Warning signs your loved one may be abusing drugs: Insights from a grieving father

Grieving Out Loud host Angela Kennecke received a special invitation to the White House this year, where she met with some of America's top government officials working to end the historic drug crisis. The visit included discussions with prominent figures such as our nation's drug czar, the CDC director, and the Second Gentleman, Douglas Emhoff, Vice President Kamala Harris's husband. 

Angela also had the opportunity to connect with parents who, like herself, are grappling with the heartbreaking loss of their children to the fentanyl epidemic. One of those parents, Gary Carter, is the guest on this episode.

Join us in this very candid conversation as Gary reflects on some of the signs he may have missed when his son started experimenting with drugs. He shares the difficult moments and lessons learned as he watched his son battle substance use disorder, find recovery, and then, amidst the hope and joy--suddenly die from fentanyl. 

Despite his profound grief, Gary is on a mission to help others identify warning signs of drug use and substance disorder through support groups and Hope's Room. Prepare for an enlightening and empowering discussion as we tackle one of the nation's most significant challenges.

Transcript

[00:00:00] Angela Kennecke: Welcome to Grieving Out Loud. I'm your host, Angela Kennecke. This year, I received a special invitation to the White House, where I met with some of our nation's top government officials working to end the historic drug crisis. My visit included discussions with prominent figures such as our nation's drug czar, the CDC director, and the second gentleman, Douglas Emhoff.

who is Vice President Kamala Harris's husband. I also had the opportunity to connect with families who, like mine, are tragically mourning the loss of their children to the fentanyl epidemic. 

[00:00:42] Gary Carter: Instantly, when you meet somebody else who's dealing with the same thing, there's just an instant bond there. And I think a big part of that is because we have all this love now that has no place to go.

That and compassion are gifts that my son, you know, I always felt I was compassionate. But this is a gift my son gave me to be more compassionate. 

[00:01:01] Angela Kennecke: I always say I'm a better person now than I was. Not that I was a bad person, but I think I'm less judgmental and more compassionate. All of these things, right?

Because this is what this situation and this person teaches us. Join me in this very candid conversation as Gary Carter reflects on some of the signs he may have missed when his son started experimenting with drugs. He shares the difficult moments and lessons learned as he watched his son battle substance use disorder, find recovery, and then amidst the hope and joy, suddenly die from 

[00:01:36] Gary Carter: fentanyl.

There are definitely different stages of grief. I don't necessarily believe that you have to go through all of them. And one of them is anger. You know, maybe some anger towards, because they left you. I've never experienced that since Bryant passed. But I think a big part of that is because I spent so much time being angry while he was struggling.

[00:01:56] Angela Kennecke: Rather than succumbing to anger, Gary has channeled his grief into a mission. Helping others identify the warning signs of illicit drug use. and substance use disorder. His hope is that by doing so he can spare fellow parents from enduring this profound devastation.

Thanks for taking time to become more informed about the number one killer of Americans under 50, fentanyl. We hope this discussion leaves you enlightened and empowered to make a difference.

Gary, it's a pleasure to see you again. I just recently saw you in Washington, DC. We were. Both members of families invited to that White House meeting on International Overdose Awareness Day. Yes, 

and 

[00:02:51] Gary Carter: I'm happy to 

[00:02:51] Angela Kennecke: be here. I'm sorry for the circumstances that bring us together, though. It's really no fun, the fact that we're all united in this club that I say none of us ever wanted to join and we can never leave.

Right, 

[00:03:03] Gary Carter: right, right. The unfortunate thing, I, I have so many friends now and I've met so many amazing people. It's just a shame that this is what it took to meet them. 

[00:03:12] Angela Kennecke: Right, right. I actually just wrote a blog. I'm not special and neither are you because , there are just so many of us who have lost a child in this way and our stories, while they are all unique.

They share so many similar threads, right? And we have this connection now, and so many parents are trying to make a difference, trying to do something to stop it from happening to other families. Right, right. Well, let's talk about your son Bryant, age 25. Tell me about Bryant. Well, 

[00:03:41] Gary Carter: Bryant was your, I would, I would call him a high maintenance kid growing up, and I did have concerns because there have been addiction issues with alcohol and stuff in the family line.

