May 7, 2025 • 31 mins
Guest Bio and Links:
Mary Beth O'Connor is a federal administrative law judge and the author of "From Junkie to Judge." She is a writer, speaker, trainer, and recovery advocate. Mary Beth’s journey from addiction to the bench is a powerful story of resilience and triumph over trauma.
Listeners can learn more about Mary Beth O’Connor at her website, or check out her book: From Junkie to Judge: One Woman's Triumph Over Trauma and Addiction
In this episode of Zone 7, Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum, sits down with retired Judge, Mary Beth O’Connor whom opens up about her extraordinary path from a painful, abusive childhood to years of meth addiction, and ultimately, to finding sobriety and rising to become a federal judge. Mary Beth shares candidly about being introduced to drugs at a young age and how that set the stage for a 15-year struggle with addiction. She reflects on the turning points in her life, the strength it took to begin her recovery, and how she used a blend of academic insight and emotional support to rebuild.
Show Notes:
- (0:00) Welcome back to Zone 7 with Crime Scene Investigator, Sheryl McCollum
- (0:15) Sheryl welcomes guest, retired judge, Mary Beth O’Connor
- (1:00) Early life struggles - a childhood of abuse and trauma
- (2:30) Positive school experiences
- (4:00) Violence beyond the home - sexual assault and relationships
- (7:30) Crafting a path to sobriety
- (9:00) “I always viewed myself as the decision maker, but also as a decision maker whose job was to keep her ears open, you know, and not just reject anything out of hand.”
- (12:30) The road to law school
- (14:30) Becoming a federal judge
- (15:00) A spark of idea - to write a memoir
- (19:00) Reflections on drug courts and recovery
- (22:30) Maintaining sobriety and relationships
- (30:45) ”Sometimes you can only find heaven by slowly backing away from hell.” -C.F
- Thanks for listening to another episode! If you’re loving the show and want to help grow the show, please head over to Itunes and leave a rating and review!
---
Sheryl “Mac” McCollum is an Emmy Award winning CSI, a writer for CrimeOnLine, Forensic and Crime Scene Expert for Crime Stories with Nancy Grace, and a CSI for a metro Atlanta Police Department. She is the co-author of the textbook., Cold Case: Pathways to Justice. Sheryl is also the founder and director of the Cold Case Investigative Research Institute, a collaboration between universities and colleges that brings researchers, practitioners, students and the criminal justice community together to advance techniques in solving cold cases and assist families and law enforcement with solvability factors for unsolved homicides, missing persons, and kidnapping cases.
Social Links:
- Email: coldcase2004@gmail.com
- Twitter: @ColdCaseTips
- Facebook: @sheryl.mccollum
Instagram: @officialzone7podcast
See omnystudio.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Have you ever thought the cards were just stacked against you,
that life for you was not fair. Well, our guest
tonight is going to give you something hope. She's going
to prove to you that you can overcome. Mary Beth's
(00:31):
childhood was abusive, traumatic and not surprising, led to substance abuse.
She started drinking y'all when she was twelve, then used
various drugs, and at sixteen she found meth. By the
time she was seventeen, she was shooting up. Now I
(00:55):
want you to listen to this next sentence. She struggled
with meth until she was thirty two, y'all. That's half
her life. She's here tonight and she is going to
talk about her life of crime and where her life
is now. Y'all please help me. Welcome Mary Beth O'Connor.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Happy to be here. I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
Well, judge, it's an honor, and y'all I did not misspeak.
I want you to know that as a title, not
a last name. You heard me. She's a judge.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Y'all.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Better get ready. As my sister Chareon would say, hang
on to your beds here it comes. So tell us
a little bit about that childhood.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Yeah, I mean it was problematic from the beginning. You know,
I had a mother who really wasn't bonded to me
or interested in me. I was left one time for
six months with my uh at a nunnery my first
six months of life, for three years with a great grandmother.
My mother could be violent, but when I was nine,
had just got much worse because she married my stepfather
(02:06):
and he was very violent with her, physically, sexually violent
with me. Just you know, a very high stress environment
where you never knew what was going to happen or
how far things would go, and where what I did
and what happened to me. There was not a close
connection between those two things. So it was really really
difficult to handle on a day to day basis.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Was there anybody, a teacher, a neighbor, a coach, like
anybody that tried to look out for you at all?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Well, I did get a lot of positive attention at school.
