Your empathy and compassion can help save a life

Sarah Keast:

This is one of my favourite photos but in full disclosure those are my kids so clearly there’s a bit of mom bias going on here. And as a fashion girl by profession I just love our outfits. I love how the patterns are mixing. I love how we’re coordinating but so subtly. I love the little shoes. But what our outfits don’t tell you is how we were feeling that day. I remember the anxiety that was tearing my insides apart. I remember my hands were shaking like a leaf. I remember the extra coat of waterproof mascara I layered on that morning. But most of all, what I remember is what my brain was screaming at me. It was deafening and it was unrelenting. It kept screaming at me, “I can’t believe we are about to go to his funeral. I can’t believe I’m about to bury my husband. I can’t believe he’s dead.”

In August, 2016, a week before this photo was taken, my husband died unexpectedly and I was about to get in a car with those two little girls, age two and five, and we were about to go to his funeral. It’s a beautiful family photo but it breaks my heart because it’s incomplete. Let me introduce you, this is my husband. This is Kevin. He was one of a kind. Kevin had his master’s in social work and he had spent almost a decade working in long-term care with senior citizens and he’d spent a shorter stint working in palliative care in a hospital. And Kevin always said that the best part of his job was that he got to talk to old people all day long. He said he just loved hearing the stories they had to share.

Kevin was an amazing father. I remember when our oldest daughter was four she was invited to a Halloween themed birthday party and all the kids were encouraged to wear their costumes and the grownups were too, but of course none of us did except for Kevin. And the best part is, the party was in a public park. So there was a bunch of people in the park that didn’t know Kevin was wearing a costume and he was dressed as a heavy metal rocker at that with the zebra print leggings, his mullet wig. It was a true testament to the love of his children because Kevin actually hated Halloween and he hated dressing up.

Kevin had a love of all things political and I still can’t believe that in the last two years he’s missed so much in politics in Canada and the U.S. Kevin loved tattoos and he was covered in them. He loved the art form so much. He had one on his leg that was simply the letters W D T S F . And he would grin like a Cheshire cat when someone would say, “Kevin, what does that stand for?” And he wouldn’t answer, he’d just laugh and smirk. And they’d say again, “Kevin, what does that stand for?” And he still wouldn’t answer and he’d laugh. And then they’d ask again, “What does that stand for?” And then it would dawn on them. “Oh, W D T S F”.

Kevin, his silliness and humour are what got me through many a day. He was my best friend and he was one of the best things that ever happened to me. A week before that family photo was taken my family was ripped apart unexpectedly. Those little girls, they are now fatherless. I had 16 years with the love of my life. But I’m now facing 40 plus years without him. But what I haven’t shared is how Kevin died and the truth is my husband was a heroin addict. For seven of our 16 years together he shot up heroin alone in our basement and he died of an accidental overdose at home.

To the outside world we were this beautiful family, a young couple, university educated, in love with two beautiful young daughters. But on the inside, we were a family ripped apart by mental health and substance use disorder suffocated by shame and stigma. We led a double life for seven years.

Now, I want to ask you a question. When I told you that Kevin died of a heroin overdose what was the flickering thought that may have passed through your mind? My stomach tightens every time I say it. I say it bravely, I say it confidently, but my insides turn over and I actively work to control the red flush of shame that is desperate to overtake my face when I tell the world my husband was addicted to heroin. Because in the unspoken hierarchy of death, overdose it’s pretty well at the bottom.

I will tell you at a party I am a huge buzzkill. Someone will find out that my husband has passed away and they’ll say very kindly, very sympathetically, “Oh, I’m so sorry for your loss. How did he die?” And then I’ll look at them and I’ll say, “He died of a heroin overdose.” That pretty much shuts the conversation down right there as a look of horror passes over their face.

That though of judgment that may have flickered through your mind, that’s what I want to battle. That feeling of shame that I feel when I tell the world my husband died of a heroin overdose that’s what I want to eliminate. Because it’s the same shame that is suffocating those who are struggling today with substance use disorder. That shame keeps their suffering in silence. It keeps it in the shadows and prevents them from reaching out for help. I know because Kevin and I lived it.

