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Welcome to Choose Your Struggle Presents: Made It, Season 1: Stay Savage. In this episode, Sarah relapses, but it's not what you think.
Choose Your Struggle Presents: Made It, a documentary, serial-style podcast telling the story of a person who has made it back from the depths of trauma and created something extraordinary with their second chance.
Season 1 is titled Stay Savage and focuses on Sarah Laurel and the harm reduction and recovery housing organization Savage Sisters.
* This transcript has not been edited. Sorry, I ran out of time!
Made it made, it made it as a member of the shameless podcast network previously on made it and Dez called me and she was like, I'm going to get. You want to come? You want the truth? Fuck. Here we go again. So I knew something was wrong. If he dies, work ovaries first, choose your struggle presents made it season one, stay Savage.
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yeah, like when she was in the hospital day, day two, she said to me, mom, I I'm going to do something. We got to do something, start something, a movement to help people recover. I said, yes, we are. She's like, no mom, really CRC. We're going to do something. I said, we are going to do. All you have to do is stay where you are for today and begin, and we will do something well, she didn't know it at the time Sarah's recent traumatic event would end up being the catalyst that would provide the change in the birth of Savage sisters at that moment.
However, Sarah was focused more on her recovery, which as it always is early in recovery was incredibly fragile. Unfortunately for Sarah, her first test would come sooner than she. Welcome to episode eight of choose your struggle presents made it season one, stays Savage. I just remember being in my bedroom and like freezing completely freezing.
And I said, let me call you right back. And I hung the phone up and I got down on my knees and I was like, please don't let me go get high, please. Don't let me go get high. And my phone rang. Like, and I don't have these kinds of moments, if that makes sense. You know, like I hear, I used to hear people say stuff like this, and I was like, that would have been nice if something like that happened for me, I was still on my knees when my phone rang.
And it was this woman named Candace from Keystone treatment facility. In Chester. And I had been there so many times and she said, she's all bubbly. It's Candace. I got your number from your mom. And she said, you're sober. And I was like, uh, okay. And she's like, I just switched desks. She was my counselor, like 15 times.
She's like, I just switched dash and I found your ID. So I contacted your mom cause she's your emergency contact. And she gave me your cell phone on. So I wanted to let you know, I have it, it was behind my desk when I moved to desks and she was like, how are you doing? And I don't remember what I said, to be honest.
And then she said, well, do you ever want to come in and speak to the group? And I was like, yeah, sure. And I was like, when? And she was like, can you come today at one? And I, I just said, yes. I said, yes. I hung up the phone and I went upstairs and then I didn't think like, this is a God moment. I'd forgotten about Dez by that point.
You know, because I like that was how quickly my brain shifted in those moments. In that early recovery time, I went upstairs and I got Claudia and I was like, come on, poodle, we're going to, we're going to Keystone. And I went and I told my little story. And, but in that moment, I got distracted from going to get high with Dez and I did something that was more purposeful.
And Dez kind of went in and out in and out. And, you know, we obviously always talked to each other, but I was, um,
I got really busy. I got really busy with like what I was doing with Savage and like my own work and, um,
There's a saying that some of us in recovery strongly believe in that there are really two major dates in your recovery. Obviously the first is whenever you get into recovery. But the second, in my opinion, almost more important is when you first open up about it, when you first start talking about it, it's a major weight off your shoulders.
And it's a major community building moment because when you tell your story, other people tell them. So that moment for Sarah came very early and as you can hear, it was incredibly powerful. Now, besides Dez, there was another important person in service life at this time. Claudia and I were in jail together too, so much fun.
Uh, yeah, so Claudia was like, she was my, everything at that point. Um, we were together every single day. Obviously we lived together. We listened to music together. We watched TV together. We went to meetings together. Every, every activity we were together for every holiday for years, she just helped me. You know, um, we laughed though that first year with me and Claudia, we laughed so much.
She was such a huge part of me staying sober because. I don't think I'd laughed like that. The only other time that I laughed, like that was with Dez in jail. When we were in cell one 12. And we were locked in constantly, cause I couldn't keep my mouth shut and the CEO hated me. So Dez would, he would always be like, Sarah, please don't get us locked in today.
Um, and we would just be stuck in this little tiny cell together, just cracking up about the dumbest shit. And that was kind of how it was with Claudia and I, we kind of treated it like jail. It was cold. We stayed inside. We laughed a lot. And, um, we did the intakes and our, in our version of intakes for new residents was like, what up?