That was sort of my one place where I was seen,
where I was valued. I always did really well. I
was very verbal, you know, I was engaging, and so
I got positive attention at school and that did make
me at least feel that I had sort of some
positive attributes. You know that people were paying a little
(02:58):
bit of attention, but they didn't know what was going
on at home, and so it was never there was
never any obvious sign to them, or at least none
that they recognized. So positive attention, but not any sort
of intervention in the family situation.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
I figured you had to be a good student, and
I figured that there had to be at least some
not safe place, because it may not have been that
for you either, but at least a place, like you said,
where you could show off a little bit and know
that you had something to contribute.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Yes, yes, I mean, and it was really important to me.
I mean I had a lot of anxiety around making
any kind of a mistake. I remember we took a
standardized test when I was in fourth grade and I
got like straight ninety nine's on this standardized test, and
I went home crying because I didn't get any I
didn't get any hundreds, and my mother had to explain
(03:51):
to me that they were percentiles and there weren't any hundreds.
And I mean, but that was the level because it
was sort of all I had. He's afraid of losing it.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Ah, So you didn't realize you were like in the
elite one percent like you. Yeah, we might not have
hung out back then. Academically, I'm gonna tell you that
is fantastic. Okay, So you had abuse inside your house,
(04:22):
but a lot of times when people are out on
the streets using drugs, there's danger elsewhere outside of your house.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
And that was true for me. I mean there were
dangerous situations. I had several sexual assaults outside of the home,
including when I was in college. I was kidnapped off
the street three men six hours, rape by all. And
I also moved into a violent boyfriend in college, and
that's not an uncommon choice by women who have been
(04:50):
abused as children. So the violence was sort of deep
and wide, and it sort of built on itself. I
felt like I couldn't get away from it, like it
was following me wherever I went.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
And the kidnappers, you didn't know. This was just off
the street.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yes, I did not know them. It was off the street. Yes.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And let me be clear, I'm not saying it would
be any better. I was just trying to understand, you're
just going about your life and you are snatched.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Yes, And I mean I made a choice to get
in the van. So you know, I could have made
better decisions, but I didn't know that there were three
of them in the van. You know, they sort of
took me by surprise. And it's like interesting because with
an abuse history, sometimes you go back and forth between
being hyper alert and at other times not really recognizing danger.
(05:38):
And that's sort of how it played out for me.
And so sometimes I would, you know, jump if you
came up behind me, and other times I didn't understand
the risk that I was getting myself into because my
self preservation skills had been beaten out of me, and
so I wasn't always able to do that or to
recognize danger.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Well, it's going to skew what is danger because sometimes
you're beat because you didn't do what you were told,
and sometimes you're beat for no reason, so there's no
way to know. And that to me, is how you
go into adulthood. Is this guy dangerous? No, it's a guy.
I'm gonna get in the van. We're going to party
a little bit, that's it. But then when you get
in the van, you've been conned, you've been swindled. That's
(06:18):
a whole different gig to me, that's true.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
And part of the reason I talk about that story
is because so many of us that have been through
a sexual assault, we second guess ourselves so much about,
you know, whatever we did leading up to it, And
I always want to make it clear like that, even
though I made a poor choice, that doesn't mean that
I was responsible for what happened. What happened was on them.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Preach Listen. The youngest victim of a sexual assault that
I've ever worked was eighteen months old. The oldest was
ninety eight on her birthday. So let me just say
neither one of those victims did anything. No victim that
I have ever dealt with, brought it on themselves. Somebody
(07:00):
else made the decision to harm somebody. Doesn't matter what
they're wearing, doesn't matter what they say, doesn't matter what
car they get into. None of that matters. And certainly
we know that now. If we didn't know it in
past decades, we know it. So there's no conversation there
with me. I'll tell you. You get out of college,
(07:24):
you're still using math, and you develop a plan. Now
this kind of knocked me out, judge, because you attack
this thing almost academically. You know AA doesn't work for you,
it's not something you're gonna be able to subscribe to.
