Slide: The Real Story of a Recovering Addict

Todd Welch – Gatehouse Graduate: I am an alcoholic and an addict and I’m  an alcoholic and addict who’s in recovery today.  And I started drinking and using drugs when I was twelve years old. My first drink was at age twelve at my brother’s wedding.  So they offered me a glass of champagne and I drank the champagne and then proceeded to have six or seven more glasses.

Photo: Life’s too short to drink cheap wine

Todd: It all kind of ends up and sort of culminates in this one experience that let me know that I was not in control anymore.

Slide: Todd went through several treatment centers searching for help.

Slide: While in a treatment center, Todd overdosed and went into a coma.

Todd: I was in six or seven treatment centers, the second to last treatment center I was in, I woke up in the hospital surrounded by my family and learned I had injected a cocktail of heroin and cocaine.

Photos: Todd in hospital surrounded by family.

Todd: Days before I went into this treatment center I was living in an apartment taping up the windows, ya know, putting all kinds of locks and barriers in front of the door, laying behind the couch in the dark and only periodically coming out to go get more drugs or to wander into some neighborhood where I should never be in the first place.

Photos: Todd with cigar, Todd high with friends

Todd: I continued to use after my stay in the hospital because again the obsession to feel differently, to feel high, to get out of myself. That became strengthened by the guilt, remorse and fear surrounding the fact that I almost died and that I had been nearly responsible for killing myself.

Slide: Todd’s parents felt helpless to treat his addiction

Todd: My relationship with my family was so strained when I got here, I mean, they were just fed up you could just feel it, it was palpable. I was so ashamed of what I had done and so guilty that it was uncomfortable for me to be around them.

Slide: Then they found…Gatehouse Academy

Todd: At the point that I came into Gatehouse, I was physically addicted to alcohol and opiates.  I entered through the ranch campus and finally I could just sit and at the end of the day, realize I had not done anything to hurt anyone and hadn’t used any drugs.  I was starting to like myself maybe even love myself and accept myself for who I was.

Slide: Gatehouse Academy’s long-term program gave Todd the time he needed to rediscover himself.

Todd: The reason why I have been able to get and stay sober is that I was here for an extended period of time.  I had the opportunity to not only learn what I needed to do but to live it out, to start really walking my talk.

Slide:  Gatehouse Academy changes Todd’s life.

Interviewer: Tell us a little bit about, tell the families that might be watching this video, a little bit about what your life looks like today? What your relationship with your family looks like today? And how that is different from what it used to be like.

Todd: That relationship changed and it has become something it never was in the first place, I mean, maybe it resembles the relationship I had as a kid, they tell me I was this happy kid, bright, talented outgoing and fun.

Photos:  Todd as a child

Maybe it resembles that relationship a bit, but differently because now, I am a responsible man which is what I should be. I shouldn’t be a kid anymore. We enjoy each other’s company these days.

Slide: There is hope

Todd: In our culture it is inevitable a person will try a drink or a drug and if they have the potential to be an alcoholic or an addict it is going to start them on their disease process. There is hope; I mean there is a way to turn your life around, and to make it, to clean up the past, to go on and live a productive life and you can even help some people, help them turn their life around. There is probably some guy out there right now who is waiting for your recovery.

Slide:  You can get help. Call Gatehouse Academy today. (888) 730.0905

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