My name is Jim Reidy, and I’m in recovery I have been since March 4,2006. I am a father, a husband, a mentor, and an Interventionist. I never would have imagined, in a thousand lifetimes that I would become either a mentor or an Interventionist. I guess I am one of the lucky ones. I am not one of the lucky ones only because I survived my own battles with addiction, I am because I get to witness miracles almost daily. There is a reason why they say that “The greatest weapon against the disease of addiction is the recovering addict.”
That reason is empathy the wordless language that speaks from one addict or alcoholic to another saying; “I may not have been where you’ve been, or done what you’ve done, but at one point or another I have felt what you’ve felt.” “You are not alone.” I believe that the life, the profession of an Interventionist is more of a calling and purpose than a career of one’s own choosing. I didn’t choose this line of work, it chose me. I hope that in the lines that follow these I will accurately portray just how much this life means to me, and why it is that I keep doing what I do; in spite of all the heart ache, sleepless nights, and turbulence that accompany it.
Throughout my career of interventions, which currently exceeds four hundred, I have been attacked with a baseball bat, knives, and even a gun at one point. It has not been some walk in the park trying to love someone who doesn’t even love their self. I always have kept in the back of my mind, going into every family session and intervention, that I am saving Jim Reidy. That this person, this alcoholic, this drug addict, is someone’s baby. And they deserve a shot at a new life. That has kept me going every single day.
Addiction Treatment Group