So you go and you build your own plan. Can
(07:46):
you walk us through what happened? Was there a dark moment?
Was there a rock bottom? Or was there I'm gonna
do something different and get myself out of this.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Well by thirty two, I think I was in a
place where a lot of us, you substances for a
long time, get to, which is it's not necessarily sort
of a one time event that's a light bulb. It's
a wearing down process. And so by thirty two I
couldn't hold a job. I was having physical problems from
the math. I was really just you know, hopeless and
(08:18):
in despair and feeling like I'm living in this miserable
little box. And my partner was ready to throw me out.
And so it was all of that together where I
finally said, you know, well maybe I ought to go
to rehab. And so I did, and like you say,
when I got there, I found out it was twelve
step exclusive, which is, you know, Alcoholics Anonymous and all
(08:39):
of the anonymouses and those programs are a good fit
for many, but they're also not right for many. Others,
and they weren't right for me, and so I really
had to think about what to do, because they swore
to me there was no other way. But I decided,
like you saying, I decided I was going to sort
of that. I decided it was my job to listen, right,
to listen from people who had more success, you know,
(09:02):
further along in the process, people who had some knowledge,
to take what they said seriously, but at the same
time to filter it. Is this a strategy or a
technique or a philosophy or approach that I think I
can make work for me. And so I always feed
myself as the decision maker, but also as a decision
maker whose job was to keep her ears open, you know,
(09:24):
and not just reject anything out of hand. And so
that's how I did it. I synthesized. I did read
all the AA books. I found women for Sobriety. I
found the Parent Organization, the Smart Recovery, the Parent Organization,
the Life Rang Secular Recovery. I read all their books,
went to all their meetings, and I just always was
building the plan that I thought was going to work
(09:46):
for me, and then adjusting and over time, which is
what most recovery looks like, and then also adding in
trauma therapy because I knew that the violence was underneath
my drug use and if I didn't address that, I
wasn't going to be able to be so. But I
also would never be happy or productive, and so I
had to tackle everything together. And that was how I
(10:06):
was thinking about it.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
And you know what kind of knocked me out when
I read that, I'm like, you know what, She's approaching
her sobriety with logic, with rules for herself, with this process,
kind of like you do with a criminal case.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
It's true, It's true, And the truth is that I
was really sort of teaching myself. I didn't think of
it this way, but in retrospect, I was teaching myself
that I could guide myself forward. And it was the
same skills set that applies to everything. It was like
sort of analyzing where am I, where am I trying
to get to, how do I think I might get there?
(10:45):
Setting a goal, building a plan, implementing it. These are
all life skills that applied well beyond sobriety.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Correct. Yes, And you know the title of your book,
from Junkie to Judge. I mean, if that don't make
you want to pick the book up and at least
flipped through it. But you know, as I'm reading the book,
here's what you do six years into sobriety, which is
(11:11):
not that long, right, I mean you use drugs a
lot longer than six years. So six years into sobriety,
what do you decide to do? Mary Beth O'Connor.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Go to law school.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Because there's no stress there, there's no drugs or alcohol there.
I mean, it's going to be a very soft, very
light hearted community for you, I'm sure.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
And I'm sitting there going law school, like, oh my gosh,
how so again? I knew you had to be bright.
But that's kind of a risk, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
It was a risk. Well. Also, I had actually gone
to law school right after college, but I was using
so much meth by the time I got there that
I couldn't do it. Like I literally couldn't get there.
I had handed back a top ten law school, Berkeley Law,
because of my meth addiction. And I knew it. And
so when I got sober, well, first of all, when
I got sober, my and I was thirty two, As
(12:12):
you said, my first professional goal was literally let's not
get fired again.
Speaker 4 (12:17):
That was my.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Hey wait a minute, sugar, I've never used math, but
I've got that same philosophy.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
And so I had to work my way up. I mean,
I had a Berkeley degree in good grace, but you know,
an embarrassing resume for the last ten years before I
got sober. And so I started like at a low
level temp job, and then I got you know, more
of a mid level job, and then I got a
supervisory job at a larger company, and then at six
and a half years sober, I went to Berkeley. I
went to law school for real when I was thirty
(12:50):
nine years old as well, So it took me that
long to get ready for it. But it was scary.