And, uh, a lot of things I saw from him early on. You hope that you didn't make it a self fulfilling prophecy, but I honestly could see that I felt he was going to be prone to dependency. 

[00:04:00] Angela Kennecke: Can you give me some specific examples? Like, what did you think? Cause I was thinking about Emily. She was a high needs, fussy baby.

She was always a lot more work than any of my other kids. I don't know if that was any indication, but tell me what you, what you mean by 

[00:04:14] Gary Carter: Bryant. Yeah, it's a lot of that. It's, you know, he had to be constantly stimulated. Cutest kid in the world. And a lot of the things that he did, we laugh about now, fortunately we've gotten to a point where we can laugh about some of the memories.

But yeah, he was absolutely, he struggled to fit in with other kids, he kind of was one of those ones, kind of always had to have things his way. Maybe it doesn't paint him in the best of light, but he was also a sweet kid. But, you know, he would get frustrated easily. And then of course, as growing up, and he was one that was easy to push his buttons.

And the kids knew it.

[00:04:54] Angela Kennecke: Gary's concern deepened as his son entered adolescence. Bryant was still navigating some relationship challenges, and Gary couldn't shake the feeling that his son's choice of friends may lead him down a difficult path. You likely know, friends can have a huge impact on a teen's decisions, especially when it comes to using alcohol or drugs.

In fact, new research published in Drug and Alcohol Review finds friends still hold more power than influencers, celebrities, and other people on social media in shaping teens substance use decisions. I

[00:05:32] Gary Carter: could see as he was getting older, you know, who he was hanging out with, and it was all the people that I hung out with. You know, they just had different names. Tell me what you mean by that. Well, you know, this friend or that friend, you know, he might have a friend named Mark, but he was the spitting image of my friend Steve.

He hung around with the same groups. And I, and I gotta be honest with you, if the crisis we're in now was happening when I grew up, you know, somebody might be doing a podcast with my parent. 

[00:05:58] Angela Kennecke: Sure. Because you shared a lot of similar personality traits with your son. Maybe you were more of a rebel or more of a risk taker.

And you're right. Like, you go back 30 40 years, there wasn't the kind of risk that there is today with experimentation or even people who fell into Substance use disorder or addiction that that risk wasn't there the way it is today 

[00:06:20] Gary Carter: Right. He honestly got to a point where he even openly said if somebody dares me to do something I'm gonna do it He wanted to fit in that badly And, you know, we're like, Bryant, you can't be like that.

And we were really on top of them. And advice I would give to parents, too, with their kids now, is get on the same page as parents. And be consistent. I think that was one of the things that was difficult with Bryant was me and my wife didn't always see eye to eye on how things should be handled with him.

I don't think there's necessarily a right way or a wrong way. I think it helps to be consistent with the two of you. And that wasn't always the case. I 

[00:06:55] Angela Kennecke: think you're absolutely correct. If two parents aren't on the same page. So in my case, I was divorced from Emily's dad who suffers from substance use disorder, addiction issues.

And she knew exactly how to play that, you know, one of us against the other. And she was just looking to do whatever she wanted. So if dad said, come over here, you can do whatever you want. And I'm playing the bad cop. I mean, that did not work out well at all. 

[00:07:21] Gary Carter: And I, you know, I'm not going to say that me and my wife weren't always on the same page.

And we were both at the same goal. But I can see where, you know, the struggles that kids go through break up marriages, the loss can break up marriages, it is a family disease. I'm very fortunate my wife and I still maintain a strong relationship. But, I kind of fault myself for being a little too hard on them sometimes.

Like I tell people in grief groups, you know, that they have a lot of anger is basically considered one of the stages, you know. There are definitely different stages of grief, I don't necessarily believe that you have to go through all of them. And one of them is anger, you know, maybe because they left you.

I that since Bryant passed, part of that is because I being angry while he was struggles started 

[00:08:09] Angela Kennecke: when B Gary's father was battling cancer and his mother suffered from severe osteoarthritis and dementia. Doctors prescribed both of them the highly addictive prescription painkiller, OxyContin. 

[00:08:31] Gary Carter: One of us had to be there, either my wife or I, 24 7.

