Lou's testimony

from drug addiction, I am healing from major depression, I continue to struggle with codependency. Raised as an only child, my parents made me feel like I was a center of the universe. While I believed in God, he really was not part of the equation of my life. I was consumed by work, working day and night, running a huge office in hospital practice as a family doc, making house calls, getting involved in local politics, attending patients in nursing homes. I was full of pride, I was filled with my up-to-date medical knowledge and armed with modern wonder drug pharmaceuticals, and I thought that I could heal everyone from everything and totally on my own power. My addiction started innocently, I was suffering tension headaches, early in practice as a result of the stress that I was under, and the pharmaceutical companies were leaving samples of pain pills in my sample cupboard. Let me make it abundantly clear that the drug samples in a doctor's closet are not for the doctor's personal use. I found that those pain pills, known in relieving my headaches and settled my anxiety, but they gave me this tremendous energy and sense of well-being. One pill, sample pill, at the end of the day, then turned into 40 a day. Sample pain pills turned into prescriptions I would write to patients, they would fill and give back to me as I had this fraudulent give back scheme with patients that I trusted. Finally, when I ran out of patients that I could trust, I began to write and fill frauds on prescriptions and pharmacies throughout North Central West Virginia. At my worst, I was eating 40 lures at a day as I said, which was about 25,000 milligrams of towel every day. As a result of that title and all, I was taking an overdose every day. I should have died as a result of a scene of men for an overdose, but only by the grace of God did I survive all that. I became depressed and suicidal, estranged from my family. I tried everything. I tried going back to my Roman Catholic roots. I tried new age, crystals, massage therapy, energy, ricky therapy, having my shockers adjusted

and magnetic therapy and Tai Chi and nothing brought peace. I knew better, but I was perilous and then God did send help. One night, a very common serene nurse named Donetta met me in the hospital in the critical care unit. Her peace intrigued me. She shared with me a little bit about the faith that she had in Jesus Christ and I wanted what she had in the midst of my chaos. Within months, I accepted Christ as my savior on my knees in one of my exam rooms and after that, I was delivered from my hydrocodone addiction and that was over 23 years ago. I have a 23-year cellbreak every coin in my pocket by the grace of God. Donetta and I got married in one month after we got married, the feds raided my office. I had 15 agents from the DEA, the ATF, the FBI, the OIG, and the IRS raiding my office and it became really tough. They seized over a thousand patient charts, my computer hard drives and a lot of medical equipment. It became very difficult to practice medicine and then not long after I developed life-threatening, hemorrhaging, necrotizing pancreatitis, I ended up on life support. But through prayer, I recovered, but I faced felony charges and conviction that cost me my medical license. With no income and no job, I did minimum wage day job work through manpower and needing more income, I began to work as a pizza delivery driver for a local pizza restaurant. I have to tell you, I love pizza delivery. You can't go wrong with pizza delivery. You drive up to the house, you've got hot food in your bag. The kids are at the door screaming and it's a pizza guy. They're so excited. You give them the food they give you money and a tip and you drive away in your car. But I knew that God had done an amazing work in my life and I'd experienced his grace in a huge way because I can go to prison. That was another thing.

I got a merciful sentence in all that, but I felt a call in the ministry and I got a job as a director of our local homeless shelter to Clark's permission. at all because I didn't want to go to any meeting where I had to say hi, I'm Liam and addict, because I knew that I was not an addict. I just wasn't sure what I was, but I figured if the emission residents were going to celebrate recovery, I would go check it out. If it was good enough for them, it was good enough for me. And I got involved in CR, really embraced it and worked the steps, did a step study, and I came to understand my deeper struggles that I was showing drug addiction because deeper that I was having codependency with having people pleasing, not having boundaries saying yes to everybody, and deeper that I was dealing with anxiety and depression. And the heart of it all was just plain selfish. That's kind of how my onion peels. And that's why I learned through celebrate covering. And then in a whole series of opportunities where God opened doors, I began to be the ministry leader of our celebrate recovery at Clarkford Baptist Church, and we just celebrated our 14th anniversary. Really proud of that. We're in the inner city of Clarksburg, offering help and hope to folks that certainly needed. And I get to serve as a West Virginia State, celebrate every representative team lead, and we're leading a great group. I'm leading a great group of CR representatives who I really are passionate about this work that we do. And I get to distribute free Narcan in our community, and my perspective is keep people alive until they can meet Jesus Christ, but whatever that takes. And I was the director of our homeless shelter for 16 years, then I retired, then I came out of retirement to be the director of alcohol and drug treatment, residential treatment center. I found the work really grueling and difficult. And I got depressed and suicidal, but by the grace of God, a good psychiatrist, huge

mental health assistance from both the global team and the local team. I'm healing from that. It's been remarkable. And I get to serve as a spiritual leader of our Mayus community in North Central West Virginia and the vice president of our ministerial association. I mean, I'm still in the town where I offended, but God set it up so that I can still serve in a bigger, more important way. I say that God upcycled me. He didn't recycle me. The work that I do now is so much more important than anything I ever did as a family doc. Having a huge impact by the grace of God again, nothing that I did. I just showed up, but a huge impact on the recovery community in our area and really the world. I've been on documentaries and news clips from 13 foreign countries and all over the United States, again, talking about what Christ did in my life. Never would have had that opportunity if I were just still practicing medicine. So, it's just great to be able to use Salbright-Carrie as a tool to reach folks who need Jesus. I used to think the church was a museum, a warehouse, a showroom, or a country club. But I've come to understand that Jesus is a great physician. And Jesus is a great physician, then the church is his hospital for the sick. And in the hospital, CR is ER, Salbright-Carrie is the emergency room where folks can come in as they are and get the help that they need. And the church can step up and be who they are called to be. And one of the cool things that God allowed me to do is service Salbright-Carrie inside CRI at our local federal prison in Morgantown, West Virginia. How cool is God to allow me a federal felon to go into a federal prison and talk to other federal felons about Jesus Christ. It's been a grand opportunity. And I met some really cool people in there and I've seen God's hand move in people's lives.

Thanks for letting me share.