers, coaches, clergy more than ever before.
• 36:58
  And that's the time when they start separating themselves from
• 37:00
  it. They start becoming less
• 37:02
  interested in extracurricular activities.
• 37:04
  They're doing things that are on kind of in moral opposition to
• 37:07
  the household. So they start separating
• 37:10
  themselves from any kind of community support that they
• 37:14
  could get. And it kind of it kind of edges
• 37:16
  away little by little. So when we look at also one of
• 37:20
  the most misdiagnosed, you know, diagnosis that we see also is
• 37:25
  anxiety or OCD, anxiety disorders.
• 37:28
  We have kids underneath the surface.
• 37:30
  And those are also kids who are a lot of times high performers.
• 37:33
  But underneath the surface there is a storm going and they are
• 37:36
  feeling just lost. And those are the kids who just
• 37:40
  one day they're like, I can't go to school.
• 37:42
  And their parents look at them and say, you're a straight A
• 37:44
  student taking AP courses. What are you talking about?
• 37:46
  You can't go to school. You got to go to school or the
• 37:49
  kid they're, these are the same kids who all of a sudden if they
• 37:51
  do find a substance, they're very, it's like they're teed up
• 37:55
  because it's going to give them relief.
• 37:58
  And those are also kids who are really high risk for suicide and
• 38:02
  self harm because they, they, they hit a wall.
• 38:05
  They're not good at talking about their feelings.
• 38:07
  And the wall is I, I just can't do this and I'm just
• 38:13
  disappointing everybody. And when you add disappointment
• 38:17
  to somebody who's already has anxiety around doing well, it,
• 38:21
  their world collapses, you know, so, so we, we see a lot of, a
• 38:26
  lot of that and then we see a lot of trauma.
• 38:28
  I sat in a group, I was running group at, at one of our houses
• 38:32
  and, and I, I asked the question, what is it?
• 38:38
  What is it that haunts you about your children?
• 38:41
  Because we all have things, you know, if you've been through,
• 38:43
  had your kid go to treatment, you know, different things.
• 38:46
  And in the same room I had, I saw I had one parent say the
• 38:49
  sirens. I was holding my son, hoping he
• 38:54
  would still breathe until the until the sirens got close
• 38:57
  enough. And another mom raised her hand.
• 39:00
  She said it was the blood, the blood on me while I was waiting
• 39:03
  for the parent for them to show up.
• 39:06
  And then another mom, my son was in convulsions having overdosed.
• 39:10
  And these, there's, I mean, same rooms.
• 39:12
  There's not, there's like 8 families in there.
• 39:14
  And three of them, three of the moms held their children
• 39:17
  wondering whether they would live or die.
• 39:19
  And, and I, I think, you know, we hope that won't happen, but
• 39:24
  those are the kinds of things that are happening to our kids,
• 39:27
  you know, and they are struggling with.
• 39:29
  And, and I think that as I have a few soap boxes, this is one of
• 39:35
  them, the disrespect that we show as adults to our children.
• 39:44
  So that saying that pot is legal and that it's harmless, or that
• 39:49
  ketamine is harmless, or that psychedelics are harmless, we
• 39:55
  walk over the graves of our children to justify our
• 39:59
  recreation. That is absolutely what's going
• 40:03
  on now we see psychosis as a higher rate, depression at a
• 40:07
  higher rate. And, and, and because of the way
• 40:12
  the misinformation out there, there's it's the what did they
• 40:18
  say? One day there's 680 misdirected
• 40:21
  sites for one that gives accurate information, you know,
• 40:24
  and our kids are struggling. We're, we literally are seeing
• 40:27
  higher rates of psychosis from THC than we are from
• 40:32
  methamphetamine, you know? Yeah, I'm glad.
• 40:36
  I'm really glad to hear you say that.
• 40:37
  And that's a message that's come up again and again on this
• 40:41
  podcast without taking a side. Thank you.
• 40:44
  Yeah. Thank you.
• 40:46
  And I don't mean that somebody says, you know, that
• 40:49
  psychedelics could be helpful. That's not the point that that,
• 40:54
  you know, the ketamine could be helpful.
• 40:57
  That's not the point, not going to be helpful for somebody who
• 41:00
  has a significant substance abuse problem, or at least the
• 41:03
  the risks are so high. That's what we have to evaluate.
• 41:07
  The first thing when I heard about ketamine being used, I
• 41:09
  said, so how many people are we OK with dying and destroying
• 41:14
  their lives in order to help other people?
• 41:16
  And there's always a number there, right, Depending on how
• 41:20
  helpful it will be, only to find out that they're selling this
• 41:23
  through, you know, you can mail order for ketamine.
• 41:26
  So my concerns are that when we increase access, then we
• 41:31
  increase the consequence and the negative effects and kids being
• 41:37
  able to get a hold of things that they may not have been able
• 41:38
  to get a hold of so easy before. Yeah, it is really refreshing.