I hadn't been I hadn't taken a test in sixteen years,
and law school, of course, is very challenging. But I
will say I was actually in a pretty good place
in my life for it because my sobriety was solid.
I was I had resolved some of my PTSD, some
(13:12):
of my IT which showed up as very severe anxiety
some of that. So I was in a better emotional place.
My partner and I actually made it through and we
were still together. So I had sort of a safe,
supportive home environment, and I wasn't, you know, twenty two anymore,
sort of you know, trying to date and do all
the things that twenty two year olds do. So it
(13:32):
was scary, but I actually was in a good place
to tackle it the same way I tackled everything else,
which was systematically and with discipline, and you know, the
skills that I had developed during those six years of sobriety.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Well, I'm going to tell you you and that partner.
That's another book from Junkie to Judge to Partner, because
that's amazing that y'all could stay together and still be
on a foundation that's rock solid.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Yeah, I mean it definitely took work. When I mean
when I went into rehab, he was making no promises,
you know, like no promises. They have family group in rehab,
and he came and he told the therapist, I think
it's too late. You know, she heard too many bridges.
So it wasn't looking good. But he did let me
come home to sort of see whether I was going
to succeed or take it seriously. And we are still
(14:22):
together today.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
So it's been congratulations, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
It's it's an unexpected joy. It's been a real help.
I mean, I will say when when I got out
of rehab, things like having you know, a safe home
to go to with a relative partner who was at
least letting willing to let me try to succeed. That
was an advantage. Not everyone has that situation, Amen, and
I was grateful for it. Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
So twenty fourteen, you're appointed a judge. Ship Yeah, I
mean that's got to be one of those moments. I
mean you're driving home going, girl, you did it. Nobody
could say anything to you at that point, to me,
but just honor it and celebrate it.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I mean it was a real accomplishment. I you know,
I had been working as a lawyer for let's say,
about twenty years at that point, and I mean I
was I was twenty years sober at that point. I
was twenty years sober. And I had worked in big
law after I got out of law school, and then
I did class action work for the federal government, and
then I was appointed a federal administrative law juze. So
(15:29):
it was really a time of reflection. That's when I
started thinking about the memoir, you know, because it was
a how the heck, did I go from shooting method
seventeen until thirty two? That was not a short period
of time. And now I'm a federal judge. And it
really made me start to think, is my story unusual
enough that it would would capture attention to allow me
(15:54):
to share information and educate and talk about multiple pathways
to recovery and offer reassurance to those struggling or to
their friends and their family, help reduce stigma by saying,
you know, I mean, we really don't want to give
up on anybody, not even if they're shooting met for
fifteen years, you know, because look where they could end up.
So I was thinking about all those things, and that's
(16:16):
sort of how I started taking notes for the book,
thinking that perhaps it could be useful.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Perhaps, And here's what's so remarkable to me. One element
to your story as a parent that is shocking to
me is you know, you don't go to Macy's to
get your math. You are street wise. You are street
(16:42):
level buying from pretty accomplished drug dealers. This is not
something that you were not in danger doing every day.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
That's true, Although the other side of that is that
a lot of times there is a community among drug users, right,
I mean, of course, like when I was in high school,
I mean these are I grew up in a small
town in central Jersey. You know, the drug dealers are
guys three years older than me, you know, from my town,
or their buddy from two towns away. So there there
(17:16):
is danger to a certain extmp, but there's also a community.
You know these people, and then when you're on math,
you spend days with them, you know, like days without sleeping,
And so there's that side of it. You choose your
friends based on your drug use, because when you're using
at that level, you really don't want to be around
people who don't support that. But you know, I mean,
(17:40):
there are relationships that you develop, and so there's some
risk and you have to be aware of it, but
there is also a sense of community, which is one
of the reasons that some people keep going with the
drugs because it does give you that community that you
may be feeling because of your family situation when you're
when you're a teenager or whatever others struggles you have,
(18:01):
that these are people that you can sort of hang
out with and that you're all going to sort of
have a a common lifestyle, a common way of life,
and that the pain that we all share. Sometimes we
see it, but a lot of times we all just
mutually agree not to discuss it.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Again, not a whole lot different than the law, all right.
