From Rock Bottom to Giving Back and Helping Others
- Apr 7
- 6 min read
***Content Warning: This piece includes themes of addiction, overdose, suicide attempt, and grief. If these topics are sensitive for you, please pause and consider your current mental health before reading, or skip this story.***
Sometimes the road that leads you home doesn’t look like a road at all. Sometimes it looks like a broken caravan on the side of a country highway and a stranger walking out of a paddock.
That’s how Matt’s story starts.
He didn’t wake up one day and decide to become addicted. How he got there is complicated and a story of its own. But eventually he was smoking, drinking, using whatever he could get his hands on, until one day you could barely recognise him. If you knew him and loved him, you’d still catch glimpses of the old Matt, but mostly he looked and behaved like someone else entirely.
One day he and a mate drove out to pick up an old caravan. Matt had all these ideas about what they could do with it. But halfway home the thing just collapsed. Too old, too tired, too broken for the road.
It stopped them dead in the middle of the road next to a driveway. Middle of nowhere. Paddocks and bush in every direction.
And then this man walked out of the paddock like he’d been dropped into the moment on purpose. He came over to see if they needed help, but it became clear pretty quickly he wasn’t just talking about the caravan. He could see Matt was in trouble: not the kind you can spot from the outside, but the kind you recognise if you’ve been in that sort of trouble yourself.
He told Matt he’d been lost once too.
And that there were people who could help.
Matt wasn’t ready to hear it.
He nodded, said thanks, and went right back to the madness.
Months later, when everything finally caught up with him and a big incident forced his hand, he remembered that man from the paddock.
He remembered the offer of help.
He didn’t want to go.
He fought it.
He delayed it.
He went in kicking and screaming on the inside.
But he went.
A year of detox, reflection, prayer, rebuilding.
And at the end of it, he stayed on as a volunteer.
One year turned into five.
And in those five years of volunteering, he met people and moments that he will carry for life.
Dylan
There was this guy named Dylan. A good man. A genuinely good man. Kind. Gentle. Trying so hard to get his life back. He struggled with addiction and meth, but he was a genuinely nice person.
He was six months into the twelve‑month program and doing well when he decided he wanted to leave. But six months clean doesn’t mean six months strong. He thought he was ready. He thought he’d done enough.
We tried to tell him:
“You’re doing super well. You’re progressing through the program nicely. But it’s just not enough time yet for you to have the stamina and strength you’ll need for real life.”
But Dylan was confident.
He was keen.
He left anyway.
Two weeks later he overdosed and died.
One day he went into the bathroom to use drugs and just never came out.
He was living at his mum’s house, and he locked the door behind him so it was his mum who found him.
It was just a simple, tragic mistake. He didn’t plan to overdose. He just couldn’t use the same amount he used to: his body wasn’t the same anymore after six months clean.
He used a little too much, and that was it.
It hurts, because Dylan was a good man who was doing good.
But he made a choice that felt convenient in the moment.
He thought, in his own wisdom, that he’d made enough progress.
It wasn’t intentional. It was just a mistake.
…..
Matt still thinks about him. Because Dylan wasn’t reckless. He wasn’t careless. He was just human. And humans always think they’re the exception. That they’re fine. That they’ve got it under control.
The Cowboy
Then there was the cowboy.
A real Australian cowboy: he looked, walked and talked like one: wore an Akubra, had bull‑riding titles from around the world, stood seven feet tall, chest like a brick wall, thick Aussie accent. Tough as nails. A very cool dude.
But he couldn’t stand Matt.
Not because Matt did anything wrong, but because Matt was 21 and in charge. And in the cowboy’s mind, that wasn’t how the world worked.
Whatever was going on inside him made him angry, and over time he just got angrier, until one day he said he was leaving. We offered him a lift, but he said no and walked out into the bush.
Later it became clear why he didn't need a lift.
The cowboy wasn't going very far.
He walked into the bush and tried to hang himself.....fortuitously the rope snapped.
He walked back with the mark still around his neck and sat outside until morning.
When we woke up, he asked if he could come back in.
We said yes. The process of recovery still far from done.
But the depth of despair and the anger came back inside too.
Eventually one day he was just gone.
Matt doesn’t know what happened to him after that.
But he knows what the cowboy taught him:
Pride isolates you.
Pride and arrogance can take you to the edge.
If you treat people badly because of your own issues or beliefs about how the world should work, it pushes everyone away.
Eventually there’s no one left.
That’s what pride does: it destroys every relationship around you.
Matt understood why the cowboy tried to take his own life…
Arrogance pushes everyone away.
And when you’ve burned every bridge, the silence gets loud.
.....
The thing Matt came to understand over those years is that none of us are as original as we think we are. Humanity has this shared memory: a kind of collective consciousness, built from thousands of people who’ve walked the same roads, made the same mistakes, fought the same battles. Rehabilitation centres have seen thousands of people come through over the years. That’s a lot of lived experience. A lot of patterns. A lot of wisdom about what recovery takes.
You can call it spiritual, or practical, or just common sense, but the truth is the same: we’re not smarter than the people who came before us.
Everyone thinks they’re the exception. Matt did. Dylan did. The cowboy did.
Most of us do at some point.
We’re all unique: different stories, different wounds, different ways of coping, but our frames are the same. We’re all human. We’re all vulnerable to the same temptations, the same shortcuts, the same belief that “I’ll be fine… I can handle it… I know better.”
But that one decision: “I’m ready, I’ll leave early, I’ll do it my way” cost Dylan his life. And even when it doesn’t take your life physically, relapse still kills things. It kills hope. It kills relationships. It kills the future you were trying to build. Nothing can grow in that space.
That’s what Matt carries with him. Not fear but respect. Respect for the process. Respect for the people who’ve walked the road before. Respect for the long race that recovery really is.
Because in the end, none of us win this thing by being special. We win it by being humble. By listening. By staying. By letting other people hold us up when we’re not strong enough to stand on our own.
Being a volunteer in a drug rehabilitation centre can be hard, but it can also be deeply rewarding. Matt owes his life to the people who came before him. And helping others in need, especially those standing where he once stood, is one of the greatest gifts he knows how to give.
......
If this story brings up difficult feelings, or if you’re struggling with addiction, grief, or thoughts of self‑harm, please take a moment to reach out to someone you trust. You don’t have to carry it alone. Speaking with a GP, counsellor, mental health professional, or a crisis support service in your area can make a real difference. Support is available, and you deserve to feel safe and supported while you find your way forward.
Comments