Like, we were not super official. Um, but she spoke with me. She helped me run the house and check chores and do your ends. And we went and did everything together.
If I were a more poetic person, I'd have something beautiful to say right now about how the ghost of all these people are still with Sarah all these years later. And their very blood runs through the veins of Savage sisters, but I'm not. So we'll leave it at that instead. Let's push on to just a few months later when she met another person who would have a huge impact on her life, his name was Pete and he plays a major role in this story.
I have this vivid memory of Claudia. He came to the recovery house to help us put up the tree cause he was in a men's recovery house. And. I didn't know, like we needed help putting together some furniture for one of the new men's house for one of the new recovery houses that we were opening. And then we needed help putting a tree up and we didn't like him.
He was just like a beefcake and like, you know, like 10 and like, like just, and so Claudia and I, at that point, like Claudia was gay and I wasn't talking to men at that point. I was like, so fucking dead inside. Like men would like ask for my number. And I was like, I don't know, before. I actually, I believe for several years, a couple of years people thought that Claudia and I were a couple, we weren't, but we didn't care who cares.
It kept the guys away, but Pete had come over and, um, when he was done, I think he thought that we were going to like hang out and he was gonna like, be able to like, hang out and like put his arm around me and chill. And I was like, um, And Claudia got a broom and she like swept him out the door, like in a joking way, because that was just how Claudia was.
And she was like, can I cut out, cut out? And he just looked at me all surprised and I was like, sorry. Bye bro. And then he just kind of kept hitting me up and uh, I noticed him and we started dating and we took it kind of slow and. I wanted to work. I was working in like a real estate office very briefly, and he needed help doing some flooring stuff and he paid good.
And so I was like, yo, like, um, I'm good with physical stuff. Like, let me help. So I started helping and we started dating and it was so kind of natural up to this point. Savage sisters' existed more as a dream than reality, but as usually is the case with this tight-knit group scenario, it turned to another member of the family to make it.
That member was Adam. And he was more than happy to step in at that point, Sarah became the house manager and she was talking to me and she was like, look, I've been fighting with this, this owner of this house. Cause he's now providing us with like any of the shit we need. And she was like, and I got a whole house full of people and I want to start of recovery house program.
And she knew I was at the time and about to buy a house. Uh, I've been saving up. I've been working full time for five, not five years. I've been working full-time for four years. Um, as a direct care worker, taking care of a really awesome guy named Tommy in a wheelchair with muscular dystrophy, um, while going to CCP and saved up enough money to buy a house, didn't want to pay rent anymore.
And I was going to move into it and Sarah was like, let me have your house to start this recovery aspect. And, you know, I really, I wanted to do it because I wanted to help my sister in any way that I possibly could. I was beyond excited to see her living life. Again, it was having her back was, it was incredible up until she got into her addiction.
Having Sarah in my life was having somebody. Was able to help me in with everything that I ever needed. And afterwards it was, I was able to help her. Um, and it was, uh, it just felt right. And I wanted to help her in any way I possibly could. So she had me on that, but then she also is an excellent sales person and she convinced me that it would be an excellent business venture.
You know, I ended up getting the house and she ended up moving in and starting. Her program. And at first it was just her program. I wasn't there to help her with seven sisters. I was just, I just helped her get the house. That's all I did. She started the program by hers. I just helped her with the resources to make it happen.
And it was incredible. Um, she, she made it happen and she made sure the mortgage was paid every month. The, the crazy numbers she had originally predicted, certainly didn't come to be, which is why we inevitably realized that there's absolutely no way to provide all the resources that we wanted to provide to the people we were serving.
Um, without support from the community, which is why we very quickly decided it would be best to become a nonprofit. I'm sure it's not a surprise to you, but nobody in this family does anything. Half-assed. And so from almost the moment that Savage sisters started people in the community started to take notice.
One of those community members was a woman named Shannon, and she's still with the organization today. You'll hear more from her over the next couple episodes. Here she is. I was about three, three years sober. I think I was like coming out of my insanity period in the beginning of my sobriety and like starting to come to a realization that more work needed to be done.
She was immediately drawn to Sarah and Savage sisters. Having a safe space for women in new and recovery is obviously something that any woman wants to see. Other women stay sober. We exchanged numbers the first time. You know, I eventually met her sister, Liz at another meeting and was all excited because I hadn't met her before.
