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This week Jay chats with author, advocate, and policy pro Morgan Godvin.
Discussing issues of Mental Health, Substance Misuse and Recovery, and Drug Use & Policy with host Jay Shifman, Speaker, Storyteller, and Advocate.
Each week Jay chats with interesting guests as they seek to destroy stigma and advocate for honest, educational conversations that motivate positive change.
You can learn more at https://jay.campsite.bio/.
Choose Your Struggle has been streamed in over thirty-five countries and is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever else you get your podcasts.
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*** Transcripts are not edited for clarity.
You are listening to the, choose your struggle podcast, a member of the shameless, a podcast network.
Welcome to the choose your struggle podcast. I'm your host, Jay Schiffman, on this show, I interview people with lived and learned experiences and subjects of mental health, substance misuse, and recovery and drug use and policy. But occasionally we talk about other topics as well. On today's episode, I chat with policy pro writer and activist Morgan Dodman, but first kid mental
some battles yesterday.
Hello, and welcome to another episode of the choose your struggle podcast. It's great to be back with you all. Thank you to everyone who reached out after Garth's episode. Last week, I am so inspired by him. I hope you were as well. Thank you to everyone who continues to like to share. Uh, to talk about made it, um, there's a, I'm doing a promotion right now about it, uh, an advertising campaign honoring the fact that it spent three weeks and, and on Apple's top 200 list, which is pretty cool to me.
Um, everyone sharing it around all that really, really appreciate it. Thank you very much. I really appreciate. Before we get into this week's episode, two things really quick. Number one, listener, actually shout out to this person. Let me know that, that, uh, all of a sudden, a bunch of my ratings on apple disappeared, uh, which was very weird.
Um, you know, this, if you listen to the show that every week I ask you to like and review the show, uh, uh, the reviews are in two places. They're on apple. Or there's a link in your show notes where you can review, um, to, in that takes you to a different site that allows for reviewing of podcasts. Um, but ratings are, are, are very much an apple thing and, uh, Spotify just got into it.
In fact, if you're listening on Spotify, please look up, up in your screen and see if you can leave a rating, go to the page of the podcast, if you cannot, uh, that the podcast is the stream itself or whatever. Yeah. And leave a rating. I really would appreciate that. But on an apple who was like the first one in the game to do this as of last month, last time I looked, I had over 120 rating, which was amazing.
Thank you. Thank you to everybody who took the time. And then this person reached out and was like, Hey, just a heads up. I don't know if you've seen this. And I looked and it's like 30 something now. So I have no idea what happened. Uh, I have no idea of apple. Deleted old one. I have no idea. Um, but that sucks because those were the things that people, you know, new people judge a podcast on our, uh, has it been rated a bunch?
Has it been reviewed? Um, you know, the, the fact that I think it's a 4.9. I think I have one for everything else is fine. Like that's cool. Uh, obviously wouldn't like you to rate it poorly, but just leave a rating of four out of five, five out of five, whatever really. I really would appreciate that it would help the show a lot when people ask how they can help.
Um, I say share it. I say, you know, obviously check out Patrion. That's that's big. Um, but really leaving a review and a rating help a lot. Cause it helps new people find the show. So please, if you can on apple, especially, but also on Spotify now. Uh, and, and I think Google does it too. Uh, please leave a rating for the show.
I really, really appreciate. The other thing is voting is still open. I mentioned this last week, the best of Philly awards. Uh, I am a finalist for the best Philly blogger. That's there. The category that I fit into best, uh, and Savage sisters is a finalist for best, not for profits. Um, to be clear, there is a charity qualification and also at not-for-profit one.
So Savage is a finalist for not-for-profit. You can vote once a day per email. So if you're like me and you have a lot of emails, I am voting three, four times a day, um, or four, you know, four different emails, uh, please do so it's open till September. You don't have to vote every day. In fact, if you voted once a month, I'd greatly appreciate it.
The link is in the show notes. You can also go to my social media as it's all over there. Um, but yeah, please, please, uh, do that. It would mean a lot to me it would mean a lot to Savage. Um, obviously we're, we're honored to be finalists, but you know, to win this would be really cool. So, uh, definitely check that out.
It would, I would appreciate it and hope. Now this week's episode is with another person just like Garth, that I've been falling for a couple of years that I really admire. And it's a Testament to the show that it's gotten to the point where people like this are like, yeah, I would love to chat. So, uh, this week's episode is with Morgan Godwin, who I am a huge fan of, uh, her writing Morgan's case, uh, is very famous actually.
And that's how I found out about Morgan. I didn't know about her writing until I looked into this. Uh, she. You'll hear her talk about this. Uh, she's very open with it that a friend of hers sadly passed away from an overdose, uh, and Morgan was charged with murder because she sold him the bag. Um, as Morgan says in this.
