Addiction Medicine Made Easy | Fighting back against addiction
Addiction is killing us. Over 100,000 Americans died of drug overdose in the last year, and over 100,000 Americans died from alcohol use in the last year. We need to include addiction medicine as a part of everyone's practice! We take topics in addiction medicine and break them down into digestible nuggets and clinical pearls that you can use at the bedside. We are trying to create an army of health care providers all over the world who want to fight back against addiction - and we hope you will join us.*This podcast was previously the Addiction in Emergency Medicine and Acute Care podcast*
Addiction Medicine Made Easy | Fighting back against addiction
The High Functioning Patient with Addiction
Today we speak with Dr. Samantha Harte about her experience living as a high-functioning person with addiction and how perfection masks internal struggles. She shares her journey from overdosing on cocaine as she was accepted into her doctoral program to becoming an author and recovery coach helping others find authentic healing.
• High-functioning addiction often hides behind external success and achievements
• Control and perfectionism become secondary addictions that receive cultural reinforcement
• Traditional recovery approaches can face resistance from high-achievers who struggle to admit powerlessness
• Dr. Harte discusses writing her book "Breaking the Circuit" after losing her sister to overdose
• Trauma-informed recovery approaches help address the underlying childhood experiences driving perfectionism
• Self-compassion and making amends to yourself are crucial parts of healing for perfectionists
• Both Dr. Harte and Dr. Grover share personal experiences of maintaining outward success while struggling internally
• Physical healing and spiritual healing are interconnected in authentic recovery
If something Dr. Harte shared resonates with you, please reach out. Dr. Samantha Harte, responds to her own DMs. Connect with her, book a free discovery call, and don't ignore the call if something pierces you – she's here to wake you up and light your soul on fire.
To contact Dr. Grover: ammadeeasy@fastmail.com
Welcome to the Addiction Medicine Made Easy Podcast. Hey there, I'm Dr Casey Grover, an addiction medicine doctor based on California's Central Coast. For 14 years I worked in the emergency department seeing countless patients struggling with addiction. Now I'm on the other side of the fight, helping people rebuild their lives when drugs and alcohol take control. Thanks for tuning in. Let's get started.
Speaker 1:This is a really special episode for me. Today I will be talking with Dr Samantha Hart, who is a physical therapist, and for me, today I will be talking with Dr Samantha Hart, who is a physical therapist and recovery coach in Southern California. She is the author of the book Breaking the Circuit, and today we're going to be talking about what it's like being a very highly functional person with addiction and how to heal when everything looks good on the outside but actually isn't good on the inside. And I really, as you will hear during this episode, can relate to this. Sam was in active addiction as she was completing a doctoral degree in physical therapy, and I can relate because I was suffering from major depression, self-harm and an eating disorder when I was graduating from UCLA with straight A's and getting into medical school. For the person who is highly functioning, who is struggling, it becomes easy to say nothing is wrong because everything looks good on the outside. Control and perfectionism become addictive, as it's how to believe that you are successful without actually having to face being vulnerable.
Speaker 1:This was a fantastic episode to record, and I am really grateful to have met Dr Hart. As you listen to her speak, you can tell how intelligent she is, and yet she's had some real struggles. This episode is a great reminder that addiction can happen to anyone, even if their life looks good on the outside. One quick warning this episode does contain some salty language. And with that here we go. Well, good morning, sam. It is so nice to meet you. I'm so looking forward to hearing your story today. Let's start by just telling us who you are and what you do.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me. I am many, many things. I'm a doctor of physical therapy and personal development coach, and today I can safely say that I help people heal and consciously create a body and life that they love. If you had asked me that question even two years ago, I would just be Dr Hart which is not small, it's not nothing and I would tell you that I help people correct faulty movement patterns and prevent injury. And so what's changed? What's changed? What's changed? And I would say that when I got out of grad school and I saw the landscape of the healthcare climate, I was newly sober and I thought this is it, this is what I got into, all this debt for you want me to see four or five patients at a time and at best, before insurance discharges them, give them a set of straight leg raises to do when they get home. Is this a joke? And so I remember one of the exciting things about becoming a PT was that I could have my own business one day. So it was always in the back of my mind, but I didn't want to start my career that way. I needed to get my clinical feet underneath me, so to speak. So I worked for a woman who truly only saw one patient at a time, and I did that very intentionally so I could become a good practitioner. And I did that very intentionally so I could become a good practitioner. And then within three years, I was% better. And so I started to ask them and their answer was oh, I go to a trainer. I bought a package of Pilates sessions and all of a sudden I'm thinking, wait a minute, these people who are so much less qualified are getting three times as much money to do the thing that I would love to be doing with these patients. I should offer it. So I did, and that's how my business was born and I ran a cash-based PT clinic in Santa Monica for 10 years and the thing is on a parallel track. I was in sobriety and we'll get into that.
