Nick Mcculloch is slaying the Goliath of addiction with help from David’s Courage (part 2)

He woke up after one overdose with blood everywhere as they were draining the drugs out of his body. There were times he had so much in his system that he didn’t come completely out of the overdose after NARCAN. “The NARCAN wore off and I’m still about to fall out.”

There were times his mother found him face down in heroin. “She thought I was dead.” She called 9-1-1. another time his dog “Charity” barked frantically to alert his mom that he had overdosed. “She wouldn’t have known anything was going on without my dog. I was pretty far gone.” She used NARCAN to revive him and called for help.

The worst fear for many parents is that their son or daughter will overdose and not recover. “That does happen. I’ve lost a lot of friends. That’s just the cold, hard truth that can happen.”

Eventually he had an enlarged heart and suffered a mini-stroke. He wanted his life to change but didn’t know how. “I always said out loud that I believe in Jesus Christ and I know He’s not going to leave me like this. I’d say it out loud. I believed He wouldn’t.”

He revived friends using NARCAN. He saw a friend overdose by shooting-up heroin and dialed 9-1-1 to save his life. “Life has been really hard with this drug addiction.”

He fervently sought God telling his friends and his mother that he wanted things to be different. “I was waiting on God. My mom would say, ‘You can’t just sit around and wait for a miracle to happen. You’ve got to actually put some effort in to it.’ I was like, ‘God will change me, mom. He’s not going to leave me like this.”

He felt he needed divine intervention to provide strength. He read the Bible and poured over self-help books in and out of jail. “It’s weird how I did make that change. I did check in to treatment again. The timing was right. There definitely comes a time when you are ready. You have got to at least try. No time is a ‘good time’ to get sober.” he laughed. It won’t be easy or pain free at any point.

Mcculloch checked in to Recovery Works a second time, a residential and outpatient drug and alcohol abuse treatment center. He was committed to change and actively engaged in the program. “I was so ready to be done with all that stuff. I was so miserable and obviously being tormented and tortured. I was not happy. It was not what I wanted at all.”

Rather than wait for external circumstances to change, Mcculloch says you must change from the inside first. “Your mindset has to change. You’ve got to look at things in a different way. The way you think about things and what you believe in.”

Once he completed that program, he knew he needed continued support. “I knew I needed long term care. I knew I needed more than a month. I knew that I needed to relocate. You have a better chance if you change your scenery.”

That is when his mother recommended David’s Courage. “People coming out of a hardcore long term addiction, they need the same things that someone coming out of a prison sentence needs. They needs rides to appointments. They need a license. They need a job. They need food, housing, clothes. It’s just like you came out of prison. You need to start over again.”

With the help of David’s Courage Mcculloch has the support he needs to build a brighter future. “If I can do it anybody can do it. I was a hard core drug addict and I’m going on nine months. That’s amazing.”