LISA TALLYN, Staff Writer

Tom Regehr spent most of his 30s estranged from his family, drunk and
homeless.

But that life is worlds away from the one Regehr, 49, is living today.

It was not an easy road for the Georgetown man, but he has now been
sober for 12 years. He lives in a comfortable home, is reunited with his
family, is in a relationship, and is responsible for launching a support
group that has helped change the lives of many others struggling with
addiction.

Regehr’s dramatic transformation is being recognized at a gala dinner in
Toronto tomorrow (Thursday) by the Centre for Addiction and Mental
Health Foundation when he will be presented with a 2007 Courage to Come
Back Award.

The award recognizes the achievements of people across Ontario who have
shown courage and determination in the face of mental illness and
addiction. The winners have achieved personal victories and now serve as
models of hope and inspiration for others facing similar circumstances.

Regehr began drinking at the age of 14.

He was a party guy.

“Even in high school I was the guy who emceed the assemblies. I was the
rambling guy,” he says.

“My name was ‘Rambling’ because if I had money I would do five bars a
night. I drank all the time. From the age of 22 to 28 I probably would
have blown over (the legal limit) 24 hours a day.”

Regehr’s drinking was part of the “dance of distraction”– a way of life
he adopted to avoid facing his mom’s mental illness that surfaced while
he was in Grade 10. At about the same time, he also had to cope with the
fact his sister, who was a surrogate mom and his best friend, moved out
of the house.

“I was moving too quick, always telling a joke, being a clown, driving
too fast, working two jobs,” he says.

He says the “dance” became more intense after his girlfriend ended their
three-year relationship while he was in university studying landscape
architecture. His drinking was one of the main reasons she left.

Regehr soon turned to drugs as well– cocaine and Percodan.

He was making good money working in landscape design and construction,
but spending it as quickly as it came in on booze and drugs.

“It was serious partying. I could spend $1,000 in three days. I didn’t
know where I was going to wake up.”

Regehr did his first homeless stint at the age of 22. After drinking
away all his rent money, he ended up living in his car for three weeks.

“The booze was more important than the bed.”

And he was having fun, but he says “everything went for a dive when I
was 31.”

He says it was then that his mental illness started to surface. At the
time he was living with a friend in a rented house in Brampton.

Every three-and-a-half months or so he says he would have an “episode”
and end up lying on the floor naked and sweating for hours. One time he
crawled into a cubbyhole naked for two days.

Regehr’s roommate couldn’t deal with his odd behaviour and kicked him
out, starting a cycle of several years of living on the street, in
stairwells, friends’ couches, a shelter and even jail in various cities.

During that period, he says he applied for welfare many times and would
find a place to live only to lose it three months later.

His alcoholism remained a constant and he turned to fraud to make some
money.

Regehr had himself convinced that the current state of his life was just
a brief down period.

He has few memories of those years.

‘It’s like a state of shock where memories don’t form,” he says.

But he does recall having a lucid moment one day while he was on
Toronto’s Spadina Ave. He was shocked to find himself there.

“I thought f…, you’re a homeless dude.”

And he says he knew “real hunger.”

A year ago he was walking on a Toronto street past an alleyway when his
chest and gut tightened. That memory still stirs strong emotions in Regehr.

“The voice in my head says, ‘There’s home,’ and it scared me. This whole
flare of anxiety came back.”

His alcoholic lifestyle was taking a toll on his health. Regehr’s
intestines began to deteriorate and he was passing nothing but blood and
water for months. He had also lost his self-esteem, deeming himself
unworthy of being human.

At 37, Regehr turned a corner after being “shown some compassion and
understanding from some people.”

He says, while standing by Brampton City Hall one day a woman offered
him an empty apartment in her home if he would paint her garage. He took
her up on her offer.

Regehr can pinpoint the very moment he decided his life needed to change.

He was lying on the floor in the Brampton apartment, coming to after
blacking out yet again on booze and pills. He says he couldn’t move, and
was overwhelmed by loneliness.

“I realized if I can’t pour a beer or put Percodan down my throat, this
just wasn’t working for me.”

A short time later Regehr made a phone call from a nearby payphone to
the Region of Peel and told the lady on the other end of the line he was
an alcoholic and needed help.

