Addiction held the family hostage for so long.
Teddi Adams didn’t want to believe it. She could not believe that her son, Trevor, could be caught in the grasp of addiction.
Even with the strange smells coming from his room, the drug paraphernalia, and the multiple arrests, she didn’t think substance use disorder had infested her family.
She didn’t want to face the shame.
Only when she did could she help Trevor with his recovery.
“Addicts aren’t terrible, bad people. No one chooses to be an addict. It’s in everyone’s backyard; it doesn’t discriminate, it doesn’t know age or race or economic status,” said Adams, who works as a social worker. “It finds you even if you’re not looking for it.”
Adams is using her own experience, and that of her son, in the hopes of reaching others throughout the community who are searching for answers about substance use disorder. She had organized a Recovery Fair — the first of its kind in Franklin — from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday Oct. 1.
The focus of the family-friendly free event is to raise awareness about addiction, offer support to individuals and family members impacted by it, remove stigma about substance use disorder and provide resources from a wide variety of local organizations.
“In Franklin, addiction is a shame thing that you push under the rug. It’s a problem; I lived that life,” Trevor Adams said. “I see a need, and I’d like to see a change. That’s where we got the idea to do one here.”
Addiction has been at the center of Trevor Adams’ life since he was 16 years old.
“It started dabbling with marijuana, then it quickly escalated to meth and heroin. From there, in and out of jails and prisons and rehabs,” he said.
His mother and his father, Charlie Adams, started noticing warning signs — finding items in his room that she hadn’t bought him and she knew he couldn’t afford, being caught with friends breaking into cars, growing marijuana in his closet. He was caught by police with drug paraphernalia and alcohol bottles in his car when he was underage.
Trevor’s life oscillated between successes and succumbing again to addiction. He found a job, had his own home and was working to earn his high school diploma. Then, he started suffering seizures, intensified by the drugs he was taking. He was found passed out in his car, a bottle of pills in his hand.
He was arrested, then agreed to enter an addiction treatment program. But after one day, he checked himself out. Subsequent attempts at treatment didn’t work.
Multiple times, Trevor Adams overdosed, only to be brought back to life with naloxone, which reverses the effects of an opioid overdose.
“Addiction is a monster. It’s bigger than what one person can handle by themselves,” she said.
Throughout the ordeal, Trevor Adams has been through multiple treatment programs, medication assistance, out-patient group therapy, a 28-day rehab facility, multiple acute stays and detoxes.
For 10 months, he was sentenced to prison, where he completed the Purposeful Incarceration program, a partnership between the Indiana court system, the parole board, and the Indiana Department of Correction that can modify a person’s sentence upon their successful completion of addiction treatment.
“He did it all,” Teddi Adams said.
To cope with the stress, she started writing about her experience.
“I am the mother of an addiction. I am the mother of someone who intentionally and deliberately puts poison into his body and his system on a regular basis to escape his own reality. I am the mother of a person who allows that poison to control every aspect of his life,” she wrote in 2018.
Her post on Facebook was shared hundreds of times. Teddi Adams realized how important it was simply to bring up the issue of addiction in public.
“They needed a voice — not only the people in the throes of addiction, but their families as well. There is so much stigma, people are afraid to raise their hand and say they need help too,” she said.
Trevor Adams was released from prison in January 2020, right as the COVID pandemic was about to hit. The stress of that uncertain time caused a relapse, and he was again arrested.
“He was convinced he was done. He’d never get to see his baby go to school, he would never see his baby graduate. He was looking at years and years,” Teddi Adams said.
But he was dealt a “gift from God,” Teddi Adams said. He was accepted into the Wheeler Mission Hunt Training Center program — a long-term residential program offered for those struggling through addiction, held on a 285-acre property near Bloomington.
The courts allowed him to take part. Trevor Adams left for the program in September 2021, and it was months before his family was able to make contact with him.
“It took me out of the world for nine months, got me out of my head and away from all of the distractions. I built a relationship with God and reformed my thinking through the Scriptures. I’m trying to live my life now,” he said.
The transformation was stunning.
“I didn’t even recognize him anymore, physically, but it was more than that. It was everything. Spiritually, he had changed so much,” Teddi Adams said.
Now 25, Trevor Adams is at Chain Breaker House, a residential center for addiction recovery in Columbus. Through his work with Chain Breaker, he does community outreach and shares his story. Earlier this year, he invited his family to attend Hope Fest with him in Columbus.
Looking around, with the different resources and information all in one place, Trevor Adams asked why Franklin didn’t have a similar event.
“I told him I didn’t know, but somebody should do it. Then the longer I sat there, I realized, yes, someone should do it — I should do it,” Teddi Adams said.
In planning the Recovery Fair, Teddi Adams reached out to organizations providing different types of treatment for substance use disorder. She also contacted groups that work with the kinds of issues triggering substance use: lack of housing, lack of employment, no insurance.
The Recovery Fair will have information on all types of issues, as well as testimonies from people who are in recovery. Free food and activities for kids and families will be featured, and there will be give-aways throughout the day.
“The whole point is support and awareness. I want people to know that there are people in this community who can help, who want to help,” Teddi Adams said. “Telling our story will help other people realize that it can happen to them, it can happen to anyone. And if it is happening to you, you’re not alone.”