She wasn't a dealer. She's not a dealer. Not that, you know, that that's a whole nother subject, but, uh, it was just that her buddy called her up and was like, yo, you got anything? She's like, yeah, I got you. So, um, it it's, it was a really fascinating case when I read about it years ago. Uh, and Morgan has done some incredible writing about her time in prison.
And her own, uh, struggles with, with misuse and just drug use, um, and has done writing for Marshall project for filter, obviously shout out to filter a whole bunch of different places. Um, and she's a really, really incredible writer. I'm a huge fan. She is also a commissioner on the drug, alcohol and drug policy commission for Oregon.
Uh, she does work in policy for the state of Oregon. Uh, she oversees, um, some. For the American prison newspaper, she is doing a lot of incredible work. I am, am just in awe of everything she is doing. Uh, this is a wonderful episode. We had a fantastic conversation and I hope you enjoy it. So without further ado, please enjoy this wonderful conversation with Morgan guy.
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Welcome back to the chooser struggle podcast. It's great to be back with you all. I'm here today with someone who work I've been following now for poof. Uh, probably about three years, I would guess. And, uh, I found my guests today from Twitter because that's how I find most people doing amazing work these days.
And, uh, well, I'll just have her go ahead and introduce herself, please. Yeah. So, Hey, my name is Morgan Godwin and I work in drug policy harm reduction advocacy. I'm the founder of beats overdose, which is a hip-hop harm reduction, nonprofit. And I serve in various capacities in Oregon government, uh, trying to improve health outcomes for people who use drugs.
And I'm also the editor at J store daily. So right away. The first thing I want to, I want to talk about is, um, for, for the listeners actually probably don't know this. One of the questions I ask when, when people sign up to be interviewed on this show is something you're excited about, that other people aren't asking you about.
And I always get really interesting answers. Because people are like, oh wow. Like I actually get to talk about something I want to talk about. Not the same old song and dances. Every time your answer was pretty interesting. And it was how music can help make a difference. And I don't remember the actual words, but around harm reduction in drug policy.
So before we actually get to your work and your story, I did want to start with that. Cause I thought that was such a cool. Okay. So, uh, I published a paper in the journal of American medicine. Recently. It shows that youth overdoses doubled one year to the next, but drug use didn't increase at all. Okay. So what does that mean?
It means that the drug supply is increasingly toxic and teenagers are dying. Traditionally harm reduction targets. People who inject drugs mostly right. Syringe exchange was the conduit by which they access services. But this next phase of the overdose crisis, where cocaine is contaminated, where everything sold is Percocet, Xanax, Oxy, that's all fentanyl.
Here's the thing. The people using it. They don't know they need services. They don't know what harm reduction is. They don't care because they feel like they're doing something safer, lower risk. Uh, you know, and I had a friend who died after doing what he thought was a line of cocaine last year. And that really woke me up.
I said, whoa, something's wrong here. Um, and then I started, you know, I'm the hip hop head. I've been a hip hop head since I was a teenager. And what do we hear in hip hop lyrics? Pop perks. Then you see Mac Miller overdosing and dying. After talking very openly about his drug use in his addiction and his struggles and his mental health.
You see Joe juice world. Exactly the same talking very openly about his drug, use his struggles, his addiction, his mental health, and then dying. And so I thought, okay. And then my friends too, we all listened to hip hop. Half of them are dead. And so I, I felt like there was an opportunity here because music, especially hip hop music, unlike the rest of society is already talking about drugs.
That's half the battle you get, like these square bears up in here, they just want to pretend like it doesn't exist. And just like, you know, stepping under the rug, but hip hop, they're already talking about it. So isn't it just a half a step further to talk about ways to keep yourself safe, ways to not die.
And I had this wild, crazy idea. Like I'm going to do this hip hop harm reduction program and IDM my favorite rapper, like, like a kook, like a crazy Stan. And yet. He DMD me back. And now I work with the record label and him taking harm reduction on tour with hip hop. Well, you have to shout out the name now of that rapper.
Yeah. So that's atmosphere. So that's the rap duo atmosphere. Slug from atmosphere is my champion. And then Rhymesayers entertainment. Uh, the indie label out of Minneapolis. They're about it too, because hip hop has been severely directly impacted by the overdose crisis. And you know, the coolest thing that that slug said to me, he's like, you know, I didn't know there was another way I thought it was just say no to drugs.
And then if they didn't listen to that and they ended up on drugs that we just had to sort of throw our hands up and be like, oh, that sucks. He had no idea. There was like a series of practices and a whole philosophy to keep people safer, especially right now, when it's so dangerous out there, I know atmosphere has been sort of.
Uh, Ryzen above for a long time. I've seen them more times than I can remember back when I was, you know, going to hippy festivals pretty much every weekend. Uh, and, and, you know, God loves ugly, still comes up on my, on my mixtape every now and then, but you make such a good point. And, you know, a couple years ago we had, it was about a three month, uh, or so, uh, session, there were.