Speaker 2:You know one of those high-functioning addicts who, on the evening of getting accepted into a doctoral program, overdosed on cocaine, very begrudgingly entered the rooms of AA and didn't go back for a year and a half until I begrudgingly went back because the guy I was dating caught me with this prescription pill bottle that was not prescribed to me, that I was totally abusing, and I felt like, uh-oh, he was probably going to leave me if I didn't get sober, but not because I really wanted to do any of the work that the steps were suggesting I ought to do, because that work threatened my entire identity. That work meant that this high-achieving perfectionist who was able to control, curate the world around her, was going to have to relinquish control over people, places, things and situations. And I didn't see a reason to do that at all. I just knew I had to stop using cocaine. And so, as I'm trudging through sobriety very reluctantly and having to do the work Now, I did the work for a long time without a power greater than myself.
Speaker 2:My husband, the guy who found the pill bottle, who was my boyfriend, who became my fiance, who became my husband. He was my higher power. I didn't know that until he pulled away from me, but he was. His love for me was what kept me safe and whole in the world, and until he pulled that away, I didn't understand how much I was relying on it. So I did the steps the best I could.
Speaker 2:I worked through my fourth step. I unpacked my anger. I had made amends to him and to a lot of people I had hurt, and I'm starting to gather some evidence that these patients in the clinic, who are not addicts, seem to also be suffering from a spiritual malady. What do I mean? Well, I'd have the wife who had seen every in-network practitioner for plantar fasciitis and nobody could fix it. And finally I'm going. Well, you have a hip issue. Nobody's looked at your hip and because you have no stability there, you're dropping into excessive pronation and your plantar fascia is getting yanked over and over again. So here's what we're going to do about it.
Speaker 2:I create this amazing program and then she comes in the next day and says I'm so sorry, I didn't get a chance to do it. Oh, what happened? Well, my husband was supposed to do this and that and the other, and then he didn't, and so I obviously had to get it done. And by the time I did all the things, I was exhausted, and in order for me to have any time to myself at all, I stayed up late and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or you know, I know you said I should be using at least five pound weights to really build strength, but I just, every time I do that, it makes me feel bulky and I feel I feel big, and I just I don't, I don't want to do that, I don't, I don that. And so these people are suffering from hypervigilance, taking on the invisible mental load in their household, chronic people-pleasing, perfectionism, obsession with the beauty and body standard, and all of it is getting in the way of their plantar fasciitis getting better, and so it was like an itch that I couldn't scratch, you know, and when you ask me, who am I?
Speaker 2:The second part of what I said is that I'm a personal development coach. I could also say I'm a life coach. I could also say I'm a mindset coach. I could also say I'm an executive coach. I could also say I'm a sober life coach. Kind of depends on who I'm speaking to, of course. But why is that part of my description today? Because on March the 13th of 2022, I lost my big sister, jessica, to a drug overdose and in that moment, I decided I was going to write a book and the book was going to be about the spiritual side of wellness and that I was going to put that at the epicenter of what I do in the world, whether it's talking on a podcast, speaking on a stage or treating a patient in the clinic. So today, I don't just treat the body, I treat the body and the spirit, because I don't believe we should separate the two.
Speaker 1:I just want to pause and acknowledge the loss of your family member. I'm so sorry to hear that.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:If I can reflect back what I heard from you, as you shared who you are and what you do, I heard two things. One is that you wanted to see people for all of them, not just one aspect. I mean, that's always been my frustration. I was an ER doc before I was an addiction doctor and people come in and it's been like 45 years of poor nutrition, no access to exercise, family didn't prioritize education and now we need three back surgeries and we're dependent on pain meds. I was like man, this didn't start this week and I can't do much in the ER. So I 100% relate to your sentiment of I actually want to help all of the person and it takes attention to more than just what they tell you is wrong. And then I also hear you saying that about yourself is you want to work on all of Sam to be the best Sam you can be. Do I have that right?
