CHANGING THE CONVERSATION … Chris Herren, former professional basketball player and long-term recoveree of substance abuse, came to speak to the youth of Williams County about healing from their trauma instead of turning to drugs.
By: Anna Wozniak
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
anna@thevillagereporter.com
Students across Williams County got to join the over 2 million students that have heard from former professional basketball player Chris Herren.
He spoke on his journey in long-term recovery, as he has been doing since 2009. He shared how he has dedicated his life to helping to spread awareness on the disease of addiction.
Herren detailed that not everyone can walk away from the choices they make, and highlighted how everyone starts somewhere.
“We focus on the worst day, and forget about the first day,” he shared. He said that struggle is often part of the “why” people turn to drugs.
He went on to say how alcohol, cocaine, and heroin “completely changed” him. The son of a politician in a blue collar town, Fall River, MA, Herren grew up in emotional and mental turmoil, dealing with his parents’ divorce and standing in the shade of his brother’s shadow. He was first introduced to cocaine during his freshman year at Boston College.
As he played basketball, he couldn’t shake the huge fear of failure the limelight brought to him, and turned to drugs to cope with that fear.
After news spread of his failed drug tests, Chris shared how hard it was to know he was letting his mother down at the end of her life, struggling with addiction instead of excelling at school.
“Everybody wants to say how bad it got, and not the reason it began,” he shared that more parents need to be digging into the reason as to why their children would feel the need to turn to substances, and deal with the root issues of the substance use.
Everyone needs to try and make peace with their inner-child, and Herren detailed his own healing journey to the youths of Williams County in the hopes that they’ll make better decisions.
These speeches are intended to help facilitate drug use prevention, and Herren also runs a wellness center for rehabilitative purposes.