Kept everything under lock and key upstairs, but, I mean, with my father, with all his issues that he was having, I was giving him 26 pills a day between all his medications. So I would set up weekly trays and I had a system so that I made sure I didn't mess it up. Little did I know Bryant was coming down in the middle of the night down into the inlarm would go into those trays.

[00:09:00] Angela Kennecke: Gary first started realizing something was off when home health aides who were helping his parents began to notice that the oxycontin pills prescribed for his father and mother were mysteriously disappearing.

[00:09:16] Gary Carter: We did briefly have home health aides coming in and I'd occasionally get the call at work. Geez, you know, one of the Oxycontin pills, you know, his pill for noontime was not there. I started getting these calls regularly, and of course, I'm guilty, not my child, it's not the way I raised him. I was convinced that it was the health aid that was sneaking them out, cause, you know, this was when people had to fear leaving the pharmacy with their prescriptions because they might get held up outside for the prescriptions.

And of course, my parents were on such high, high doses, and it was just prescribed on a regular basis. Oh, did you lose it? Here, we'll give you another prescription. You didn't have to wait till it was needed to be refilled.

[00:10:00] Angela Kennecke: Gary believes his son began taking prescription painkillers not just because he was a risk taker and curious, but also because he was battling pain himself. He was grappling with psoriatic arthritis, which added another layer to his challenges.

[00:10:18] Gary Carter: Very painful, and he had it so severe that When they finally did diagnose it properly and they said you've got to go see a specialist and they sent them into Boston to taught person in the field and she took one look at him and said you're way beyond light treatments and they had to put him On chemo and then up until the time he died He had to go monthly over to the hospital for monthly infusions.

So he was self medicating, you know This was at a time. He's in high school now. He's interested in girls He's desperate to fit in and he feels like elephant man his appearance. Fortunat get that under control. A was having his regular inf by this point he's been s that. Plus there's no que Going on in the house taking care of my parents.

He had a very close relationship with them I'm sure that was difficult for him It was difficult traumatic for him to see what it was doing with to us

[00:11:21] Angela Kennecke: Bryant carried the weight of that trauma with him when he headed to college He was also secretly battling substance use disorder, but he didn't have access to his grandparents prescription painkillers anymore Plus it was getting more difficult to find Oxycontin on the streets Because the government had tightened the reins due to widespread misuse and addiction.

[00:11:45] Gary Carter: And his roommate turned him on to heroin. And it was probably towards the end of that year we started realizing, and he came to us himself. And said, I have a problem and this is, you know, after struggling for many years and us not realizing what was going 

[00:12:00] Angela Kennecke: on. You're not the only parent who didn't know what was going on.

In the case of my daughter, we were three days away from holding an intervention. We knew she was using, but we didn't know what, right? So I was thinking marijuana, Xanax. I knew about those things. I didn't have any idea she would have turned to heroin. No idea. I mean, I would never even would have imagined that.

So it's not something as a parent, you're really thinking your kid is going to do. Right. Exactly. 

[00:12:25] Gary Carter: Yeah. And we brought him home. Myself, I was in that denial, of course. You know, my wife really stepped up and started getting him to places and me, I'm like, no, this can't be happening. I mean, that total denial or something, he's going to outgrow, you know, he's going to smarten up.

And for years I was, you know, why can't you smarten? You know, why don't you see what's happening here? You know, when, when are you going to smarten up? You know, that was my attitude. You just stopped doing it. Right. 

[00:12:48] Angela Kennecke: Well, don't you think that's so much of this country? So many people think that way. I mean, That's just a prevalent thing and people do not understand the hold that these substances have on the person using them.

Right. 

[00:13:02] Gary Carter: Yeah, the stigma is definitely strong. You know, like I said, until the last year of my son's life, I didn't understand, you know, what the addiction was really all about. It took me that long, sadly, to then realize that he had to be stronger than I ever had to be just to get another day. And I can remember this is something I'll take to my grave.

Thankfully, nobody heard me say it, but I know I said it. I didn't say it to my son, he wasn't even home. But the first time I ever heard, he had to be revived with Narcan, and then refused to go to the hospital after. And, you know, this is after some time with the struggles and just not getting it and stuff, and I can remember saying to myself, just get it over with so we can all move on.

And, as we all know, we don't move on. And I'm glad he never heard it, but I know I said it. 