When she said she was Sarah's sister. I was like, oh my God, that's so amazing. I love her as Savage sisters grew Sarah's place in the community, grew with it at the same time, she was trying to juggle a new relationship with Pete who wanted to take things a little bit faster than Sarah was comforting. He said he wanted, he was just so fucking mushy dude.
He was like, I love you. And you're so beautiful on yourself. Amazing. And I was like, bro, don't get attached. Like I'm dead inside. I don't want to get married ever. He kept talking about getting married and I was like, I don't want to ever get married. I don't want that for me. And like, that was important to him.
You know, he, he said he loved me for a few months before I responded to it. I didn't want to do that with a man. Like I just was like, look, we work together. We got, we have good sex. Like, it was just like, can we keep it the fuck light? You know? And like he wouldn't and eventually I kind of gave into it and I was just like, okay.
He sat me down and he was like, I'm I want to marry you. And I was like, no, like I said, no so many times. And he goes, well, I'm going to your mom. And he was like, he was like, will you marry me? Like, what can you just, I'm not going to do this if you're not going to agree to it. And I was like, fine. I was like, yeah, I'll, I'll do it.
And I didn't know that he had talked to my mom yet. Apparently he had, my mom told me about that later. And, um, then he. Yeah. He relapsed and died. Yeah. So if you've been listening and I don't know why you would be on episode eight, if you hadn't been, you know, that this entire show should come with one giant trigger warning.
Uh, obviously this is another one. You remember how, at the end of last episode, I said, it's not really a, you, it's sort of a backwards J with some squiggly lines, and this is one of those squiggly lines. The rest of this episode is going to get dark. So just be prepared for that. But first let's take a break.
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He'd never gotten long-term recovery and he didn't want anybody to know. And I somehow felt like I was supposed to like, protect that in him. I don't think he ever got six months. Um, he would like just relapse for the day. And I remember the first time I came over, I, I, you can just see it, you know, um, uh, And I saw it and I was just like, what the fuck?
But I was busy. So the idea of like relaxing with him, wasn't really on the table. And I had done that in the past with an ex and then that was a bad time. That was a bad time. So I just kind of supported him through it and. Kept it moving. If that makes sense. Um, I don't even know that he told his sponsor about it every time I know that there were speculations, um, people had asked me about it, but it wasn't really my story to tell.
So I just didn't really tell people when they asked new year's day, new year's Eve, he was still sober. We went to an AA, Dan. And, um, it was actually really fun. All the residents went, we just had a good time. And then the next day I had to go to the house to do something and it was cold. And when I got home, he was high.
Then we got the flu. We both got really, really, really, really sick. My mom had just had it and she was like in bed for 10 days. And I remember we were working a job site in, um, west Philly at this point. And I remember my mom being like laid up for 10 days and I was like, what the fuck? And then he, he relapsed and then like two days later, like we couldn't even move.
Like we were both so sick. So he was like, I mean, he, there's no way he could have gotten high. It was a tiny apartment. And I would've known if he had even gotten out of the bed, we were laid up for like a solid 10 days, whatever, just like vomiting. Like we were so fucking sad. I don't know why. And during that time, Yeah, we were just sick and bad.
And then I got up and I had to go to Myrtlewood to get stuff set up and
yeah, that's it. When you're in recovery, you get used to loss. The other thing that you get used to is recognizing that everybody's using. From the person who can have a glass of wine at dinner and not want 10 more and literally never touches any other substance all the way down to the problematic ill use and misuse of addiction.
And that's the thing, not everybody who struggles with addiction looks the same. Sarah says as much about. I don't know how he did it. Like he would just get high and then just be like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna use again. Like I, that's not who I am. Like once I pick up when like, yes, I'm going to hell, you know, he, he would just like use one day and then go to a meeting the next day and like, not pick up again.
I don't know how. Unfortunately, Pete substance misuse drove a wedge in their relationship and was the topic of conversation. The last time that Sarah saw them alive, the last conversation that we had in person was when he came home from his parole officers and it was a Tuesday and he was visibly high, you know, and, um, we were in the kitchen,
we were shouting at each other and, uh,
Uh, I told him to call his sponsor and go to a meeting. Um, I had stuff come into the Savage house and I had to be there and he was like going to go to rehab the next day. And I, I remember.