Unlike the times he had reached out before for help, this time it
worked. He credits his success to a then new approach to dealing with
addiction known as harm reduction– kindness no matter what the person
chooses to do.

At 38 he attended various detox centres including a 28-day in-house
treatment, a three-week day program, and Alcoholic’s Anonymous. He
hasn’t taken a drink or done drugs since.

But after five years of sobriety Regehr found he was still struggling.
He couldn’t keep a job, a relationship, or a home without help. He still
hadn’t received help for his emotional pain and began two years of
difficult, intense trauma healing with a private therapist.

In 2000 Regehr started a self-help group called Come And Sit Together
(CAST). The group is a combination of all the best parts of groups he
had attended and Regehr says it’s not only for alcoholics, but for all
people who want to make big changes in their lives.

The group received Trillium funding in 2003 and today CAST meetings are
offered in Clarkson and Brampton.

CAST Canada, which Regehr now devotes himself to full-time, continues to
expand with a mission in reducing mental health and addiction stigma and
has offered 40 training events for professionals throughout Ontario with
more than 500 participants including shelter and housing workers,
lawyers and police officers. Regehr has plans to expand the sessions to
the corporate sector.

CAST Canada also has a high school visit program, and Regehr has spoken
at many schools in Halton and Peel.

Regehr is also involved as a representative and advisor of many mental
health organizations including Mental Health Works Ontario, the Ontario
Substance Abuse Bureau and is currently a working group member for the
development of an Ontario Drug Strategy.

“I have personally witnessed the impact Tom has had on individuals and
agencies in a rural setting, as well as on local and provincial levels
in other settings,” says Suzanne Witt Foley, his nominator for the
award, and friend.

Regehr couldn’t be more thrilled and proud to be receiving the Courage
to Come Back Award. Five others will also be given the award.

“In our world, it’s the Oscars. There’s nothing comparable in the
country,” says Regehr.

Lisa Tallyn

“It is the Oscars of our world, there’s nothing bigger” says Tom Regehr about winning the Courage to Come Back Award from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH).

The night of the awards dinner there are more than 800 people in a hotel ballroom in downtown Toronto. People are elbowing each other to take pictures during photos sessions. Regehr and the other winners appear in every major paper and some on TV and radio. The ceremony was broadcast on local cable and CAMH raised more than $500,000 that night.

“I was very proud”

From his hotel room on the 27th floor at dawn the next day, Regehr could see the neighbourhood where he was homeless 14 years ago.

Six months before the award dinner Regehr is helping Suzanne Witt-Foley to write the nomination. Suzanne, a project consultant with CAMH, has worked with Tom in the community. This is the first time he has seen his story – an arc Regehr traces from childhood trauma, through academic and career success, to homelessness and addiction, and back to a meaningful life today as a leader in the addictions education field, drawn out in detail.

“Looking at the whole story all at once, was something I had never done before. I cried and cried.”

Regehr remembers being a quiet child, he did nothing but ride his bike, had few friends and did no school work. Looking back he assumes it was in response to some trauma at home. In grade 10, he discovered that getting attention was a good way to avoid the feelings. He became very active and like many kids, he also discovered alcohol.

“I was loud, drove too fast, drank too much, had a lot of jobs come and go – just like a lot of kids but I did not stop.”

Regehr completed “three good learning years” at university studying landscape architecture but didn’t graduate. Pushing his family away, he hung out in bars and worked too much. His career flourished as he was working jobs where it was common to drink during work hours.

“It was landscaping – we drank on the jobsite and later had meetings in bars and strip-joints, so staying drunk all the time was a way of life.

By age 29 he was working as a freelance project manager, making good money that he spent on booze and cocaine. At age 31, after being kicked out of the nice home he was sharing in a leafy Brampton suburb he experienced his first stint of real homelessness.

“Things get foggy here, how long I was on the street, where I slept, my memory is not clear.”

Was it hard being homeless?

“Well, people always talk about the cold and hunger. For me, the cold and hunger were nothing. Have you ever gone without food for 3 days? You get a nice, light headed buzz, then it seems to go away. And, unless you’re dumb, it’s easy to not freeze.”

So what was the hard part?

“I was unbearably lonely. You watch people smile and touch and talk, knowing somehow that will never be you. You will never fit in, never get a hug, never feel loved. It tore at my chest like fire.”

