Family hopes overdose tale helps others

CHILLICOTHE — Shauna Patrick thought her husband, Michael Todd Patrick, was turning the corner on his drug addiction the night of Jan. 5 — although something didn't seem quite right.

It hadn't been a normal night. Michael had arrived home that morning from Tennessee, where he had gone with his brother to visit his mother. Later in the day when Shauna went to get groceries, he told her he wanted to go and get some marijuana. He was gone much longer than she had expected and when he finally arrived home he spent a long time just sitting in the driveway.

"He just kind of broke down," Shauna said. "He said, 'I'm just thinking about all the things I've done wrong.'"

When he came inside, he kept apologizing to his wife, saying he'd messed up again, and then he wanted to talk to his mother on speakerphone with Shauna in the room — something he'd never done. That was when he told his mother about some things that had happened to him as a child that haunted him throughout his life. His mother, who Shauna describes as "a good, Christian woman," and Shauna, who has recently started attending church, let him know that holding onto his anger was not helping him and that forgiveness was the path to take.

"He said, Mom, will you pray with me, and she prayed with us and he said, 'I want to get off the phone and spend some time with Shauna now,'" she recalls. "We had a beautiful evening. I didn't go to sleep until probably 3:30 or quarter to 4. His brother had been staying with us and his brother told me he had talked to Todd about 5 o'clock because Todd was looking for his heartburn medicine. I woke up at 7 and found him in the bathroom."

She tried to administer Narcan, but it was too late. On the morning of the same day her husband was scheduled to attend his first drug counseling appointment, he was gone.

Even though she recognizes that her family's story is not dramatically unlike many others who have fallen victim to the heroin epidemic across the region, state and country, she is hoping that by sharing her experience, it may lead to someone else recognizing a problem in a loved one or helping a family member avoid the same fate.

Shauna doesn't believe someone wakes up one day wanting to become an addict. It usually takes time, she said, and her husband of 18 years was no exception. A 1992 graduate of Paint Valley High School who performed well on SVC championship football teams in 1989, 1990 and 1991, Michael suffered from chronic pain as the result of his football career. To deal with it, he had been on Oxycodone for a lengthy period of time. When problems with the pills started becoming apparent, Shauna said the doctor cut off his supply cold turkey.

"He struggled with admitting he had an addiction to them because it was always, 'I'm in pain, I'm in pain," she said. "I never questioned that he was (in pain), but it was hard for him to comprehend that the pain pills were making his mind think his pain was worse than it actually was."

Losing his supply of pain pills, coupled with uncovering some repressed memories from his childhood that contributed to troubles sleeping and night terrors, helped lead him to the heroin that would cost him his life.

Shauna said she chooses to remember her husband for the man he was when the impact of the drugs wasn't so significant — the man who worked alongside her serving a holiday meal at the Alvis House or who volunteered time to help with the annual holiday giveaway done by Zion Baptist Church. One of the traits she admired, however, his intense loyalty to his lifelong friends, also should have been a red flag. She said he had seen several of them die as the result of the drug scourge and that he would not pull himself away from situations that were not healthy for him.

That type of cycle is just one thing families should watch for, she said. Paying attention to how someone is dealing with both physical and mental pain and changes in behavior may also help families make a decision on encouraging a loved one to get some counseling. Shauna said it's a fine line to walk between tough love that helps and tough love that may push someone away, but it's a line that has to be walked to possibly save someone's life.

She also wants members of the community to recognize that the face of heroin and other drug abuse is not always what you may first think — that there's no stereotypical candidate for drug abuse as it has reached into all backgrounds and income levels.

"(Michael) was known for his fearless attitude and ability to fight whatever battle he was given," Shauna said in an obituary she had written for her husband. "He struggled for several years with addiction to pain pills and like so many do, fell prey to the heroin epidemic that has struck our country. He was not proud of this and he was trying to make the turn to recovery. ...

"His family asks that if anyone has a loved one who is fighting addition, please do everything possible to be supportive and guide them to rehabilitation before it's too late. That one last time (of use) could be exactly that, the very last time."