Speaker 2:You sure do.
Speaker 1:Tell me about your book.
Speaker 2:So I was in the Austin airport when I found out she died, with my husband, and I really don't remember anything at all about that day, other than wailing on the floor of the airport. But my husband said that on the flight back I turned to him and said I'm writing a fucking book. So apparently I knew that day. Now, I think what I knew in that moment was this was a story among a sea of stories, it being the most painful and dramatic. That finally gave me permission to say I am not recovering in silence anymore. I am sharing my story because our secrets are keeping us sick and there are people in and out of the rooms of recovery, addicted to substance and other things, that are suffering in silence, and I will be the lighthouse. And so the book started as the stories of my life. You know, when I sat down, I took a note from James Clear in Atomic Habits, who said we don't rise to the level of our goals, we fall to the level of our systems, and I thought what is a system I can put into place that would actually hold me accountable to writing this book, which is a huge goal, a goal that so many people have by the way for their lives. And I thought I'm going to write for 30 minutes a day for 30 days. I'm going to start with that. No pressure, this does not have to go in order, I do not have to start at chapter one, I do not have to know the structure. I'm just going to pick a story and write, and so I'm writing, and I'm writing, and I'm writing, and eventually I work with someone who's a published author and I create a book proposal and then I start submitting and submitting, and submitting, and eventually I work with this hybrid publishing company, and a hybrid publisher, if you pick a good one, gives you all the process for a certain fee monthly, which I was okay doing in exchange for a much higher royalty split. And as I got my team assembled, the question became what is this book for? Well, it's to help as many people as possible. Great, then, what helped you? Helped you when I worked the 12 steps in my marital crisis in a more modern and trauma-informed way. My healing actually began. That's what this book is going to be. This book is going to be a modern reinvention of the 12 steps of recovery. So I didn't know when I started that the memoir was not just a movement, but it is.
Speaker 2:I am trying to become known now as the girl who 12-stepped the world. We talk about it in the rooms all the time. Man, this is like the best kept secret. The whole goddamn world needs these steps. Well, who's bringing them to the world then? If we're all anonymous, who's going to be the cycle breaker? Who's going to be the one that has the courage to say you know?
Speaker 2:Much like yoga, these principles are beautiful. They're sacred. There's something ancient about them that many people believe we shouldn't touch. But it's also 2025. And we know a lot more now about addiction, childhood trauma and psychology. We know a lot more now about addiction, childhood trauma and psychology. So how can we take this beautiful set of principles if it's an accordion that's squished together, best kept secret and widen and open it up and bust through the framework so that anyone can have access to a spiritual blueprint for how to get through life's hardest things. Anyone can have access to a spiritual blueprint for how to get through life's hardest things. So my book is called Breaking the Circuit how to Rewire your Mind for Hope, resilience and Joy in the Face of Trauma.
Speaker 2:I purposely did not put the 12 steps on the title. I didn't want to scare people away. I wanted them to crack it open and give it a whirl right. And for me you know, speaking about high achievers and how, in some ways, how much more difficult it is to really concede to your innermost self that you need help and that you actually are an addict. When I think about who I was when I got into the 12-step rooms, I was just a woman who came into, came into a childhood that was wildly volatile, with a mentally unstable mom who was popping prescription pills, an emotionally absent father and a very, very angry sister who was acting out sexually and with drugs, and control was my drug of choice. So if I could make my body perfect and my grades perfect watch out world, here I come. Then everything was okay, and so I was hardwired as a type A perfectionist genetically, but then it was so unbelievably reinforced by the unstable environment and those set of skills really worked for me.
Speaker 2:Culturally, you get rewarded for being perfect. How did you get that job? Wow, you're summa cum laude. How are you so fit, crowd? How are you so fit? Just patting, patting on the back again and again, and so, all of a sudden, aa's going hey, by the way, even though your mom told you that there's no such thing as God and the greatest thing about you is your intellect, and the only person you can count on is yourself. You're going to have to get down with God. So you're going to have to come to believe that some power in the sky, some dude with a white beard, is going to wave a wand and strike you sane because you're acting fucking crazy. To that step I said fuck you. Show me, I'm crazy, show me, I'm about to be a doctor. For God's sakes, I'm living in Manhattan in my 20s and I'm surviving. I have a job. I have a boyfriend. What about me exactly is crazy. I just have a cocaine problem.