First, I think it was extension, uh, passed away first. And, um, you just said the other, the other rappers name and then juice world, who I was a huge fan of passed away. And I think that actually woke a lot of people up of, wow. These aren't your typical people you're hearing about overdosing. And so that sort of such a cool program.
You have such an incredible story that relates to this work. And my listeners know this has become a joke. You know, nobody in our line of work Morgan gets into this because they decide, you know what, I'm going to focus on drugs. Every, we all have this personal connection to it. So, you know, I, I know we don't have time for your complete story, which is an episode in its own, but, you know, help us help the listeners understand what really got you to, to doing this.
Yeah. I mean, I took the whole Oxycontin to heroin pipeline thing back around the time I should have been graduating high school, but it actually dropped out. Um, and then, you know, but I got my act together a little bit. Like I joined the air force, but then they were like, oh, you're medically unfit for service sent me back home.
Uh, and then I tried to join the police department and I was like, okay, well I still want to serve, I didn't want to bash heads. I wanted to serve my community. So I wanted to be a police officer. And instead I became addicted to heroin, like right. Literally at the same time I was trying to get hired under the police force.
And immediately I started seeing a different side of the war on drugs. Cause like growing up white and middle-class, I'd never been treated like that by law enforcement, you know? And they're pulling their guns out at me, step out of the car, step out of the car ads on that route. And I'm like, oh, I thought you were the good guy.
And so then I lived a life under the, under the thumb of the war on drugs for several years, ended up in and out of jail. You know, they called it drug court as if it was an alternative to incarceration. And I ended up incarcerated all the same. And so many times that I lost my job, like for the first time in my addiction.
I lost my job cause I, cause they were putting me in jail too much and my boss couldn't cover it. And then I was, I ended up homeless right after that for again, for the first time in my addiction, because despite the fact that I'd been addicted, I was still able to get military benefits. I was going to school.
I mean, I was like taking out student loans and otherwise being sort of like a dirt bag, but at least I was holding my life together. I wasn't committing crime. Right. I was going into debt, but I never committed crime to support my addiction. And yeah, so I just lived, you know, addicted to heroin for years.
And then I ended up going to federal prison after my best friend overdosed and died. And I had middleman that bag for him. And so that they sent me up on a law called drug delivery resulting in death. And I just thought that was real. Interesting. Cause like, I wasn't a dealer, but he just like texted me and I had it and I'm like, yeah, dude, whatever else to you.
And then like, so they spent over a million dollars to prosecute and incarcerate us. And meanwhile, the rest of my friends died. Like w what if that million dollars that they spent on imprisoning us would have been spent on overdose prevention. Anything because we were prohibited from accessing anything.
So I got out of prison, uh, and that whole experience lit a fire under my ass. And I just said, no, this system, as it stands is not okay. You're letting my friends die. You're putting the other half in prison, but, but no one is able to like achieve their full potential. No one is succeeding under the system either they're in prison or.
And listeners, I will make sure to link, obviously in the show notes, all of Morgan's incredible writing, but I want to go back first to something you talked about, which was so such an important qualification. And that was that you lost your job, not because of your addiction, but because of how the government responded to you.
Not the story that we're told when we're a little, I mean, as somebody in recovery myself, you know, like a lot of what we are taught is, you know, drugs keep you from working hard and all this, this bullshit, but you are living proof. That's like, no, I went to work every day. The government is why I lost my.
And then back it up a little bit. The second time I ever did heroin, I'm 18 years old. Okay. My friend, Justin, who ended up being the victim on my case, I went up for his overdose. Way years later, he sold me a $20 bag of heroin. I've just gotten off work at Bellagio as pizza. You know, I made like a hundred dollars in tips that day when you're 18, that's like a fortune.
And I was like, oh, I'm rich. And, um, and we're in my boyfriend. And I were like smoking heroin. And then I overdosed and he had, cause I had taken benzos that day and nobody, my drug education did not include the word poly substance overdose. And these two drugs have any, you know, are contraindicated because they increased respiratory depression.
I didn't know that. I didn't know that the benzos I took that morning should not be mixed with heroin because everybody says, oh, you can't overdose off smoking. So, you know, I, I did. And he called 9 1 1 to save my life. This isn't 2000. And they arrested him and gave him felony possession of heroin. Put him in jail, mind you.
This is the second time we ever did heroin. We were not addicted. We were not dependent. And then we got an immediate notice of eviction for an arrest being made out of the unit. So my young boyfriend lost all hopers future because he was branded a felon right there, immediately fired from his job as a security guard.
And we were home. Not because of the drugs. It was the second time we ever did the drug. It was because of the government response. And then, you know, fast forward five. And then I, but I still worked a full-time job every single day of my life and my addiction until I went to jail too many. And, and it's stories like that, that, you know, famously lead people like Carl Hart to say, it's the prohibition, that's doing more harm than the drugs themselves.
Uh, and you know, I think we need to hear more stories like yours that says, look, obviously an overdose is terrible, but the, the, the, the response to that overdose. Potentially ruined more alive than, than that overdose itself. Uh, my flag, my friends. So here's like my friend, Justin. He was so criminalized. He started going to jail right after he turned 18.