Speaker 4 (18:22):
So you know, I've often told people, especially rookies, you
can't arrest addiction out of somebody.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
You've got to get them help. And one thing that
has recently happened in our criminal justice community, a judge
was killed by a sheriff in Kentucky. And both of
those men, independently and working together, ran programs to help
people with drug problems. If there was an arrest, they
(18:54):
went to drug court and then they were sentenced to
get some help, and they followed up and they gave
them up their tools to help them be successful. And
this is a tragedy for both families, for the court,
for the sheriff's department, but it is a complete tragedy
for that community because the next person may not have
(19:18):
that same belief. I want to ask your opinion on
drug court.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, there's a wide range of quality of drug courts
around the country. Some are good, some are evidence based,
and some are not. And so it really depends on
the specific court. And so For example, if somebody had
a perfect abstinence it from day one is unusual in recovery.
(19:45):
I didn't have perfect abstinence from day one. I used
three times in my first five months, which was a
vast improvement, but not perfection, right, yeah, and so.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
That's a remarkable change that was.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
But did I feel fail three times and succeed? I
don't look at it that way. It's just when you
first get sober. First of all, you've been using the
drugs to keep down the pain. Now there's nothing keeping
it down. It comes up, and you don't have the
skills to handle it. Plus your brain is screaming at
you you need drugs like you need them, and so
it's a challenge, right. Some drug courts understand that, and
(20:21):
they will have some consequence for having a you know,
a lack of perfect absence, and others, you know, there's
a very heavy penalty for lack of perfect absence, which
is really not understanding how recovery and addiction work because
it's very difficult and not possible for most people to
do that. Some drug courts will put people in treatment
(20:44):
that's evidence based, and others put everybody in one program
regardless of whether it's a good fit or not. Some
drug courts recognize that often often over half the time,
people have another mental health condition in addition to their addiction,
which is a mental health condition, so they need treatment
for both if they're to succeed, and others just don't.
(21:04):
It's just we'll treat you for the drugs and pretend
there's nothing else is going on. And so there's a
variety of qualities. Certainly I would rather have people in
drug court than incarcerated, But I really think the better
option is that we take the money from the criminal
justice system when we put it into the treatment system.
Because a lot of our drug policy there's sort of
we talk about it as if there's treatment on demand
(21:27):
for everybody who wants it, and that's just not true.
I mean, we don't have a very good treatment system
in the US that you know, for people that don't
have insurance or don't have cash. And so is drug
court better than going to jail? Yes? Could there be
a better use of our dollars? Often there could if
we would take the money out of the criminal justice
(21:48):
system and put more of it into the treatment side.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You know, I have a sister that is a level
one trauma nurse. A lot of times people ask her,
you know, how many people do you see that have
been using drugs or alcohol? And she's like almost all
of them, you know. And I'm a crime scene investigator
and I can tell you the same thing. So to
your point, sometimes money might be better spent on the
(22:19):
front end of that thing.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Yes, yes, for sure, Yes, that's right. I mean, and
there's just a lot of positives from getting people to
help they need it. Does it reduces crime? I mean,
incarcerating someone is expensive. You know, the data shays you
could treat three or four people for the price of
incarcerating one. I mean, it's just a much. You know,
it's an expensive system. And that just counts the price
(22:42):
of the incarceration, not the police and you know, all
the lawyers and all the other parts of it. And
so it is better to try to get the system
ready so that when someone's ready to get help, that
there's a door open for them. That's the ideal scenario.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
So is there any person from your past when you
were drinking and drugging that you are still connected to,
still friends with.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, there are people that I'm still connected to, especially
as I've gotten older, more and more of them got
sober as well. I mean, of course a lot of
people died, right not everyone is still here with us,
and that's that's always a loss. But there are definitely
people that I used drugs with when I was a
teenager that I'm still friends with. Few were in the
last ten years of my drug use, which is a
(23:29):
little more isolated, but I do have still some of
those relationships.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Yes, well, I think that's important for people to hear,
because you always hear, oh, everybody's going to abandon you
or you're going to abandon them once you get sober,
and that doesn't have to be true. So I just
wanted to have that for people to know that doesn't
have to be part of the story.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
That's right, I mean. But also, you can peer support groups,
whether it's Twelve Steps, you know, the Alcoholics Anonymous or
other peer support groups that you can build old a
sober community through them. That's one of the benefits of
pure support is that you meet other people that are
committed to sobriety as well, so there is some replacement
of some of the people that you were hanging out
(24:12):
with with new sober friends. And that's one of the
advantages of going to support meetings because you get to
meet people in your community that have the same goal
and path as you do. The other thing is that
in the beginning of sobriety, it is important to evaluate
your relationships as far as who can I safely have
in my life today? So you don't always have to
(24:35):
cut people out forever. But sometimes, let's say even a
family member. There may be a family member who just
isn't very supportive or who triggers you because of the
way they interact with you, and you may have to say,
you know what, I have to put my cousin on
sort of a longer leash for a while. I can
talk to her or email with her, but I can't
(24:56):
be in the same room with her for a while.