Speaker 2:I didn't understand that the steps were butting up against childhood beliefs that kept me safe in a very traumatic home, and nobody said that to me. It was just get down with God or good luck to you. So when my marriage was falling apart and this man's love for me that was my higher power was taken away, I was truly insane. In recovery, I was filled with rage, I was filled with anxiety. I was so sure that something I could say or do was going to change this man's mind and make him love and forgive me again, because I had been able to do it every other time in my life and it didn't work.
Speaker 2:And so what started as I'm going to sleep on a friend's couch because we're fighting so much and I had enough sobriety to go this isn't healthy turned into a month in a sponsor's apartment, turned into three months on another friend's air mattress, until finally a sober friend said you can't live like this. If you don't want to leave your marriage, you need to find a place that's yours, you need to sign a lease and you need to heal. The idea of doing that meant, in my mind at the time, failure, complete failure meant, in my mind at the time, failure, complete failure, perfectionism Collapsing Before my very eyes. But I didn't know what choice I had, because I couldn't live in that house under those circumstances, with the fighting. I didn't want to get down with God and I didn't want to relapse, because my first sponsor who saved my life, who had 22 years sober from heroin addiction, he relapsed at the end of my first year and he killed himself and I knew if I relapsed I was going to die. So I sign a lease and I go into this empty apartment that needed to be furnished and I'm sobbing so, absolutely depressed. That was rock bottom. That was spiritual rock bottom, a place where I didn't want to die but I could no longer go on living with the coping patterns I had been using and in walks, a woman who has worked the steps many times in many programs, who says what if we do the steps on your marriage?
Speaker 2:What do you mean? Well, I'm not saying you can't call the drug dealer and that it's not a possibility, but I don't think you're about to do that. I think you know you're powerless over that. What you don't really know is your powerlessness over this man, the situation, the history of you cheating on him before you got married and the way it's plaguing the marriage today. What if you were powerless over him Whether he is cheating on you, because it seems like it, but you don't have no evidence and he's denying it over the future of the relationship, and that when you try to exert power over this man and every other person, place, thing and situation of the relationship, and that when you try to exert power over this man and every other person, place, thing and situation, by the way, your life becomes unmanageable in the following way. Well, that's pretty easy to see You're full of rage, you're depressed, you're anxious, you have no sense of self-worth and you're only okay if he loves you. So if all of that is true, then what do you have power over?
Speaker 2:By the way, I find it fascinating that Mel Robbins' new book called the Let them Theory, has caught fire culturally. Because what is the let them theory? It is step one, modernized. That's what it is.
Speaker 2:Let them let your child be upset that you took away their screen time. You're powerless over their upsetness. Let them let them be who they are. Let them feel how they want to feel. Let them be who they are. Let them feel how they want to feel. Let them think what they want to think and let me do what I can do. I'm powerless over him, him, him. I'm not powerless over me. So that's the work we started to do, and we repurposed the steps in this way around the marital crisis and the breakthrough that literally not just changed my life, but saved. It was the ninth step, because here I am, I'm five years sober and I'm thinking oh God, amends, you know how many times do I have to apologize to this man for all the cheating. I did seven years ago when I was in active addiction, and she looked at me and she said have you ever made an amends to yourself?
Speaker 1:Nope.
Speaker 2:Hadn't even occurred to me. No one had ever suggested it. Why does that matter? Why did that change my life? Well, let's be really clear. It was not a white light experience where I stood in front of a mirror and said I love and forgive you, sam, and I was fucking healed. Okay, because this is the difference between the land of positive affirmation and spiritual bypass and doing the work.