Like a few days after he was arrested, at least a dozen times since to prison. I just got like put in a public records request and it's just a series of his mugshots. And you see him aging through mugshots because while he lived, the government was like, oh, you're the scum of the earth. You jump. JL Dale, Dale, Dale, Dale, never a compassionate response.
No one offered him. Medications for opioid use disorder is just jail and prison. And then the moment he died in only upon his death, they're like, oh, we care so much about his life. That we're going to put these other five people in prison at the cost of a million dollars. And honestly, his mom was pissed because she'd watched her son just be churned through the criminal justice system.
And it just felt so dishonest for that same system to all of a sudden, pretend to care about his life. Only in so far as it meant they could imprison other human beings. So that was your first article, or I don't even remember how I found it, but I read that of yours and was so blown away. And the question that I have, which may be a tough one, but what was it like trying to mourn the loss of your best friend while also being incorrectly fingered for his murder?
Yeah. So it's, it's really challenging, uh, to try to grieve the loss of someone's death while you are being prosecuted for it. Um, so that was really twisted and, and, you know, important context is my mom had died three months and eight days before Justin other prescription morphine overdose. And so then I'm in jail.
I'm sober for the first time, since my mom died and Justin died and I'm trying to process this and I'm like, okay, but wait, my mom's doctor, nobody's like putting her in prison because my mom's the one who chose to take too many of her morphine. She knew better. Um, and I'm like, okay, so that's that? And then Justin's dead, but they're saying it's my fault.
But also. I don't really feel like it's my fault. Like my friend reached out to me in desperation, looking for a bag and I sold it to him and I wasn't a drug dealer. The government even had to go on to admit that, but you know what really did it for me mostly, I would feel guilty some days. I always felt regret.
Cause if I just didn't answer my phone that night, maybe he would still be alive. I know. I saw in the discovery, he'd reached out to multiple other people and he was going to get that bag one way or the other, but maybe the dope I had was stronger. Maybe if he would've got it from someone else, he have been alive.
Maybe not. How can I know that? So I always felt regret, but I didn't exactly feel guilty. You put me back into that position that night with the information I had at the time, there was nothing unusual about it. You know, we had bought and sold from each other hundreds of times. And I was the only one who had over, over ever overdosed.
Like I was a prolific overdose, so I'd never known him to overdose. And so some, you know, sometimes I'd feel guilty about not feeling guilty, but then when his family came out against the prosecution saying that, you know, Justin died of an accidental overdose from a broken heart. And that they did not blame me.
So therefore I should not blame myself, you know, any residual guilt that I felt at that sort of evaporated, I will always feel regret for what happened. But it was not my fault, Justin and I struggled with our addiction side by side for over five years. This is a question I always ask people who, who served were incarcerated and, you know, by the time this drops.
Uh, season one, stay Savage, which is an interview with Sarah Laurel, who was spent time incarcerated while struggling with addiction is out. Uh, and she answers this question as well, but I kind of want your take on it. You know, we are told this what seems to be a bag of lies, that there is some kind of treatment or, or, uh, care in jail.
You know, you were. Struggling with addiction, you were struggling severely with the loss of two people you really loved. Was there any sort of treatment waiting for you behind bars? Absolutely not. So, I mean, addiction is most often a trauma response, right? We're responding to childhood trauma, adult trauma, and there's nothing but more trauma waiting for you behind bars.
You know, 90% of women in prison have experienced sexual trauma. Most of the guards are men and then they screamed like, shut the fuck up, bitch. And then they're just allowed to talk to you like that. There's no recourse, there's no law that says they can't talk to you like that. Um, and I'm just like watching that and I'm like, wow, this is probably not the way to respond to people's addiction, specifically FCI Dublin.
Cause I went to federal prison. Right? It's federal correctional Institute at Dublin. It has had five cases in the last year of sex abuse. The chaplain mind you there's no college courses available, but there's plenty of Bible study. The warden, the chaplain, and three, uh, ground level correctional officers have all been arrested for sexually abuse.
Some of, I know some of the victims were my friends. I know these women. So we put this is where we're putting people in prison, you know? Had they have a maladaptive coping response to trauma drug use that lands them in prison, but then we traumatize them further. And so I just want clarify my success is not because of the system.
It is despite it. And mostly the fact that I had money, like I was able to spend $600 a month in prison to stay in touch with my friends and family. I was able to pay cash for my college tuition. Money really set me up for success. And I was like the 1% in prison. Like. So many people had literally nothing, no one on the outside supporting them phone calls are expensive, everything's expensive.
And so I was the 1% and it was hard for me. So just imagine what it's like for the vast majority of people inside it is heartbreaking. But let's finish this, this half of the show on a, on a positive note. What did getting into recovery look like for you? What was your personal experience? And, and if, as much as you're willing to share, what does recovery look like on this?
