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When they heard the term recovering addict, I would say that they

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immediately hear excuses. Generally,
in my experience, what I get is

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people picture a transient, a hobo,
someone who's on the streets, dirty

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yucky drunks, junkies,

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crack heads. Some of the stereotypes
I've heard when it comes to addiction

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is that once you're an addict or you
admit to being an addict, you're

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untrustworthy. Generally speaking, the
addict portion of recovering addict

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, it's very negative. Overall, it's
hard for people that are not in

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recovery to change their view of
somebody. There's a lot of issues and

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there's a lot of misunderstandings of
what recovery and addiction really

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is. It's not this awful thing that
people might think that it is.

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We love to have fun. We're not
different. We're not uh we're not scary.

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You don't have to walk around
eggshells with us. The reality of what my

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life consists of, of being a student,
being in recovery, but then also

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being a veteran as well. Is that in
order for me to be successful, I have

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to be very involved. I call it staying
in the some of the hardest

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challenges in life I could ever
imagine is maintaining sobriety in

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whatever shape. That is one of the
other hardest challenges I could ever

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imagine in life is graduating from
university. There is no graduation date

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for being a recovering addict. The way
there might be for being a student.

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You know, it's something that you're
going to work at every single day

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for the rest of your life. My
particular struggle, that's not as much of a

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struggle anymore. But, you know, the
thing I have to keep check on is, you

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know, recovery, I tend to look at
every piece of my university experience

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as something to be grateful for
because where I was and where I am now is

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two totally different places. I
graduated with my undergrad and now I'm

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getting my master's degree and like
the feeling of being proud of myself

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and just being able to be successful
in school is, is an awesome feeling.

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We want to change the narrative about
how addiction is perceived and how

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recovery is perceived. Because there's
a lot of people who do not

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understand recovery who do not
necessarily know anything about it.

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We measure our community, not by whom
we exclude, but by whom we include

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and how they succeed. And I think that
stories of students in recovery

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goes a major way in proving that fact,
I want to help to create an

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environment, at least on this campus.
And the goal with all collegiate

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recovery I think is to do this for
someone who can, who recently got sober

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, come to school, have the best
support possible, get good grades, get

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their degree and move on to help
change the world. What recovery has done

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is it's given me my life back, I'm
able to go and attain things that I

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want to attain. So to have a community
on campus where I can be myself. I

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don't worry about the judgment and I
don't even have to explain why I am

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the way I am or what makes me me is a
gift that again is undescribable.

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That's what recovery rising is doing.
They're saving lives. Bottom lines

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, plain and simple and that is
incredible. That is absolutely incredible.

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Recovery has given me and get
emotional um more than I can ever imagine.