[00:13:50] Angela Kennecke: Gary, don't you think though that that is somewhat human nature to feel the point where you're so frustrated? The only answer seems to be like it would be easier. It's I think natural for your mind to go there And I'm not saying You ever want to think that you feel bad that you thought it obviously, but it seems to me like you just get to a point of desperation.

[00:14:13] Gary Carter: Absolutely. Yeah. And of course, anybody I'm sure will tell you that I would take that life back. Be going through that every day. Yes, 

[00:14:23] Angela Kennecke: if you could understand what that loss was really like, right, because you don't get it when you're in the midst of dealing with all of the chaos and the frustration. I mean, I never had that thought, but I do remember thinking my daughter is dead.

The daughter I had is gone, and that was when she was still alive. I felt like I'd lost my daughter, you know, and I think we've all felt, you know, that way, but yes, once you know, the pain of the true devastation of losing a child, you would, you would take them back. You would go through everything again, again, and again, and again, if you had to, but it's not until you've experienced that, that you really know it, right?

[00:15:04] Gary Carter: Right.

[00:15:09] Angela Kennecke: But Brian's last few years of his life weren't all struggles. In fact, Gary thought his son had turned a corner after doctors prescribed him Suboxone, leading to a period of recovery. 

[00:15:23] Gary Carter: Eventually, he did start doing very well with it. He met a beautiful girl. We ended up coming close with her family as well, and she didn't have issues.

She loved Bryant regardless of his issues. You know, we didn't even have the conversations with her. Do you really realize what you're signing yourself up for? And she didn't have an issue with that. He met her. through a church program that he started going to, called Celebrate Recovery. And he was actually good friends with her father, and that's how he met her.

So, fast forward a little bit, he's finally starting to do very well. Then next thing you know, we hear, oh, you know, they're having a baby. And like, are you kidding me? Are you crazy? Well, little did we know, they were trying. They ended up losing it, unfortunately. But then, later on And this is when we found out that they were trying as she was pregnant again.

And I'm like, didn't you learn anything from the first time? And he just looked at me and said, Dad, we're trying. We were trying to have one, and he asked her to marry him. She accepted that and they were gonna get married. I just 

[00:16:22] Angela Kennecke: bet at that point you felt like you'd been through the worst and things were Really looking up and things were gonna turn around and stay that way, right?

[00:16:33] Gary Carter: Oh, yeah, he was a totally changed person. He was excited, you know, he was getting married to a woman he loved He was so excited to become a father. Had never seen him like this before. And for the first time in a long time, we were not fearing that phone call.

[00:16:54] Angela Kennecke: Parents who face the anguish of a child battling substance use disorder can relate to the dreaded phone call Gary is referring to. A call that something terrible has happened. because of drugs. Now Gary did get a call saying his son was in the hospital, but it was for a surprising and unpredictable reason.

[00:17:16] Gary Carter: He had to have emergency surgery, have his appendix out. So we rushed over to the hospital and he is there. When we get there, he is frantic as they're prepping him. He said, they want to give me fentanyl. They want to give me fentanyl. I told them I'm an addict. I don't want it. I don't want anything. I'll go through it with nothing.

I want nothing. And he said, they won't listen to me. They say I have to have it. And he begged us to plead with him. So I'm pleading with the nurse, I said, My son's an addict, he's in recovery, I said, he does not want, and she says, No, we have to do this, we have to give him fentanyl to push the suboxone off his pain receptors so that we can control his pain.

They insisted on it. And of course, he's got to have the surgery and they're not going to take him into surgery until he signs on the bottom of that paper, basically letting them off the hook for anything that happens from that point.

[00:18:05] Angela Kennecke: Unfortunately, something did happen. Gary believes that fentanyl administered in the hospital was enough to trigger his son to relapse. Sadly, it's not uncommon. According to the National Institute of Drug Abuse, Approximately 40 60 percent of people who struggle with substance use disorder will experience a relapse.

The situation is particularly alarming when it involves opioids. Studies indicate that 80 95 percent will relapse in the first year. That's why Dr. Hanna Stotz DeVries says, It's important to know your triggers. We spoke with a psychiatrist who specializes in addiction care. You're 

[00:18:45] Dr. Hannah Statz DeVries: going to go back to reality at some point and how are you going to work with those triggers because, you know, we say people, places, things, and even just being around those people, places, things released just that tiny bit of dopamine that put someone back into the place and that can be the trigger.