Yeah. So I found recovery in jail, not right when I was arrested quite a bit after, actually about a year after. Um, because previously I'd always intellectualize my addiction. And so I was like, I do drugs. Cause I like to, like, I would literally go to rehab and my counselor would be like, why do you use?
And I'm like, cause it's fun. And you know, there's an element of truth in that. Right. Drugs worked for me. I was like a hypersensitive little bit, maybe Asperger's Z little kid and you know, heroin. The world easier to deal with, but in jail, all those sorts of intellectual rationalization sort of melted away.
Cause I'd be like, oh, you know what sounds fun today, getting high, but it's jail. So they're just not be any heroin. So if this was logical at all, I'd be like, okay, no heroin today. Guess I'm going to go watch family guy. But instead it made me crazy. Like if I had done heroin the day before. And then the next day there was no heroin.
It was a problem. And I would become obsessive and start to think about committing acts of violence among, against other women in the hopes that they maybe had some heroin and were holding out on me. And as soon as that thought entered my mind, I thought, oh no, this isn't me. This isn't who I am. But it was like doing dope in a laboratory because.
Th all the other variables were just stripped away. It was just me and my thoughts and time for introspection, I was like, oh, maybe introducing opioids to my bloodstream really does. Make me crazy, like does something, it takes away my element of self-control and I don't like this feeling I like to be in control.
So I, I, the next day I asked the judge to transfer me to a rural jail that I knew had fewer drugs, almost no drugs, and she did it and I never used again. Um, but I had to go through a year of hell of using drugs in jail to get there, but, and now, um, my recovery. Mostly, I just pay it forward. Like I focus a lot on harm reduction and I don't, I don't think drugs are the boogeyman they're inanimate objects.
I'm not going to trip and fall and land with a needle in my arm. So I work a lot with people in inactive use and around. Frequently. And I know that's not everyone's path, but it is for me because honestly, I think my addiction was very dependent on my social context. My life kind of sucked and now my life is pretty cool.
So I no longer crave the oblivion. Like I couldn't do heroin. I would never get anything done. Cause like anxiety is my driving force. If I did heroin right now, like I would be so unproductive. I'd be like, yeah, let's watch Netflix all day. Oh, I love it. Thank you so much for sharing that. And before we go onto your work, if we wouldn't mind shouting out where people can find you online, where they can follow your work and all that kind of good stuff.
So I'm at Morgan Godwin at Twitter, Tik TOK, Instagram Morgan, godwin.com. And then my hip hop harm reductions beats overdose. So at beats over to. Hi there. My name is Johnny and I'm the host of the podcast called what's on your mind. At the end of the day, we are more than our bios and our professional descriptors and our credentials were people with unique life experiences, interesting perspectives and stories to share with the.
Once a month. I like to showcase stories specifically from the neighborhood that I live in, in Memphis, Tennessee. The first Monday of every month is mental health Monday. So again, that podcast is called what's on your mind, new episodes weekly, and you can find us on your favorite podcast streaming platform.
Find us on social media. Check the link in your show notes or search for Jay Schiffman and choose your struggle on any social media platform. So let's talk about that, your work now, because it is prolific. Uh, your writing is, is very, uh, vulnerable and in a lot of you're very talented writer. When did you decide?
Okay, so you get into recovery, you get out of jail or did the writing start before that? So. You know, I never knew that I could write well, in fact, I didn't think that I could, but then in jail I would see women around me who couldn't even properly construct sentences to get their medical requests seem to get triaged accurately by a nurse because they, and they had like severe medical issues.
So I started helping people, right. Like here in this. And then there's really nothing better to do in jail. And I was in county for two years, so I just write a lot of letters and practice makes perfect. Right. So I got like better at articulating my feelings into words. Then I got to prison and we had the kiosks and I would write sometimes about.
Gorgeous abuses. We were experiencing, which have now been confirmed by like dozens of news reports. But back in 20 16, 20 17, my complaints were falling on deaf ears. No one was listening, but I was emailing the whole world about everything that I was seeing. And somehow I got connected with families against mandatory minimum sentences, and they would read these like monthly email digest.
Writing. And they helped me get published while I was still inside with the Marshall project and vice inside. Um, but I didn't, I had like this whole like imposter syndrome, like, oh my, I can't write. But then they like published. I was like incarcerated. And then I got published in. And I was like, wow, okay.
Maybe I can write. And then I got out of prison a little bit after that, and it's not ever, like I set out to be a writer. I just saw things that were really fucked up all the time and needed to be talked about. And so I just kept writing when I would get these like burning desires to re like I would find some topic on you're like, oh no, this is fucked up.
And the write about it. And then I just started getting published a lot and then accidentally stumbled into a career in journalism. Totally accidental. And you, you continue to regularly be featured in one of my favorite, uh, publications being filtered. I've worked with ML Lansalotto has been on this show and will himself has been on here.