Speaker 2:Once this woman gave me permission, which, at that time in my life, I needed someone to give me, because it wasn't even in the realm of possibility, as a professional self lacerator, that I could let myself off the hook. Plus, my identity was so wrapped around beating myself up, which gave me the edge that I had that. Who would I be without it? I needed this woman to open that door for me so that I could consider whether or not I could be a woman who, despite cheating on her then-boyfriend-now-husband, is worthy of love and forgiveness. Because if that was true, what did that mean? Well, that meant that in the days and weeks that followed, every single time, which was constant, my critical voice showed up and said this is what you fucking get for what you did, sam. You get a shitty marriage, and I guess you'll just have to wait and see. If your husband forgives you or if you're dissatisfied at some point, maybe you'll leave. But I can't imagine that, because then I'd be nothing and no one. If that way of speaking to myself is reflective of a person who doesn't love and Shit, now I have to think about that. Now I have to think about shifting my critical self-talk to a compassionate self-talk. You know what, sam? Those things did happen and it really sucks, and your husband's definitely still angry about it. But those behaviors are not who you are. They are separate from your identity. And even though you did those things and he's not over it you actually deserve a big, beautiful life and a happy marriage.
Speaker 2:I had to practice coming up with what sounded real and true to me, not something I read off the internet. And once I came up with what that was, I'd had to double down on saying it and interrupting the feedback loop of self-criticism that was so unbelievably reinforced for decades. And so, as I did that work and, by the way, I was depressed every day in that apartment, I mean I woke up and it literally felt like a gray cloud was over my head, following me everywhere. But I didn't want to die. I just didn't know how to live differently. And this was the beginning of learning how to live differently.
Speaker 2:And in that six to eight month period, the miracle, after doing the amends on myself, was that I could hear the whisper of my intuition. She told me what my favorite color was. I didn't know, so I decorated my whole apartment with splashes of teal. It made me feel good in a really dark time. She also said, because I was working for someone else at the time, I hadn't started strong Heart Fitness yet.
Speaker 2:You know, sam, I think you'd be really good as a business owner and I think you could make a lot more money than what you're doing and help people way more than the way you're helping them. She just started nudging me, she started speaking to me and she sounded so different than my critical voice that's how I knew. She was clear, calm, curious and compassionate every time, versus the critical voice, which was just cerebral. Just cerebral, obsessive, mean, constrictive, gave me anxiety. There's a physiologic presentation of a critical part versus a compassionate part, and the compassionate part always seemed to rise up, and I love that. There's some research being done right now about, you know, our gut being like a second brain, you bet, and I really feel like my intuitive downloads come from there, and since there's trillions of bacteria inside of there, I don't think that's outside of the realm of possibility inside of there.
Speaker 1:I don't think that's outside of the realm of possibility, and the beginning of that relationship was the beginning of my life starting, and every good thing that has happened to me since, including the feeling of I'm writing a fucking book, has been a declaration from my intuition, which I now call God. You know, it's interesting. You just shared so much about your life and it reminds me quite a bit of mine. So I went through college, at UCLA, with an eating disorder. People always ask me what my addiction was. It was binge eating on food and I engaged in self-harm and too many relationships to count that were horribly unhealthy. And yet I got straight A pluses one year at UCLA. I didn't know they gave A pluses, but I literally got 10 A pluses my sophomore year at UCLA and I went off to medical school and same thing at UCLA. And I went off to medical school, and same thing self-harm, eating disorder, perfection, I agree with you, was my drug, and I just want to reflect back one successful person talking to another successful person, that I'm grateful that you and I have the social capital to be vulnerable with our own stories on behalf of those who can't, because when I listen to you writing your book, sam has been through a lot and by Sam. Having been through a lot and having emerged on the other side, sam can empower those who haven't emerged yet, and that's how I share my own life professionally.
Speaker 1:I got diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder from my time in the ER and I know there are thousands of healthcare workers nationally who feel that way but don't have a voice. So I am willing, as are you, to share my own dark secrets because it can help others. So I would love to read your book. I love the idea of taking a trauma-informed approach to our deepest struggles, because as I heard you speak, I heard adverse childhood experiences Yep, and we know how that affects us and looping together what you do and what I do. I incorporate fitness into my addiction treatment program. We're running a Spartan race with some of my patients this weekend and I incorporate trauma and a trauma-informed approach to everything I do. I actually have my personal CrossFit trainer and I send my traumatized patients to her because she has such an unbelievable understanding of trauma and how it affects the human body. So I got to say I love what you do and if only you were not in Thousand Oaks but Monterey, we could refer patients back and forth.