What changed? One spring, Regehr had come back to Brampton, his home town, to look for work as a labourer. He was standing on the street waiting for the soup kitchen to open when an old friend walked by. She happened to have an apartment that needed some work; Tom was able to stay for 3 months in return for fixing it up. Why did that work?

“She was very firm with the arrangements, she treated me like a competent adult, I felt compelled to act like an adult – it felt good! While I was there, I noticed that the drinking, drugging and running away weren’t working anymore. No amount of booze, painkillers or running kept the pain away. I asked for help. This time it worked.”

After many months of deliberation, Regehr checked himself into a detox, followed by a 28-day treatment centre. He then did a 3-week day program, a year of after care and started to go to A.A. several times week.

“It was hard, but I graduated all the addiction programs and stayed clean. I did not drink again.”

Nevertheless, after several years of living clean, things were not all good.

“I couldn’t keep a girlfriend, I had no friends, couldn’t work a regular job. I had the attention span of a gnat and was only able to keep a roof over my head with the help of my family.”

‘Sober’ but far from happy or functional, after 5 years clean, Regehr was diagnosed by several professionals as depressed.

“I went looking for a general therapist, someone to help with the larger issues. I found Johanna Gabel, in Toronto. There were bumps in the road but she was able to help.” Regehr went to see her every two weeks for more than two years. “In my view she did two important things for me; she helped me deal with the massive emotional build-up in me and she taught me to accept the goodness in the world”

“Other people call it ‘trauma therapy’ but it sure didn’t feel like anything that scary or grand with her. Her demeanour, right from the start, was that what I needed to do was hard work but she was down to earth in her approach in a way that I didn’t get from other professionals. After I got comfortable with the ideas, she sent me home to read Judith Hermann, a pioneer in the field of dealing with past trauma.”

There were many stages to this healing process but when it was done, Regehr felt quite different about things:

“It was glorious! Don’t get me wrong, it was hard, much harder than getting sober, the demons of trauma aren’t visible like a bottle – but when I was done it was fall, and I remember I was thinking more clearly, sleeping better, my attention span grew and I for the first time I was able to make friends and keep them” It also helped professionally. With Johanna’s support, he was able to get – and keep – a regular job for more than a year. A lifetime first.

In 2000, Regehr started a self help group called Come and Sit Together (CAST). Talking to social service agencies about the group, he found that the workers always had more questions about his own journey than about the group. Soon he was regularly speaking at workshops and conferences.

“I loved it. It went right to my head, I was going to get an agent, a retail haircut, business cards – I was going to go big time!”

He noticed that workers had a real need for information about addiction. Many worked with addicts in places like shelters, probation offices or social services and had no addiction background at all. They attached huge value to the life experiences of the addict. Regehr responded by holding his own panel event in 2004.

“I invited friends with addiction issues to speak on the panel. Each one had other issues as well, making for a nice variety. Requests for more, and longer, events like it came in.”

Regehr now works full time offering trainings for helping professionals and a parallel series of events for business. The CAST Canada High School visit program is special to Regehr:

“The kids are amazing. If I could, I would work with them full time. They speak from the heart and they really pay attention. They are kind and they care, and it shows, and it’s just so refreshing”

Suzanne Witt-Foley had the idea of nominating Tom after seeing a local woman win the award the year before. She met Tom 1999 on a local community committee.

“Over the years I saw an amazing transfomation in who he is – he has changed. He has accomplished a huge amount, for individuals through the CAST groups and for the system through his other work. He found the motivation and courage to make important things happen. I have never seen anyone else do that on their own.”

The night of the award was a big thing for Tom, “But not as big as working on the nomination with Suzanne. Having the healing work I have done on myself with Johanna as well as the community work all laid out in one place threw me for a loop. I went right around the bend. The sky became hateful, the trees were there to really mess me up. I was back on the other side of sane. It was fascinating.”

Fascinating? Wasn’t it scary?

“Not really. I was in my car when I realized what was happening. I sighed a big sigh, came home, cancelled some plans, called in support from friends and family, increased the ‘self-care’ that Johanna had taught me and waited for it to subside. I made sure I ate well, got fresh air, didn’t make big decisions without running them by someone – the whole nine yards. Within three days my feet were back near the ground, within a week I was fine again. And all the more strong for having been through it and accepting all the love around me. For that I thank CAMH, Suzanne, Johanna and all my family, the official and the CAST Canada family. I am blessed.”