You recently had an article out that that has I've, I've actually been sent by multiple people. I've seen it all over social media. And that was talking about what you, what you kind of referenced earlier. And that is. Uh, it's very scary thought, which is sort of an upcoming, another wave of, of overdose, uh, deaths.
Talk a little bit about how that came, that that article came. Yeah. So that piece and filter talks about the research that's in the journal of American medicine, which started sort of as a filter piece. So we'll reach out to me like, Hey, do you want to write anything? Versus is like last year, way, long time ago.
And then I, I had heard that people were shifting from injection drug use to smoking. And I thought that was fascinating. I'd never heard of people going backwards. And so I researched this piece about blues, right? These. 30 milligram oxycodone is that are totally dominating the drug market here on the west coast.
Um, and while researching that piece, I stumbled across this anecdotal finding that these pills were getting into the hands of teenagers who were done. A lot in a way that I'd never seen before. And my friend, who's a researcher, uh, crunched the CDC data and confirmed that teen youth overdose doubled one year to the next and continues to rise.
And so he was able to write about that academically and get it published in one of the most prestigious academic journals in exhibit. And put me on there a second author, and then that generated just a flurry of other media about the piece I got interviewed, um, by like LA times the guardian NPR. Um, but really like, I mean, Joe, Joe might disagree.
He's the first author, but I'm pretty sure that he got the idea from reading my filter piece. So filter, but yeah, it's really. Uh, well, we should always give as many shadows to filter as possible. They're one of the few who are doing this work. Uh, I would say altruistically. Uh, so let me ask you something about that, because I think a lot of people, while I'm only assuming here, because I don't, you know, I'm sort of in a bubble when it comes to drug policy and, and talking about drugs, but.
A lot of people would push back and say, why are we even focusing on this? We need to be focusing on keeping drugs out of the kids' hands right now, obviously you and I can commiserate how kind of silly that is. But as someone who actually writes to a lot of those people, what do you say to them in response to that, that, that claim?
Here's what we know. States that teach abstinence only sex education have higher rates of teen pregnancy, right? The very outcome they are ostensibly trying to prevent because they think if they, somehow I teach kids about safer sex that is like encouraging them to have sex, but then those same states have the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the nation.
It's no different with drugs. Although people. Many hangups about drugs, because we've been inundated with 50 years of drug war propaganda that we now regurgitate reflexively subconsciously without even realizing it. But here's the thing drug use among teenagers is at historic lows. We used to have much higher rates of illicit drug use among teens.
And we did a pretty good job with, I don't know, drug education, social determinance above. I dunno, we reduced the number. So how much more can we possibly reduce it? We've been trying to reduce it for 50 years and it's at historic lows. How much more of that is actually actionable? Probably very little.
And it's, it's that drug experimentation. These are not necessarily kids with substance use disorders. They're not addicted. You know, they bought an Oxy, what they thought was an Oxy cause they wanted to try it and they die that first time they die. Um, and so all of our messaging has been targeted around addiction and you know, one, one use and you're hooked and that is not what's happening right now.
We are seeing drug experimentation, kill kids, and here's the thing drug experimentation has always happened. We'll always have. Okay. I make policies based in reality, you can make policies to try to legislate your ideal version of reality, but I make policies based in actual reality because this is where people are actually dying.
And so people are so fucking worried about sending the wrong message to kids that they're sending kids to their graves. And shouldn't saving lives, be the moral imperative here, or any weird notion of like, oh, but we're sending the wrong message. Kids are dying. So what's your solution. Cause I actually have some that work, uh, well said really, really, really well said.
So let's talk about some of those solutions because I've got some ideas, but on your list of solutions, where to save supply rank in terms of feasibility. I mean, so I don't think safe supply is feasible for you, but if we rapidly expanded safe supply and. Does not necessarily mean like street drugs for people.
I also include medicalization. I, again, I live here in reality and I know that probably giving people heroin is not super feasible in the American political landscape, but a rapid expansion of medications for opioid use disorder. And we could like even put Dilauded on that list because it works. If we could reach 50% of people, adults with medications, for opiod use disorder that actually.
Fit them because right now methadone prescribing guidelines have not kept up with fentanyl tolerance. Right? So people are having issues with methadone. People on fentanyl are having issues with buprenorphine induction. So we have to modify our medication practices to keep up with the fentanyl era. And if we could do that and rapidly expand that among.
That would, you know, they would lose half the market sector for these pills. And then it would be far less likely to trickle down into the hands of youth trickle down economics. So, uh, you know, it's funny you say that, that, you know, just handing out heroin probably isn't feasible here in the U S I, I don't know.
I think part of me is like in reality once to agree with you, but the other part of me wants to live in fantasy and think that it's possible. I recently had Garth Mullins on this. Uh, and Garth of course, famously recently did that. He went, you know what, fuck it. And they handed out drugs up in, up in Canada and Vancouver and it went well.