[00:19:03] Angela Kennecke: Does that ever frustrate you? The fact that people relapse so frequently and often multiple times?

[00:19:09] Dr. Hannah Statz DeVries: I think it would be abnormal if it didn't frustrate me. I still can. We'll talk with patients that relapsing or even just having a lapse, that's part of the illness. I kind of will differentiate. This is probably a Hanna ism that is not part of recovery.

It's part of the illness or the disease. Recovery is that we're working really hard. You're looking at are you meeting with your therapist? Are we stepping you down from a 28 day residential to a three times per week meeting? Plus the AA meetings, strong family, psychosocial support, meetings with me, ongoing medication management.

[00:19:45] Angela Kennecke: Gary says his son was making recovery a priority and his family had no idea that Bryant had relapsed.

[00:19:56] Gary Carter: Within a couple of months he died in the bedroom next to ours in the middle of the night while we slept. To make it worse, it was the eve of his fiancee's birthday, so the next morning when he died on her birth, you know, we had to call her up on her birthday and tell her what had happened.

[00:20:16] Angela Kennecke: Here's what Gary believes happened. He thinks his son was trying to buy heroin, but it ended up being 100 percent fentanyl. Unfortunately, Brian's story isn't unusual these days. Drug overdoses are the number one killer of Americans under the age of 50. Many of those deaths are because people are unknowingly ingesting fentanyl.

And just a small amount can be deadly.

[00:20:42] Gary Carter: Of course, even if it was heroin, if he went back to using what he was accustomed to, after being clean for so long, then that was a danger. But he did also have some Xanax, but we don't believe it was a pill that he took. He was prescribed Xanax from his doctor. It appears that he had gotten straight fentanyl in place of heroin.

Do you 

[00:20:59] Angela Kennecke: think there's any way that the medical providers, from everything that you know now, could they have avoided that? Would there have been a better alternative for him when he needs emergency surgery? 

[00:21:10] Gary Carter: I think there's always better alternatives. We didn't always have these opiates, right? True, true.

And the other problem I have with the opiates, you know, of course they were Obviously marketed improperly. A lot of doctors were duped. Yes, there were unscrupulous doctors out there that ran pill mills, but also, I went through this with my parents. And, you know, never realizing myself, my parents were addicted to them.

I could tell when my father was due for a pill, I didn't have to look at the clock. And he had been on, sometimes, on such high doses, and it wouldn't work anymore that they had to detox him. He begged, begged to be killed. It was a dope sickness, and it was the real pain of withdrawal. Saddest thing is, if you look at my mother's death certificate, she was on high doses too.

Her cause of death is listed right on her death certificate. Failure to thrive. Geez, I can't imagine why she wasn't thriving, you know, being on all those heavy doses. My father had many cancers. The worst one, multiple myeloma. Six months before he died, you know, taking him to his doctor's appointments. And we went in and they did a biopsy and they came back and the doctor was flabbergasted.

He said, you're in remission. But unfortunately, prior to that, with all the medications he was taking, and especially the heavy, heavy doses of oxycontin and oxycodone, you know, he was not a drinker, but he had developed cirrhosis of the liver. So they had been monitoring that every six months. Well, the next time he went to have that monitored after finding out he was in remission, there was a major mass on the liver.

And that's what took him. So, you know, to me, personally, I feel like I lost three people to the opioids.

[00:22:46] Angela Kennecke: As Gary navigated through the overwhelming grief of losing three loved ones in such a short period of time, he found comfort in the outpouring of support from friends and family. He also decided to explore the potential benefits of joining a grief group. You found them helpful. Why? 

[00:23:06] Gary Carter: It was, you know, being with like minded people that have been through the same thing.

Seeing people at different stages kind of makes you realize, you know what, maybe I can do this. Obviously that first year is so difficult, you know, I refer to it as the fog that you're in. And then I find that the second year probably, and I hear this from other people too, sometimes the second year is more difficult than the first because you're out of that fog and now you know.