Speaker 2:Well, I think we still can. You know, a lot of people that I coach are virtual and when the pandemic showed up and I still had my clinic, the beauty of the model I had set up at the time, which was that I was so movement-based, could transfer on the computer right. So I was training people. So I have people on the East Coast that I'm doing physical fitness with over the computer, coupled with spiritual work, and they get all kinds of homework assignments. I mean, it's there's nothing like being in person, of course, and the level of care you can provide and connection you can make. But oh, it's, it's possible, and there's so much crossover that I think it would be crazy for us not to have each other top of mind for potential referrals. And, by the way, something that I've been doing, I have a really cool story I don't know if we have time for it that I could share with you. That takes us to current day.
Speaker 1:Let me just ask one question and then, yes, let's hear it. I came into medicine with no idea about life, trauma and PTSD and if two years ago you'd asked me about PTSD I would have been like, yeah, whatever. Having been diagnosed with it has really changed my understanding of how profound it is, and one of my patients was suicidal last week and I was super triggered and my staff in the office yesterday was great. They totally knew something was off. They checked in on me and, yeah, trauma is so profound physically, emotionally, spiritually. I have so many of my patients that are my age I'm 41, that live with chronic pain. I'm like we're missing something here and the trauma is so profound. So, as you go into your story, I'd love to just hear a little bit about how you are trauma-informed in your work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, here's a really great example. I like bringing up step two because I talked about it already in this podcast, right? So traditional step two says came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity. And I already talked about all of my objections, and I think, for the high achiever, the high functioning addict, especially if they're atheist or agnostic, same objections Please show me where I'm acting crazy, please. So then, what's a trauma-informed reinterpretation of that step that can actually land safely in someone's nervous system?
Speaker 2:Can I come to believe, when I'm stuck in a perfectionistic loop and I just want to control the outcome so badly, can I come to believe that a different part of myself, a more loving, surrendered, compassionate, curious, open-minded part of me, can restore me to a feeling of safety? Can I do that? How different is that? Because if we're looking at our perfectionist part as just a part of us, it's not all of us, it's a strong part, really reinforced part, culturally rewarded part. But if we look at it and we go, huh hey, perfect voice, I see that you're really showing up right now. You really, really, really want to control things. I'd love for you to tell me what you're afraid of and I'd love to just remind you that you've been working so hard trying to make me feel safe, and I get it and I thank you so much for your service.
Speaker 2:But right now you're actually really affecting my peace of mind, and so I'm going to let you speak your mind and I'm going to let you have a seat at the table. That is the boardroom of my life, but I capital S self, intuitive self, higher self. I'm just going to slide into the seat of CEO. I'm going to try to redirect this a little bit, because I really want to feel better than this Right, and so how different would my experience in recovery have been if someone gave me language like that?
Speaker 1:My perfectionism was my safety. It was my protection. Of course it was If I looked good and I could lift weights and I got straight A's. It had to be fine.
Speaker 2:Exactly Right. So every one of the steps can be repurposed in that way, and the idea is not to piss people off, although it will and it has, and I don't care. The idea is to cast the widest net on who I can help. Well said, the idea is to cast the widest net on who I can help. Well said, you know. And so, in the spirit of, I wish you weren't so far away, right?
Speaker 2:I recently met a guy who has 13 years sober, who is part owner in an outpatient facility in Texas, and he said you got to come and talk to our clients. They're heavily movement-based, they're really progressive. They do a lot of IFS work, right, internal Family Systems work, which is an amazing therapeutic modality which, by the way, was so much of what was happening in that period of darkness where I did the steps in this new way. It was actually a very therapeutic approach that we were using. I just didn't know it at the time, and so I'm thinking, wow, what an amazing opportunity. I can go and I can use the fact that I'm a PT and take these clients through a workout that's professionally guided and backed by science out, that's professionally guided and backed by science, I can stretch them and take them through a meditation, and then I can have a heart-centered talk to them, give them a copy of my book, give them a fresh way to look at the steps. But the last time I had been in Texas was when my sister died. The two places that I was in was Austin, and we also had visited San Antonio, my husband and I in that trip and so their treatment facility was in San Antonio and I thought, well, I can't think of a better reason to go back. Talk about PTSD and rewriting our story and creating new neural networks, about how my brain associates the word Texas inside. You better believe I'm going to go back so that I don't just have this horrific, traumatic memory and I also have a beautiful one that is a full-blown example of what I've done with my pain.
