David’s New Perspective

David is an articulate and accomplished young man with a very busy life. Along with running his own small business, he has been volunteering at several community agencies for years. He is also a victim of childhood trauma who spent many years trying to cope with bad memories. Sadly, this eventually led him down the path to addiction.

This past year, David decided that he needed to find a way to come to terms with his past and deal with his addiction because he felt he was in danger of losing everything he had worked hard to achieve. He knew The Ottawa Mission by reputation, and came to us for help. And, according to David, he has received so much more than he could have imagined.

David came to our Stabilization unit in August of last year, and spent a month preparing for long term addiction treatment. He entered our LifeHouse residential treatment program a month later. David cannot say enough about his experience at LifeHouse. He says his five months there gave him the time he needed to reflect on the past, and the tools and life skills he needed to build a better life. “I’ve finally found a way to achieve balance in my life. It used to be all about balancing my work and my community service, while not dealing with my addiction, but now there is a third, all-important element – and that’s recovery. “

David is now back at home and he continues to focus on his recovery with aftercare counselling at The Mission. At the same time, he wants to share his experience to help others who are suffering from trauma, so he is in training to be a peer counsellor. He will always be a busy person, but now he looks forward with hope to a much brighter future.