And it's just whatever, whatever the relationships are, it's important
to think in early recovery about who can I safely
have around me. Now, those don't have to be permanent decisions,
but in the beginning you may have to be more
protective than you need to be. Let's say three months
later or six months later.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
What a great way to say that though, And again
for people that are listening trying to maybe find the
right fit for them for them to know, hey, I
don't have to cut this cousin out forever. Just maybe
six weeks, maybe six months, maybe six years, but not forever.
I think that's great.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
Yeah, I mean you have to protect your sobriety. Look,
you know, I had thirty one years in January, and
one of the things I say is going from thirty
to thirty one that is not the hard part. That's
not the hard part. The time that you need to
be sort of hyper focused on your sobriety is typically
eighteen to thirty six months, and at that point, people
(25:57):
tend to be very stabilized, you know, as I'm saying.
But I'd also like to share some positive data with
your with your listeners, because we hear so much, we
hear so much negative data as if nobody recovers or
hardly anyone. The truth is that seventy five percent of
the people who have a substance use disorder, which is,
you know, the modern name for addiction, seventy five percent
(26:18):
will recover. They will get to a point where they
no longer meet the criteria for having an addiction seventy
five percent. The other positive data point is that once
you hit five years of continuous sobriety, you only have
a fifteen percent chance of ever relapsing again.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
That is incredible. I've never heard either one of those statistics.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
So you know, to me, it's light at the end
of the tunnel, right. I mean, don't ever give up
on your loved one because there's always, you know, still
hope that they'll they will get well, and the longer
that they stay sober, the more likely the less likely
they are to ever go back to it.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Yeah, and reset in the clock, man, I'm a big
believer in that in all things. If you have a
fight with your husband, honey, reset the clack. That got
to be the end of your marriage. It's a fight,
big deal, right, And I don't mean physical, I'm talking
about arguing, y'all, come on. But I do believe in
second chances. I believe you've been sober three four years
(27:14):
and you relapse one night, that's one night. Yes, reset
that clock and then maybe go seven years. If you relapse,
it's all good. I mean, I would rather somebody relapse
for a night or four than five years.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah. In the recoverage comunity, we actually use different terminology
that can be often referred to as a slip versus
a relapse because it doesn't go on, you know, it's
like sort of a momentary impulse loss.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
And well I like that better too, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
Yeah, because there's a distinction in any time that someone
has any kind of a slip or relapse, you know,
the focus shouldn't be on blame or making them feel bad.
The focus should be on how can we help you
to sort of refocus on your recovery and to get
whatever additional techniques or strategies or help you need so
that you can stabilize yourself again. That should be the focus.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
Amen. And you know it's so crazy because you know,
you try to remind people this is a disease. Nobody
chooses it. Nobody sits in that third grade class and goes, ooh,
I hope I'm a drug addict when I'm seventeen. Nobody
wants that they can't help it.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
It's miserable. And the truth is that that there are
the two primary causes of developing an addiction are childhood
trauma and untreated mental health. You know, and so when
you people get sober, they usually also have to do
that other work. What was what is underneath my my addiction,
what was sort of causing me to have the compulsion
(28:44):
to use to access because you need to address that
to increase your odds of sobriety, of staying sober, but
also just being happy, being productive, having a good life,
healing whatever wounds were there before you picked up that
first substance. That's why the subset out of my book is,
you know, triumph over trauma and addiction, because they are interrelated,
(29:06):
as was the PTSD that I didn't know I have.