Speaker 2:Okay, so talk about rewiring. Right, it was intentional on that level for me to go, and here's what's so amazing. So he's giving me hotels to book. You know places to stay that are pretty close by and I had booked my flight. I was so sure I booked my hotel. My friend goes where are you staying? Two days before the trip, I look it up, I never booked it. I'm like fuck. So now I'm on Expedia like scouring, trying to find, and I book a hotel that gets good reviews. Not one of the checkout. One woman is busy. I go up to the other one. She takes all the information, asks me would I rather be on an upper level floor or a lower level floor? I think one other person has asked me that.
Speaker 2:Anytime I've stayed in a hotel I said I don't know, upper, thinking maybe there'll be a view G, gives me a key card, walks me to the elevator, which is also kind of rare. My sister passed away on March 13th of 2022 and her name was Jessica. This woman gives me the key card and she says you're on the 13th floor. My name is Jessica, let me know if you need anything. The 13th floor. My name is Jessica, let me know if you need anything.
Speaker 2:And immediately I'm just shot with the presence of God, the presence of intuitively saying yes to this trip, saying yes to this hotel, looking everywhere for miracles, and I'm thinking I'm going to tell this woman. I'm just going to tell her, even if she thinks I'm crazy, if I see her again right and later in the day she was still in the lobby. I went up to her and I said can I tell you something spiritual? And I explained what happened with my sister and that this was the first time back in Texas since then, sister, and that this was the first time back in Texas since then, the date that she died, her name and the key card she just gave me and the coincidence that her name is also Jessica and that I just wanted her to know that I'll never forget that moment. And her face dropped and she said can I go on a walk with you for a moment? So we go down the hall, she takes me into a corridor where the stairwell is to the hotel so we could be alone, and she starts crying and she says I can't stop drinking and I think God sent you here and I don't know how to stop and I don't know what to do. And I give her a hug and I tell her there is hope and she's going to have to fight like hell and that I'm going to go upstairs and get a copy of my book and I'm going to give her my contact information.
Speaker 2:And that's what I did. And that happened before I even went to the outpatient facility no-transcript. And I would have never had that moment if I wasn't brave enough to go back to the very place where the hardest thing in my life happened. And now I don't just have the memory of helping the clients in the clinic, I have that memory. I took a photo of the message I wrote to that woman. We took a picture together. I'll remember that on my deathbed. That's fucking powerful. That's the power we get back when we're willing to heal.
Speaker 1:Well said Well, sam. Regrettably I have to go see patients, but I have to say I already put your book in my Audible queue and I'm going to buy a copy of your book for my CrossFit trainer. And I actually just bought a little free library to put in my office for recovery books and I'm going to put a copy of your book in a little free library. That'll be our first book.
Speaker 2:Oh, to put in my office for recovery books, and I'm going to put a copy of your book in a little free library. That'll be our first book. Oh my God, that means so much to me, thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 1:Anything you want to leave us with as we talk about the life of someone who's been exceptionally successful, has fallen down a few times and is now as strong as ever.
Speaker 2:I got my first tattoo at 37 years old. I have more than one now, but it says vulnerability is your superpower, and so I'm going to leave people with that to sit on and please, please, please, reach out to me. I am a person who responds to my DMs. I do not have a bot or someone else managing my social media, so please contact me at Dr Samantha Hart Book a free discovery call. Connect with me. If something I said is piercing, it's for a reason. I'm here to wake you up and light your soul on fire, and I don't want you to ignore the call.
Speaker 1:With that, I thank you so much for what you do and for sharing your story with me, and many of my patients listen to my podcast and I will have some of my patients listen to this episode and I appreciate you for what you do.
Speaker 2:I appreciate you too. Thank you so much. I appreciate you too, thank you so much Before we wrap up.
Speaker 1:A huge thank you to the Montage Health Foundation for backing my mission to create fun, engaging education on addiction, and a shout out to the nonprofit Central Coast Overdose Prevention for teaming up with me on this podcast. Our partnership helps me get the word out about how to treat addiction and prevent overdoses To those healthcare providers out there treating patients with addiction. You're doing life-saving work and thank you for what you do For everyone else tuning in. Thank you for taking the time to learn about addiction. It's a fight we cannot win without awareness and action. There's still so much we can do to improve how addiction is treated. Together we can make it happen. Thanks for listening and remember treating addiction saves lives. Bye.