In 2004, Kevin was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder and the stigma that surrounded his mental health disorder it most certainly silenced him. He shared his struggles with very few people but he wanted to feel better. He wanted to feel different. He wanted to feel something. He wanted to feel normal. His mental health disorder was most certainly a driving factor in his substance use but never in a million years was heroin something I expected him to try. Heroin is for junkies on the street, not people like us. But how naive I was.

I found out about his heroin use almost a decade ago. He overdosed at home and I found him. He was unconscious. He was barely breathing. He was blue in the face. He was nearly dead. I called 911 and the paramedics revived him. But that traumatic night, that changed both of us for the rest of our lives. Kevin fought tooth and nail for the next seven years to resist the power that heroin had over him and he struggled. He struggled with stints in inpatient rehab, outpatient rehab. He lived in a sober living facility and eventually living back with me. And eventually his Narcotics Anonymous meetings and his recovery work it started to stick and he got a year in recovery and then he got two years and then he relapsed. And then he got another year in recovery and then he relapsed again. Over and over and over again the cycle repeated itself.

I remember after one relapse we were sitting in our family room at home, Kevin’s head in my lap and he was sobbing. He sobbed, “I hate this. I don’t want this. I don’t want to do this to you. I don’t want to die.” After the first few relapses I began to hide them from my inner circle as well. I was so tired and I was so ashamed. I was so tired of explaining the disease of addiction and I was so tired of defending Kevin’s actions. I remember one night having to tell my parents that yet again my husband had screwed up and relapsed. With shame flushing my face red I told my parents and my dad looked at me with such anger and he yelled, “Get rid of him,” but I couldn’t. Kevin was fighting tooth and nail to fight this. If he had cancer and the cancer kept coming back I wouldn’t leave him. In my mind this was no different.

It wasn’t easy. Often I would stumble across a poorly hidden needle when I was doing our laundry or looking for our Christmas decorations. And each discovery was a knife to my heart because it was a realization that yes Kevin was still struggling and yes he was still deceiving me. It was a realization that yes death could still be on our doorstep.

Over 400 people attended Kevin’s funeral. It was the most the funeral home had ever had they told me. But sadly, in that huge crowd, only a handful of people knew of Kevin’s addiction and shock waves reverberated through the crowd when I pulled back the curtain on his life and shared how he died. Friends who had known Kevin for 30 years were dumbfounded to find out how much about his life they didn’t know. Guilt and helplessness consumed many as they grappled with this new found knowledge of their friend’s double life. Tears were shed and many friends cried to me, “Why didn’t he tell me? Why didn’t he reach out? Maybe I could have helped him.”

I myself have spent many a night wondering the same thing. If Kevin hadn’t been ashamed would he have reached out more? If Kevin hadn’t been ashamed would he have leaned on his friends and family more? And if Kevin hadn’t been ashamed would he still be alive? Kevin hid his use and he hid it because he was ashamed. And in that shame, it caused him to isolate himself. He pulled back from his friends, his family, his sponsor, his recovery work. And in that isolation, the thoughts that told him he could use just one more time, the thoughts that told him he could return to the drug, they got louder and louder until they were all he could hear.

Now, I want you to think of a time, a time when you have felt shame, when you have felt something that was so big and so scary you couldn’t say it out loud. Now, imagine feeling that feeling every single day. That was Kevin and that’s anyone who’s struggling with substance use. They want to share but they can’t. Shame and stigma keeps their suffering in silence. It keeps their suffering in the shadows. And it’s hard to find your way out of that darkness when there’s no one there to guide you to the light.

In 2016 in Canada, almost 3000 people died from opioid overdose. Kevin was one of those people. In 2017, almost 4,000 people died from opioid overdose. That’s almost a third more than the previous year and that increase is horrifying. And currently in Canada today, 11 people will die each day from opioid overdose.

Now Kevin was addicted to heroin but that did not solely define him. He was a person with a heart, a story, a life and an addiction. And like Kevin, the 11 people who will die today are also people, not just statistics. Each overdose is a person, someone’s friend, someone’s child, someone’s parent and someone’s spouse.

Now you might be thinking this isn’t something that affects me but that’s simply not true. Almost one in five Canadians will struggle with substance use at some point in their life. So that means that right now, 240 people in this room might be struggling with substance use and perhaps in silence and with shame. Most likely there is someone in your life, whether you know it or not, who’s struggling. And imagine what it could be like if that struggling didn’t have to be in silence. Shame and stigma are contributing to today’s opioid overdose crisis. Empathy and compassion can replace shame and stigma. Empathy and compassion can help save a life.

