Recovery has a voice. We know, because we hear it every day. It’s a voice of overcoming, of endurance, and of triumph. It’s a voice of strength, honesty, hope, and power. Meet Bruce Zeigler and hear his voice of recovery. Donate today to Healing Transitions' National Recovery Month and give more people a voice: https://healing-transitions.org/NRM/
You could go ahead and state your name and your age. My name is Bruce Siegler. I'm 45 years old. All right. And the first question we have for you is describe your life before recovery,
um, broken.
And, uh,
so I started using marijuana when I was like 14
and then drinking a little bit, got married at 18, had two children got divorced. And when I got divorced, it's like, everything I wanted in life was gone. So then I started using cocaine and asked to see PCP and just partying, selling drugs, and, uh, got very, very sick.
Second question is when did you hit rock bottom and what did that look like for. So in 2015, my wife overdosed on Christmas Eve from fentanyl 2016, I moved back to Baltimore and started using fentanyl heroin, crack cocaine daily to the point where I started stealing from my mother. And stores and anybody else I could do, I could get something from, to, uh, get that next one.
And my mom put me out of her house and I became homeless. And that was pretty much my rock bottom.
Tell us about your life now in active recovery? It, um, I never thought I could have a life like this. Um, with growing up only child mom, struggling, dad, abusive addict, high school dropout.
I never thought that I would have people in my life and be able to do the things that I do today.
What has recovery given you? Recovery has given me
my family back recovery has given me a new family.
A career and a chance to further my education.
What does recovery mean to you?
So without recovery,
I. It means the world to me, honestly, like it just shows me that there's so many more opportunities in recovery than I had in my entire life.
People wanna reach out and help me and, and support me without any looking for anything in return. It's just a new freedom.
Well, thank you for your answers. Uh, there are two additional questions, which are the
all right. And the additional question. What does recovery mean to you?
So recovery to me is, um, uh, a new life. I have relationships with my children now that I've never had, even during the small time I was sober. Now today, my son will call me just to see how I'm doing.
I can go to his house today, where, before I couldn. But just that whole new relationship with my, my children is, is great. It's just never thought I would have this relationship with my children. I thought that I, I messed up too bad, but recovery has shown me that no matter what we go through, we can always change our lives.