It went very well. And
it was really a cool conversation because Garth is one of those just like who gives a fuck kind of guy where it's like, you know, your posturing, we're going to do the real work. So, so in terms of solution, then that you do think are more feasible. Let's talk about some. Okay, so for youth, is that, is it, are we still talking about youth overdose?
Well, let's do both. Yeah. Youth, youth was the stream we were on, but I also would love to hear your thoughts otherwise. I mean, obviously safe supply would save everyone's life. Right. The issue right now is the toxicity of the drug splay, never before in human history. Have we seen this scale of drug overdose?
Okay. Are the United States overdose rate is 20 times that, of the global average. So if there were ever a time for us to radically adopt pragmatic policies and stop posturing that now he said, here we are. Um, and so, I mean, safe supply would save everybody. That's a fact, and this, this is not a politically contended fact.
This is not subjective. This is data. This is science, giving people a safe access to their drugs would save their life. Do you think Justin wanted to buy that gram from me that night, his plan D resource and not a pharmacy where he would have known exactly the purity and dosage that he was getting? No, of course not.
But since we are not given better options, we don't make better choices. Because we literally can't. So we buy from our friends and sketchy dealers and use sketchy drugs, contaminated with horse tranquilizers and benzodiazepines, and God knows what, um, so first things first obviously safe supply. When I think of this in a politically viable viable model, I think that we could rapidly expand our, uh, medication for opiod use disorder prescribing.
So methadone. Uh, Canada does it pretty successfully with Dilauded. They've got like vending machines where you can just like put your Palm and it takes your biometrics. Like there's lots of ways to make this ship more accessible. Um, so United States does a terrible job. Methadone in the United States is terrible, terrible, so restrictive.
So punitive of course, people don't want to do it. You don't want it. They don't want to make their lives more complicated. Right. Getting off drugs is supposed to make your life more convenient. Um, so it has to be as easy to get medications as it is to get drugs. And we are nowhere. All everything you're saying is, is true.
I would, I, I, and sometimes I am guilty of being very pessimistic about this because I look at our political scene and obviously there's just no hope when it comes to Republicans and Democrats, that it's all about the words. There's no action. What is making you hopeful in this arena? Well, it's going to the crisis, the magnitude of grief that people are experiencing cannot go unchecked.
So we've never, you know, ever every person that dies, they're leaving behind what five, six loved ones. And so every year in America we have 600, 700,000 being directly impacted by overdose. Now that's a tragedy and it means that we are primed for change and that. We're going to have to stop with the grand standing and the posturing and start implementing pragmatic solutions.
And we've seen a pretty rapid shift towards more compassionate responses to drug use. Um, we're still hooked on the war on drugs. Of course. Uh, we are very addicted to incarceration in this nation, but I do think that there is potential, but, and then just saying sink bucket, like Garth. So like, I'm like, okay, the government's not coming to save.
What if I just start passing out Narcan and fentanyl test strips at rap concerts. What if I talk to these younger trap artists, get fentanyl test strips in the green room so that they're not dying. What if I can get harm reduction messaging into the lyrics of trap songs? What if all kids knew. The pills are mostly counterfeit because unlike people who are sticking needles in their arms, I knew there was a risk when I was shooting up.
Obviously you're putting injecting drugs. You know, that there's a danger there. I am very perturbed by the fact that a lot of overdoses and increasing proportion of overdoses are occurring with people who thought they were using drugs safely or in a safe way. And I think. There's so much opportunity there, um, for awareness and letting people know that pretty much all drug uses right now carries a risk of overdose.
Um, Narcan, drug checking, more and more places are getting like actual, like FTIR machines. We can actually see what's in our drug. There's a lot. I think there's a lot to be hopeful about. I mean, God, the president said the word harm reduction for the first time, it's still funded at like 0.0, 1% of the war on drugs.
So there's that? Yeah. The president said the word harm reduction, which in a state of the union, which was great. And then the next week Congress bitched and moaned until money was taken out of the budget. That was your market for harm reduction. So, uh, but, but I'm with you on. The general people's response, actually just the last week.
I rereleased a couple of weeks ago, the, um, conversation I had with David poses rip. Uh, uh, a family member, an older family member reached out and said, I got, you know, just what a tragic loss, what do you think would have helped? And I said, I mean, first thing on the top of my mind was safe supply and they went, yeah, that sounds like a feasible solution.
And I was taken aback. This was an older family member who had never had this conversation with me. And so, yes, I do see hope there as well. And I appreciate you pointing out some of those reasons for hope. Um, I'm very cognizant of your time to be quite honest. And before we go too, too long on this, uh, I do want to say one more time.
If you wouldn't mind shouting out where people can find you online, where they can follow your work and all that kind of good. Yeah. At Morgan Godwin across all the socials Morgan godwin.com and@beatsoverdosebeatsoverdose.com. And please go read her stuff on filter. Now, Morgan, we've finished this, this, uh, conversation with the same two questions every time.