• 41:43
  And then just like B said, I mean, we've talked about it on
• 41:45
  this podcast a lot. We talked about it and New
• 41:48
  Waters Recovery on a regular basis because we're seeing the
• 41:50
  same things that you guys are seeing, right?
• 41:52
  We see people that, you know, whether it's minimization in the
• 41:55
  household or somebody thought it was OK and it got out of hand
• 41:57
  just like whatever. But the devastation that's
• 42:00
  caused by the minimization of some of these substances is, is,
• 42:05
  is huge. But it's just refreshing to hear
• 42:07
  somebody you know, you know, get on that same soapbox.
• 42:10
  Especially somebody who works with that, that population where
• 42:13
  that's where the the most susceptible in terms of just
• 42:18
  starting out their their adolescent years, going into
• 42:21
  adult years with, you know, with a going to treatment and be
• 42:25
  having episodes of psychosis and unlocking what's already kind of
• 42:29
  in some people sort of bubbling under the surface.
• 42:33
  Well, the and the thing about adolescents are we can help
• 42:36
  them. Substance abuse treatment is
• 42:38
  not, it's not which we're not witch doctors.
• 42:42
  It's not rocking science. It's actually we know how to
• 42:45
  help these kids. We know how to support families.
• 42:49
  It is amazing to me when I I talk to parents and I say, look,
• 42:52
  what we want for your child is have a gleam in their eye toward
• 42:55
  their future. Like the lights come on when a
• 42:58
  parent walks in and they go, they, you can see their, them,
• 43:02
  their breath as they see their child maybe after four or six
• 43:06
  weeks and they're different. They're the Rascal again.
• 43:09
  They're the one, you know, talking about.
• 43:12
  So when we're on pass, could we do this?
• 43:13
  And they're like, they just have a different relationship with
• 43:16
  their parents. I will say that it takes longer
• 43:18
  now. Like we have a 45 day minimum.
• 43:21
  We should probably have a 60 day minimum now because especially
• 43:24
  because of the amount of THC, it just takes that longer for it to
• 43:30
  come out. But when parents see that
• 43:33
  they're like, I will do whatever I have to do to put to get to
• 43:37
  the net that support for my child.
• 43:41
  Because I can see that, like I said, that glint, that gleam,
• 43:44
  that glimmer, that hope, them talking about their future in a
• 43:47
  different way, that part of their process rather than
• 43:51
  somebody else's process. I hear you absolutely.
• 43:55
  Well, without being abrupt, but I think that'll be a good place
• 44:00
  for us to wrap it up. And John, before we do go, will
• 44:03
  you tell our listeners and audience how to find you and
• 44:07
  Visions? Yes, of course.
• 44:10
  So the, the phone number is 818-889-3665.
• 44:17
  That's 818-889-3665. And then visions team VISIONST
• 44:25
  EE N as in nancy.com. That's our, that's our website.
• 44:30
  And then we have a few socials out there and things like that
• 44:32
  that we have. And, and then yet don't e-mail
• 44:38
  me. That would be a bad thing.
• 44:39
  But if somebody did need to call me, I'll give you my cell phone
• 44:41
  number and it's 805-302-9936. If I don't answer right away,
• 44:51
  I'll get back to you as soon as possible.
• 44:52
  But it also gives our other contact numbers.
• 44:55
  I just, I just love what I get to do.
• 44:57
  And the more that we can connect and, and help people that it
• 45:01
  just makes, makes a difference. And thanks so much.
• 45:03
  You too, you know, B especially for reaching out, just really
• 45:08
  appreciate that. And, you know, finding new
• 45:11
  waters is a is is just, I think you're doing a great job out
• 45:14
  there and supporting what we're trying to do.
• 45:16
  You know, a lot of places are just, you know, trying to live
• 45:19
  the dream, right and give other people the opportunity.
• 45:22
  Yeah, well, thank you man. And thank you for being, you
• 45:25
  know, a pillar of our, our, our treatment recovery community.
• 45:29
  And you know, you've got an amazing story and it's, it's
• 45:33
  just fun to listen to you and I, we will connect all this stuff
• 45:39
  and get your promoted and all that.
• 45:41
  But I just again wanted to say thank you for all that you've
• 45:44
  done. And you know, for, for our
• 45:46
  listeners, especially these because we see a lot of our
• 45:48
  listeners are parents who have kids and visions is, is the gold
• 45:52
  standard for adolescent care for substance use disorder and
• 45:55
  mental health disorders. Thank you.
• 45:58
  Awesome. Well, thank you so much for your
• 45:59
  time. Yep.
• 46:01
  Take care, guys. Thank you, John.
• 46:02
  If you liked what you heard today or just want to know more,
• 46:05
  give us a call on 9196708119 or visit us at
• 46:10
  newwatersrecovery.com. Thank you.