They're never coming through that door again. You know, I always felt that almost that whole first year. There were so many times where I felt there's still something I can do to get him back. As irrational as that sounds, I felt there's something I can do and I don't know what it is. I'm not doing it, but I can still get him back.

This can't be my reality. I do 

[00:23:49] Angela Kennecke: think that the first year is shock, right? And I think the second year is depression and just darkness, right? And then I believe the third into the fourth year is more of acceptance. You accept. that this is something in your life that you will carry forever. Right. 

[00:24:06] Gary Carter: You know, I facilitate some grief groups.

I co facilitate one with my wife, and I co facilitate one for men with another gentleman who does an outstanding job. You 

[00:24:14] Angela Kennecke: went from going to them to facilitating them, so clearly, you feel that they're very beneficial. 

[00:24:20] Gary Carter: They are beneficial, and, and I'll be honest with you, I know people who can't go to grief groups because they're too depressing for them, you know, and grief groups are all different from ones you may find when you like, because they're all different.

And facilitating a group, the thing about it, you think, wow, how am I going to do this? What should I bring up? Should I bring up a topic? You don't need to have a topic. It's not the sort of thing where, okay, today we're going to discuss this or that. The topic will find the group. You just give people that safe space where you can validate their feelings.

It's okay to not be okay, because that's the truth. And there are people out there that don't understand, that think, you know, after six months, why aren't you over this? Well, we'll never get over this. I have a perfect cure for grief. Stop loving them. Yeah, okay, and when you know you can't do that. 

[00:25:06] Angela Kennecke: Because they were our children, you know, and you love your children more than anything in the world, I believe, and you love them unconditionally, that you love them no matter what, at least you should, and I think that that is that love doesn't die.

It has to go somewhere, and I've always heard that grief is love with no place to go. So that's why when you're in a group of people, you all understand exactly how the other person feels. And you can be open and nonjudgmental. Because you're right there with them, whether they're three weeks out or three months or two years.

We all have been where that person is. 

[00:25:44] Gary Carter: Right. It's amazing the instant bond. You meet somebody else who's dealing with the same thing. There's just an instant bond there. And I, I think a big part of that is because we have all this love now that has no place to go. That and compassion are gifts that my son, you know, I always felt I was compassionate.

You know, this is a gift my son gave me to be more compassionate. 

[00:26:06] Angela Kennecke: I always say I'm a better person now than I was. Not that I was a bad person, but I think I'm less judgmental and more compassionate. All of these things, right? Because this is what this situation and this person teaches us.

Gary has shown compassion toward others. Not just by facilitating grief groups, but also helping organizations, such as Team Sharing, that increase awareness about substance use disorder. His latest endeavor is even more unique. He has transformed a trailer to resemble a child's bedroom, using it as an educational tool to teach parents how to detect signs of substance use.

[00:26:51] Gary Carter: And it has various things in it that would go unnoticed in a child's bedroom. Things that could be possible signs of substance use. As well as a lot of clever hiding things. places that we call diversion safes that would look normal in a child's room would go unnoticed. Basically to take parents through it.

We don't let any kids through it. Obviously they're smart enough. They don't need any ideas from us. Just trying to give them another tool in that toolbox to let them know the things that we wish we had known then. 

[00:27:16] Angela Kennecke: Give me an example of something that's in Hope's room. 

[00:27:19] Gary Carter: Paper straw wrappers. Not a big deal.

Okay. They're laying around in the room, you know, but I, I try to remind parents, well. That could mean nothing, but if you ask yourself, Do I see them very often with a drink with straws? And if the answer to that is no, then what are they doing with the straws? And they may see in the corner or something there's a straw that's been cut in half, and I, you know, explain to them they could be using that for snorting drugs.

Another thing is, you know, over on the desk, I've got a little tray, you know, little Bing there for odds and ends, and there's internal pen parts. It says you go into your child's room and you see that, yeah, maybe they were bored and just taken apart their pen out of boredom. Or maybe they're using the outside of the pen to snort drugs, or depending on what the pen was made out of, to fashion some type of a crack pipe.

Um, a shoelace out on the floor. Or maybe they don't see a shoelace, they see a pair of shoes, and one of them's missing a lace. But it could be that that lace is being used as a tourniquet for injecting drugs. Cotton balls. Sometimes they use cotton balls to filter the drugs as they're drawing it into the needle.