Standing in the kitchen and telling him
you're going to fucking die. If you don't get sober, you're going to fucking die. And, um, I was so scared and so angry and he started to cry and he asked me to come lay down with him and we went and we laid down in the bed and. We both cried. And he was like, I'm not going to go anywhere. I'm going to go to rehab tomorrow.
And he asked me to stay and I couldn't because I had to go do something. And we talked for a couple hours at night. Cause I stayed at Savage that night. And um, we just talked on the phone. Until like one or two in the morning. And I was like, well, when I get up, I'll come over and take you to rehab. That was, it was that
I should've stayed. She called me. Hysterical on the phone while I was in calculus class and I left and went to go see her. And the next few days were a blur. It was just really fucking traumatic. Let me clarify something. I said just a few minutes ago, you never actually get used to the death. You just get used to it happening all around you.
The family rallied around Sarah. I mean, what could they really do in that moment? Here's Liz man. Pete was awesome. She was really happy with him. Like when I saw my sister with Pete, I'd never seen her like that with another person ever in my life. And it was just, thank God, you know, I'd never seen her that comfortable and that, that authentic.
You know, my, the goofy, lovable little girl that is my sister, she was a hundred percent herself around Pete. And I'd never seen that before ever Mack took a much more hands-on role in trying to help Sarah during this dark time. The first thing that I did was I withdrew from classes. I'm moved in to the Myrtlewood house for a short while and, um, basically ran the house because.
We have these newly sober women and this broken house manager, like Sarah did not leave her room. Sarah Eileen, I brought her food. I made the food, I cleaned the house. I text the girls to meetings and got them job interviews, and I had to go help them buy clothes and groceries and get all the donations.
We got like some whole foods and we got shut down and Panera. Sick at the beginning, it was a lot of red, but it was like, this will feed you right off the bat, literally. Yeah. Three days into opening the house. It was like, holy shit. The house manager, the leader of our organization needs a break. And so it, Adam I and my mom had to step up and take that.
I was super happy to do it. I did volunteer to do it. I was out of position where I was like mentally, okay. With taking a break from school. Cause I was super overwhelmed and I was kind of debating it anyway. And then that happened and it was like, okay, this is a sign. I'm doing it. I'm taking the break. I was.
Temporary house manager more after this break, if you guys want to learn more about Savage sisters, check out www.savagesisters.org. If you'd like to hear more from me and Sarah specifically, please reach out to info@savagesisters.org, and we can come speak to you, your organization, your business, or your place of worship on Narcan, trainings, harm reduction, trainings, or anything in general with Savage sisters.
If you want to donate, please go to seven sisters.org sponsorship. There, you can find a plethora of ways to give directly to our cause and help our mission. Additionally, if you want to come volunteer at an outreach, please reach out to info@savagesisters.org. So we can give you dates times and locations for our outreach events.
Thanks everybody. Stay Savage.
Hey, y'all it's Jay, the host of this show. If you're not really enjoying this series and you're just listening to make me happy, then thank you for the rest of you. I invite you to check out everything else. Choose your struggle does in the mental health and drug use advocacy space. We have a couple of other podcasts, including our incredibly popular weekly show called.
Choose your struggle on that show. I interview people with lived and learned experiences on the subjects of mental. Substance misuse and recovery and drug use and policy. But occasionally we talk about other topics as well. We also have another new show called choose your struggle presents Monday motivation, but it's not just podcasts.
We also host two vulnerable storytelling events, rock-bottom storytellers and a day in the life on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Twitch, and YouTube. And now I'm so excited to announce that we'll be doing rock bottom storytellers live here in Philly, starting this summer. I also have a book coming out, hopefully later this year.
And I regularly traveled the country, telling my story. And speaking about these important topics. I know this is all a lot, but you can check us out at our website. Choose your struggle.com and check out all of our podcasts, wherever you're getting this serious, just by searching for. Choose your struggle.
All right. That's enough about us. Let's get back to the show
when you're in recovery and you experience a traumatic. The first thing anyone thinks of is, oh no. What if they relapsed? Sarah's recent experience? Certainly qualified. I was suspicious from the day that Pete died, that she was, I just knew, I knew she was going to relapse. It was, uh, it was just, how could you, I don't know.
How could you not finding the person that you love on the, you know, on the ground dead? That's I can't fucking it. While these concerns clearly came from a heartfelt place. They were in essence, elevating a symptom over the original disease. Here's Sarah, after I found Pete dead, um, I never, I didn't go back.