Sarah Prowse is a social worker in Toronto with an interest in substance use concerns. She works with the Detox Coalition to improve the quality of care in the withdrawal management system.

Tom Regehr could easily be dead today.

Instead, the Georgetown man likely will be deciding which tie to wear
tomorrow (Thursday) in Toronto when he will be presented with a 2007
Courage to Come Back Award at a gala dinner organized by the Centre for
Addiction and Mental Health Foundation.

The award recognizes the achievements of people across Ontario who have
shown courage and determination in the face of mental illness and
addiction. The winners have achieved personal victories and now serve as
models of hope and inspiration for others facing similar circumstances.

Regehr’s story is truly amazing.

He began drinking at the age of 14, considered himself an alcoholic at
18, and by the age of 22 was living in his car for three weeks after
drinking away his rent money.

“The booze was more important than the bed,” he said.

For most of his 30s Regehr was a homeless person, living in stairwells,
on the street and even wound up in jail. He also became addicted to
Percodan.

Mental illness began to surface, he was often hungry and his intestines
began to deteriorate to the point he was passing nothing but blood and
water for months. Any self-esteem he had, was gone.

At 37, however, he found the courage to make a phone call to a Peel help
line which led to time in various detox centres and Alcoholic’s Anonymous.

However, despite five years of sobriety, Regehr still struggled with
inner demons and only began to feel better after two years of intense
private therapy.

In 2000 he started a self-help group– Come and Sit Together (CAST)–
for anyone who wants to make big changes in their lives. He now devotes
himself full-time to CAST, whose mission is to reduce mental health and
addiction stigmas. He has spoken at many schools in Halton and Peel, is
also involved as a representative and advisor of many mental health
organizations, including Mental Health Works Ontario, the Ontario
Substance Abuse Bureau and is currently a working group member for the
development of an Ontario Drug Strategy.

Tom Regehr could easily have been just another statistic. Instead, he
chose a tougher path and in doing so, has shown no situation is hopeless.

Congratulations, Tom.

As Tom Regehr sits across the street from Brampton’s City Hall, he remembers the day when he slept beneath the canopy of the park’s trees. Ten years have passed and a lifetime of change from the days when Regehr lived on the streets, the result of years of drinking and drug abuse. Today, he heads CAST Canada, an organization he started five years ago that looks at reducing the stigma of mental health and addiction through speaking engagements and training for health professionals.

But that is just one part of Regehr’s accomplishments and only one part of the story – a story that he shares in hopes of reaching a soul lost to drugs or offer a helping hand to a family member, friend or health advocate.

Regehr grew up in Brampton, just steps away from the tree where he spent his last night on the streets. “It was August 9, I remember, lying underneath that tree over there,” he points to a spruce not far from the coffee shop in which he now sits, drinking his favourite coffee. Two days and a bus ride later, and Regehr was enrolled in a detox centre in Sudbury before venturing to the treatment centre in Kirkland Lake.

Alcohol was Regehr’s escape of choice, starting like most teens with a few beers and a bottle of red wine. But, where his friends eventually threw up and went home, Regehr seemed to handle his alcohol a little better than most. “I could drink more and for longer,” he said, a fact that did not go unnoticed by his friends.

Other drugs of choice were added to the mix, most potently cocaine, but alcohol was his constant. It continued into university and beyond, with money made from his job in interlocking stone feeding the habit. “They would give me money in an envelope, and that went straight to drugs,” he said, adding that he was a functioning addict at the time.

The reason for the escape from reality was his mother’s mental illness, says Regehr, explaining of his mother’s manic depression.

The turnaround came when he realized that his old escape mechanisms (alcohol and drugs) were no longer working. “The pain still came through,” he explained. Friends and family gave what Regehr describes as a “I love you” sandwich – one piece of bread is “I love you,” the middle says – “But you’re #$@ing up and you need to stop” and the other end, the other piece of bread, is another “I love you.”

It was not one catastrophic event that made him turn around and give stock to his life, but many. One day, while waiting for the Knights’ Table charity diner to open for the day, Regehr bumped into a friend from high school. “The guy was looking at a second house, an investment property and here I was looking at getting a second pair of pants,” he commented.