I do have a bent spoon in there. And I tell them, you're probably never going to find a bent spoon in your child's room. A very common sign that parents will tell you, and we went through it too, was where are the spoons going? Why are all the spoons disappearing and not realizing what was going on? Right, I've 

[00:28:31] Angela Kennecke: heard that before too, that spoons were disappearing in a friend of mine's house and it was heroin 

[00:28:36] Gary Carter: use.

Right. And, you know, I have big boxes of candy, you know, like you would get at the movie theater. I have a few of them scattered around the room, just to make a point, you know. And I'll say, why do I have candy here? Well, who loves candy? No mystery. Kids love candy. And I point myself out, and obviously I do too.

But who loves candy more is an addict. The sugars help with withdrawal. They help getting them between their maintenance doses. The sugars react in the brain very similar to like the drugs do and release chemicals that, so it helps them with withdrawal. So, I'm not saying if you see your kids eating it, you know, of course your kids like candy, but if all of a sudden you see a change in behavior where they're consuming a lot more, and they've developed this incredible sweet tooth.

My son had the, the sour candy, you know, the gummies and stuff like that, and he, I mean, just, Devouring it all the time. Then you may have to ask yourself, What's driving that? Is there something behind that I need to pay attention? And you call 

[00:29:34] Angela Kennecke: this mock bedroom Hope's room. 

[00:29:37] Gary Carter: Didn't want to call it Bryant's room.

This is not about my son. My son's not here. It's a way for my son to touch others. But Hope, it's a play on words. It could be a girl's name. But obviously the hope is that there's hope out there for others and we might help somebody. How many 

[00:29:53] Angela Kennecke: parents have been through the van? Well, I've 

[00:29:55] Gary Carter: had the trailer going for a couple of years now.

This is probably our third year. When we first got it together, then COVID hit, so we couldn't get it out there, but It's hard to say. I don't really count the numbers. We probably on an average at an event get anywhere from 20 to 40 people.

[00:30:15] Angela Kennecke: Gary believes it was that prevention work that earned him the invitation to the White House for International Overdose Awareness Day. We both sat in on the discussions listening to national officials talk about their efforts and plans to prevent more drug overdoses.

And they talked about the money that they're Putting toward this effort. What do you think it's going to take for this horrible crisis that we're in to end? 

[00:30:44] Gary Carter: Yeah, until they do something about these cartels. It's just not going to stop. Why would it? The best we can do in the meantime is to try to educate.

Like I said, give parents that extra tool. The unfortunate thing is with kids, you can't scare them into not doing it. Their brains aren't capable of being scared into it. It's something that served us well as a species for survival. Way, way back, but now it's killing us, is the fact that their brains are not fully developed.

It served us well because, for instance, the young men, well the one that went out, we sent them out to battle, we sent them out to hunt. You know, they may see what could happen, but it's that natural, it won't happen to me, because of the way their brains have not developed yet. And it served us very well as a species for survival way, way back.

It's not serving us very well right now. To get to kids, you've got to engage them in some way that's interesting to them, almost entertaining to them, to try to get a message across to them. 

[00:31:43] Angela Kennecke: That's what we're trying to do at Emily's Hope with our substance use prevention curriculum is we have an animated series, we have children's books, and we're trying to teach kids to protect their brains and their bodies.

We think kids will want to do that. So we're working really hard on that. I think between our efforts and your efforts to educate parents, I mean, I think it just takes all of us working in our own little corners of the world in a way, but also joining hands together, right? And taking what we're doing.

and making it available, you know, on a wider scale so that we truly can bolster these prevention efforts. So I really appreciate everything that you're doing, Gary, and thank you so much for joining me on the podcast. Appreciate that.

I want to thank you so much for joining me for this episode of Grieving Out Loud. You can get more information about Gary's efforts, including the Hope Room and the support group he helps facilitate by checking out the show notes on this podcast. And while you're there, Please leave us a positive review, five stars, and share it with your friends and family to help further our mission at EMILY's Hope to remove the stigma surrounding substance use disorder through awareness, education, and prevention.

Thanks again. Until next time, wishing you faith, hope, and courage. This podcast is produced by KC Wannenberg King and Anna Fye.