My family packed all my stuff. The next time that I was in that apartment, it was empty. It had been repainted and it was from. And I just went in and laid on the floor where he died and cried for a really long time and then walked away from that building and never went back. Um, I officially moved into the house on Myrtlewood and so we kind of did this like makeshift finished bedroom in the basement that I lived in.
And then the three bedrooms were with residents. And I did that for a few months. And then, um, a lot of the residents went away for Easter in late April, and I was like, I'm going to kill myself. I'd lost a significant amount of weight. I just wasn't happy. I was miserable and I hated everybody in AA. I was sick and tired of people asking about Pete.
There were like terrible rumors that they were saying about Pete, that like, I was there when he died and like, didn't argue with them. And like, it was just like overwhelmingly fucked. And so, um, I went to my favorite place and I shut up and didn't die. There was no relief in the relapse. I should say. I just wanted everything to go quiet.
I wanted to stop being on the floor, you know, holding Pete and I wanted to stop hating myself for not being there. And I couldn't, and I thought that just dying would be easier just dying and I didn't do. And so then I was just back on the wheel. This is such an awful story, but it's a great example of why focusing on the relapse is only seeing the literal tip of the iceberg.
Unfortunately, for those around Sarah, that's sort of what it took for anyone to notice. Here's Georgie. Sarah was, she had pulled away from all of us. I remember whenever I'd see her, she'd always have glasses on. She would never take her glasses off. I would say to Adam, I'd be like, oh, Do you think? And he'd say, oh yeah, maybe eventually it became so obvious that Sarah was struggling, that everybody did take notice and they snapped into action.
Here's Adam. She said, she'd go to rehab in the morning. And um, I called my sister Mac and the rest of my family told them I was going over there. Um, and then I was kidnapping her and, uh, that's what me and me and Mac did. We showed up that night. She thought we were going to. Wait until the morning. Um, but we showed up that night.
Here's Mac. Yeah, I was at work. Adam calls me. I just was like, what the fuck are you calling me at 1:00 AM for? And he was like, ah, dude, I'm sorry. I, Sarah relapsed. And I was like, what the fuck? Uh, she had like, just gotten a year, like super recently. We were so excited. So obviously as always, I was the one to get in the car because I was the only one that ever had access to a car and drove from work to south Philly.
And I had to sleep there overnight. Uh, she cursed me out so hard. She was like, just fucking leave. I hate you. I hate Adam. I hate mom. What the fuck is wrong with his family? You guys are like vultures. You're up, bitch. I knew she was high when she called me a bitch, but not in a nice way. Not like ha bitch.
No, she'd be like, you're a fucking bitch. And it was like, okay, I know that you're high then throughout all of this, no matter what anybody else said, Sarah never lost sight on what she thought truly mattered. She was her. And she needed help. You know, everybody just associates when the needle hit my neck.
And that wasn't when I was struggling. That was when I got to the point where I broke down and then I immediately went over yet. You know? So it's like those months where I wasn't eating and I was miserable and alone in a basement, that was the painful part, not the part where I got high. And nobody was there for that.
You know, everybody was there once I injected, it was like, I had to take it to that level for anybody to even notice that like I was alive and that like I was dying, I lost like almost 30 pounds without drugs. I weigh one 40. You can look at pictures of me during that time. I started drinking in shores. I w I had no, I'd never experienced depression to the point where you don't have an appetite.
That's just, I'm an eater. I don't have an eating disorder. I don't punish myself with food. I wasn't punishing myself. I literally couldn't eat. Um, and I think that everybody just kind of, it's a lot easier when you're a heroin addict for people to just say, well, it was the drugs. Well, The drugs is what helped me get better.
Cause it's when people started saying Sarah needs help next time on me. I definitely didn't want to do it. Cause I was so angry and like, it was so humble. But I did it. Thanks for listening. Made it. Season one, stay Savage is a choose your struggle production and a member of the shameless podcast network.
I'm Jay Schiffman, our narrator producer, and founder of choose your struggle special. Thanks to Lauren Schiffman and Steve Schiffman for their help on this show, the theme song was composed by me and built on the song. All that by Ben sound, the made it theme you hear in episode 10 was composed by lettuce and Robert.
All interviews for the show were given freely and no payment was received by anyone for providing an interview for this show, all views expressed by those interviewed are their own. For more info, please see our show notes or learn more@chooseyourstruggle.com.