The first of which is what is your self-care habits? What works for you? I am restless when static and so I need constantly varying states. Drugs are exciting. Right? And so sometimes recovery can feel really, really boring, and that's one of my largest triggers. And so I try to mitigate that, uh, by traveling excessively, um, keeping myself very busy and keeping, you know, eyes on the prize.
My life has a purpose and reminding myself of that frequent. And feeling that I am doing my best. Try, try to make the world a better place because I was able to survive my addiction. When most of my friends were. Beautiful answers. Uh, thank you for that. And, you know, uh, for the travel piece, if you ever make it out here to Philly for a, for an atmosphere show would love to, would love to meet you there.
All right. Are they on the list? I just got the tour list. I have to get all of these sites covered by harm reductionists with Narcan. I think you're on the list. I've got to make it happen in Philly. Uh, the final question we always end with is we've now spent the last almost 40 minutes here and why you're amazing.
We should all be following your work, but this is your chance to shout out some people that you follow. Some people you admire that we should all go check. My friend, Jordan Barnes just wrote a fiction novel set in a syringe exchange. So trying to bring the message of harm reduction to a wider audience, Dr.
Benjamin Boyce, Dr. Junky show, he's got the podcast. Uh, he wrote his book, you know, I buy all my, all my friends write books, or, I mean, a lot of my friends are writing a book, which is super weird and I buy them all. But his like, it's super good. I've already incorporated it into my research. What's it called?
It's just called Dr. Junky. Um, and it weaves in like a lot of research into his life experience, um, in a way that is just amazing. Carrie Blake and Jer has a book coming out in June called corrections in ink. And I heard it described as memoir Coombs sociological perspective. And I was like, well then why should I even write a book?
Because she already wrote it because we go to prison and we just sort of like use our prison experiences, like a sociologic. Um, experience, you know, I felt like an embedded ethnographer for the duration of my prison sentence. And so I'm really excited to read her book and then check out prison tick-tock.
So, uh, Carrie just wrote a story, included me as a source for NBC about these sort of influencers on Tik TOK. I am not one. I was just like fumbling through the dark, trying to figure out how to use Tik TOK. Um, But showing a different side of incarceration. And so present Tik TOK is actually pretty interesting.
You should check it out. Amazing. Morgan, thank you so much for taking the time. This has been fascinating and I know the listeners are going to love it. Awesome. Thank you so much.
Thank you for supporting the show here at choose your struggle. We rely on all of y'all to help us end stigma and promote honest and fact-based education around mental health, substance misuse, and recovery and drug use and policy. And there are so many ways to engage with our work from our podcast to our storytelling.
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If you're liking the show, please consider leaving us a review. If you're listening on apple, you can leave a review right on your player for everybody else. Check out the link in the show notes. All right, we've come to the end of another episode of the choose your struggle podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in.
I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Morgan. I have been following her work for a couple of years, as has said on this interview. And it was a joy to finally chat with her. Definitely check out the link in the show notes to follow her work, keep an eye out for everything she's doing. And as always go subscribe to filter mag.
It's like every week at this point that we're giving a shout out to filter. So definitely another. All right. Your card for this week is going to come from the believing yourself card pack from blurt. Thank you. Blurt. Here they are my bent the card as I was doing that. That's fine. That is a good, that's a good encapsulation of what this week has been like so far here is the.
When the good times roll around because they will maybe not as quickly, or as often as we'd like, know that you are worthy and deserving of them in their entirety, 100 quadrillion percent worthy. And that's a lot, uh, that is a lot. And yes, that is also true. You are that worthy as you hear me shuffling to put these cards away.
Um, I liked that card a lot. Uh it's it's, you know, something that, uh, is, is a really good mantra. I think to remember that too often, we allow, you know, what is this? Someone smarter than me said this it's like for every a hundred negative things, we remember one positive or something like that. And the way I had to explain to me I've said this before on the show was that evolutionary biology says that it's more important to remember where the predators are coming from then where that tasty.
I'm bastardizing, this, it doesn't really matter. The point stands. Remember, remember the positives too, and you are aware that. So your good egg this week is going to be doing something good for somebody else, but something in particular, uh, it is pride month. We are into the first week of pride month. Um, Loren, that we'll be celebrating.
Celebrate is not really the right word honoring here in Philly. Um, there's a couple of great events that we're going to this weekend and throughout the month. So, uh, that is your good egg check out something in your local area to commemorate, to honor pride month. And, and remember where this came from.
You know, if you have not educated yourself, Go back and read some of that history to remember that pride was not originally a celebration, it was a protest. And, uh, you know, here we are, uh, half a century later and it's become this amazing celebration, but, uh, it wasn't always that way. And a lot of these occasions that, um, start as, as activists on the ground, turn into these events.
So, um, these are really important. What's going on with. Every day, super important. These, these people, activists who are on the street, doing the work, uh, props to them and do something to commemorate to honor pride month, wherever you are, but as always the most important thing, be vulnerable. Show your empathy, spread your love and choose your struggle.