My life has been far from what my appearance lead people to judge.

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I started my journey in the projects of Baltimore Maryland. Born to a life of crime, drugs, homelessness, instability, and abuse. After ten years of this life I dropped out of school to practice breaking into homes with an introductory to selling drugs, while working from time to time on the side as a roofers assistant to one of my biological mother's boyfriends. Soon, my grandparents stepped in and at age 13, after having moved over 32 times along the East Coast, I was then put into the foster care system one afternoon at school during recess, without warning. I was up next to the plate for kickball, but never got my kick...

 

Basketball kept me on the straight and narrow though Middle and High School, supplying me with hopes of a better future. However those hopes soon diminished by my Senior year, leaving me lost and without an identity. Then came the drugs, and the re-entry into the world I was plucked from at 13.

By 21 I was into petty crime, dealing, and had a half-gallon vodka a day habit, along with heavy drug usage from everything short of crystal meth and intravenous heroin.  I stayed in and out of jail, and with constant brushes with death and overdoses. Living my life back in the same hood and ghetto environments I came from as a child. The place I felt I belonged.
By my late 20's I hit rock bottom. I had burnt all bridges, I was homeless again, no money, no job, no hope. To make it worse, I was then not able to stop drinking even though I wanted to at that point, because my body had become physically dependent on alcohol. At this point reality hit hard, I was now truly a prisoner even though I was a “free man” (at the time of that realization at least). So I made the most important decision of my life, by putting myself into rehab in NYC. I did 1 month for every year I was addicted, at a free in-patient homeless shelter rehab, equaling 9 ½ months.

 

Due to flaws in the shelter system, I was left back on the street again after completing the programs, where I then spent the next six and a half months between Manhattan, Brooklyn, and the Bronx. I slept on floors, in stairwells, parks, or a friends’ couch. During this time I was attending acting school full time where I auditioned for and landed a full scholarship, then on days off I worked restaurant jobs to afford myself a small 8x7 room in West Harlem, for $550/month in a 5 bedroom railroad, plus extra for utilities and cleaning supplies. It was the best feeling ever. This may sound trivial, but when a person hits a point like that in their life, you learn to be grateful for the smallest things, even if they come in less ideal or uncomfortable settings.

 

Feeling the need to contribute back to the shelters, I began getting involved in areas of volunteering in these specific kinds of sectors through city organizations. Soon I was put in contact with the head of a not for profit [Jake Keonigsdorf Foundation] that raised money for addicts to go into rehab in 2013/14. I did work such as being a speaker at events, research for new rehab shelters that offer the most for free, the best support systems, visiting rehabs and speaking with coordinators, and began collaborative connections. I worked with the Keonigsdorf Foundation up to 2016/17.

At a point in 2014 I was offered a book deal based on where I came from and to where I was then, as well as they offered me my own acting studio, to work with troubled youth using therapeutic acting and expression, in Philadelphia Pennsylvania. I turned down the offer due to the fear of success, and a conviction that I was not far enough along in my own recovery to guide others yet.
 

After finishing my classical training in 2017, I began a youtube playlist from 2017 - 2018, discussing my entry into rehab and how I got to where I was at that time. Offering addicts a general roadmap of how I got clean, and letting them know they can do the same.

 

To further my passion in helping guide those coming from where I came from, believing that everyone should get a chance at sobriety, I have put together a seminar course, based from decades of real-life experience, 14+ years of successful sobriety, knowledge, and education. To help the loved ones of addicts understand where the addicts mind is at, how to help them, and how we can help ourselves while enduring the stresses of caring for someone who is sick with the disease of addiction.