Another turnaround came from an understanding and patient woman at the main switchboard of the Region of Peel, where Regehr had called looking for help with his addiction. “She knew that I may lose the number she gave me, but offered me the time and understanding.”

“I needed a lot of help to stay sober,” admitted Regehr, explaining that he attended any meeting he could, including Alcoholics Anonymous and two agency-run support groups. There were certain aspects of the meetings he liked – the first half of the AA meeting and the “gentle intervention” at the Credit Valley support group.

After changes were made in the Credit Valley program and realizing that AA did not have a morning meeting available, he decided to open his own support group.

With a small Trillium grant and a strong format, Regehr started the Clean and Sober Thinking Addiction Support Group (CAST).

The first meeting was held in February of 2000, and looked at giving addicts the support and outlet they need to create a better life… everyday. Now, CAST support groups host two meetings per week – every Tuesday morning in Brampton from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. at St. Paul’s United Church (30 Main Street South), and in Clarkson every Thursday evening from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at 1700 Mazo Crescent (Clarkson).

Word got around about Regehr’s group, and government agencies like Children’s Aid, the Canadian Mental Health Association, the Ontario Substance Abuse Bureau of the Ministry of Health and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health started to approach him with questions. “I noticed a similarity in the questions being asked by these allied health care professionals,” commented Regehr, adding that he was invited to sit as a “consumer” on panel discussions where professionals could get an inside look at how an addict thinks.

Now, Regehr hosts his own training days every six weeks, often with health professionals coming from across Ontario, to sit and listen to a panel of “consumers” like himself.

The last one (August 05) in Whitby was sold-out, he explained, with 57 in attendance, some as far away as Parry Sound.

Regehr also works with the Peel Regional Police, talking with new recruits prior to graduation about how to handle addicts on the beat, including the best way “to arrest a drunk.” The message may be delivered in a jokey manner, but the seriousness comes across in Regehr’s message.

He also holds positions on many committees, the latest as vice-chair of the ConnexionOntario board, an umbrella organization for the Drug and Alcohol Registry of Treatment – Ontario Problem Gambling Helpline and a new mental health registry just announced.

While Regehr is amazed at the response and respect he gets from these health professionals, nothing is closer to his heart than his work with high school kids and youth groups – the third vein of CAST Canada.

Through CAST Canada’s High School Visit Program, Regehr offers an honest and sincere exchange with area teens. “Something happens to me when I get in front of a group of kids, there’s this connection. My first talk to a Grade 10 class was the richest thing I’ve done,” said Regehr, who admitted he was afraid at first. “I didn’t like kids. I thought they were cocky, unruly and not likely to listen to me. I found that they were the most engaging, honest people – with no question off limits. They really got my story.”

Tamara Leniew, of the Canadian Mental Health Association for Halton Region is not surprised. She writes: “The way Tom connects with these kids is amazing. He touches hearts and changes lives.”

Susan Vincent, executive director of the Ontario Drug and Alcohol Registry of Treatment (DART), Ontario Problem Gambling Helpline (OPGH) believes in Tom’s passion and says it’s his ability to bring a wonderful sense of humour to the presentation that brings Regehr’s story to the forefront.

And, Elaine Moore, regional councillor on Brampton’s own City Council is also a staunch supporter, so much that she organized a small fundraiser last year to ensure that Regehr continues his work in sharing his story and knowledge.

~

As an addict, advocate and survivor, Regehr explains that he’s had many on his list of friends to turn to in times of need. His healing, he says, didn’t start until five years ago when he started therapy to deal with the effects of living with a mentally ill mother. “I may have been sober but I was lonely, I couldn’t hold down a job and I had few friends. Through therapy, I learned that I could accept the pain and it wasn’t going to kill me, and it also gave me a safe place to feel and to cry,” he said, expressing gratitude to his therapist Johanna. She also gave him other focusing exercises to keep him in the moment.

Regehr also maintains close ties to his friends on the street, often calling on them to give their insight on the many panel discussions CAST Canada continues to hold.

His “can we talk?” demeanor puts everyone at ease, from the Public Health workers to the students attending his high school outreach presentations. Regehr is open about his past, optimistic about his future and willing to offer help to anyone, be it a fellow addict or the health care professional treating them.