Now, let’s talk about a few small yet powerful things you can do to get us there. Your empathy and your compassion can help save a life. The first thing you can do is you can change the language that you use. I’m going to share with you a quote and it’s by a man whose name is Don Kohist and I love this quote. It goes like this, “Words are important. If you want to care for something, we call it a flower. If you want to kill something, we call it a weed.” And I love this quote, it just so eloquently sums up what it does to a person when we label them.

In fact, I did it myself earlier when I referred to my husband as a heroin addict. And for many years, I’ve been quite open about his struggles but I’ve always called him an addict and it’s only been recently that I realized how wrong this is. By calling him an addict I reduced Kevin to only his drug use. I took Kevin out of the equation. I took his humour, his compassion, his intelligence, and I took all of that out of the equation. I can’t bring Kevin back but I can change how I refer to him and you can change the words you use. You can say someone who uses drugs instead of an addict. You can say someone with a substance use disorder instead of a junkie. You can say drug use instead of drug abuse. And you can say recovery instead of being clean. Changing the words is a small yet powerful step we can take and reducing stigma. It literally costs you nothing but it’s priceless to those who are struggling because it treats them with dignity and respect.

The second thing you can do is you can get a Naloxone kit. Now treating substance use disorder it’s not a simple straight line from “addicted” to “saved”. It’s a complicated journey of one step forward, two steps back, two steps forward, one step back. The reality is people can and do relapse. Kevin relapsed so many times. Someone can overdose and die while on the road to recovery, Kevin did. And a Naloxone kit is an important tool. It can quickly and easily reverse an overdose should it occur. Someone cannot access treatment services or rehabilitation centers if they’ve overdosed and died.

Now I will admit something, I’ve wanted to get a Naloxone kit for a long time but every time I’ve gone to my pharmacy, because they’re available for free at a lot of pharmacies, I’ve gone and there’s a little sign there that tells me they have them. So I start to walk up and then I freak out and I think, “What if the pharmacist judges me and thinks I’m a junkie?” Or, “What if this lady beside me in line, what if she hears my question and she judges me?” But that’s precisely the point. The more we bring this out into the open and simply treat a Naloxone kit as an important part of a first aid kit and an important tool in saving lives while someone works towards recovery, the more we can reduce the stigma surrounding drug use.

So the good news is I got my kit. I went last week and I got it. And guess what? The sky did not fall in. All that happened was I got my kit, I got a brief tutorial on how to use it, and that was it. But more importantly, I took a big step in reducing the stigma that surrounds drug use.

And the final thing you can do is you can tell Kevin’s story. One of Kevin’s best friends from university is a high school teacher and recently she arrived in class and she was really upset over Kevin. So she abandoned her lesson plan and instead she shared the story of Kevin with her students. She told them about her friend and his struggle with drug use and she told them how he died because of his drug use. And she cried as she talked and her students received her grief with such open arms and they began to talk. One student who’d been causing a lot of disruptions in class, she shared how her sister was struggling with drug use and the effect it was having on their family. And it quickly became clear to everyone in that room that her disruptions in class were actually due to her really tough family life. Another student shared her brother’s struggle with drug use. And as they went around the room all of the sudden every student wanted to share.

My friend said it was really hard and really scary to share her heart with a bunch of 15 year olds but because she did those kids were able to unload some of the really heavy weight they were carrying. And those kids that didn’t understand each other before they walked in that room, they began to break down that wall and build connection to one another and build empathy and compassion for one another. She said they left that room more connected, more empathetic and more caring.

So leave here today and tell Kevin’s story. Tell someone in your life how you heard a story about a man, a man who loved his wife, loved his children and loved his job. And tell them how he was also sick and tell them how he was a drug user and tell them that he lost his life to his illness. And tell them that you learned he was still deserving of love and compassion and empathy despite his drug use. Because the more we talk about substance use disorders the more we can reduce the stigma and shame that is associated. And the more the stigma and shame is reduced the more empathy and compassion can grow and it will be easier for those who are suffering to speak up and access help. We can save lives. Let Kevin’s story help us get there.

Thank you.