I had in the severe anxiety. So there's usually more
than one thing to work on when people start their
recovery process.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
And that's the hard part, right I'm paleling those layers
back and admitting it, putting a spotlight on it, dealing
with it.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
It's the hard part, but it's also ultimately the way out,
you know, it's ultimately the way out.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
You know, you are so open and you are just
a tremendous source of not just information but giving people
such a playbook. How can people read you if they won't.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
To well, my memoir again from Junkie to judges on
Amazon and all the usual sites. My website junkidjudge dot
com that has like my opinion pieces I've been in
the Wall Street Journal, in the La Times. It has
a messaging feature so people can message me through my
website and I answer all messages. And then also I
do do a lot of conferences, workshops, other types of
(30:04):
speaking engagements. So reach out with opportunities, reach out with questions.
I'm happy to answer questions from anyone struggling or the
people who love them.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Judge Mary Beth O'Connor, I cannot tell you how much
I appreciate you coming on given all this incredible information,
but specifically those statistics, because I do believe in spreading
good news. I do believe that people deserve second chances
and help and support and just anything we can do
(30:37):
to make sure people are the best they can possibly be.
And you are doing that every day. So I appreciate
you coming on to Zone seven and I applaud what
you are doing well.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Thank you for having me. I've enjoyed it.
Speaker 4 (30:50):
I'm going to end Zone seven the way that I
always do with a quote, sometimes you can only find
heaven by slowly backing away from hell, actress Carrie Fisher.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is Zone seven
Have you ever thought the cards were just stacked against you,
that life for you was not fair. Well, our guest
tonight is going to give you something hope. She's going
to prove to you that you can overcome. Mary Beth's
(00:31):
childhood was abusive, traumatic and not surprising, led to substance abuse.
She started drinking y'all when she was twelve, then used
various drugs, and at sixteen she found meth. By the
time she was seventeen, she was shooting up. Now I
(00:55):
want you to listen to this next sentence. She struggled
with meth until she was thirty two, y'all. That's half
her life. She's here tonight and she is going to
talk about her life of crime and where her life
is now. Y'all please help me. Welcome Mary Beth O'Connor.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Happy to be here. I'm looking forward to it.
Speaker 1 (01:23):
Well, judge, it's an honor, and y'all I did not misspeak.
I want you to know that as a title, not
a last name. You heard me. She's a judge.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
Y'all.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Better get ready. As my sister Chareon would say, hang
on to your beds here it comes. So tell us
a little bit about that childhood.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Yeah, I mean it was problematic from the beginning. You know,
I had a mother who really wasn't bonded to me
or interested in me. I was left one time for
six months with my uh at a nunnery my first
six months of life, for three years with a great grandmother.
My mother could be violent, but when I was nine,
had just got much worse because she married my stepfather
(02:06):
and he was very violent with her, physically, sexually violent
with me. Just you know, a very high stress environment
where you never knew what was going to happen or
how far things would go, and where what I did
and what happened to me. There was not a close
connection between those two things. So it was really really
difficult to handle on a day to day basis.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Was there anybody, a teacher, a neighbor, a coach, like
anybody that tried to look out for you at all?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Well, I did get a lot of positive attention at school.
That was sort of my one place where I was seen,
where I was valued. I always did really well. I
was very verbal, you know, I was engaging, and so
I got positive attention at school and that did make
me at least feel that I had sort of some
positive attributes. You know that people were paying a little
(02:58):
bit of attention, but they didn't know what was going
on at home, and so it was never there was
never any obvious sign to them, or at least none
that they recognized. So positive attention, but not any sort
of intervention in the family situation.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
I figured you had to be a good student, and
I figured that there had to be at least some
not safe place, because it may not have been that
for you either, but at least a place, like you said,
where you could show off a little bit and know
that you had something to contribute.
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Yes, yes, I mean, and it was really important to me.
I mean I had a lot of anxiety around making
any kind of a mistake. I remember we took a
standardized test when I was in fourth grade and I
got like straight ninety nine's on this standardized test, and
I went home crying because I didn't get any I
didn't get any hundreds, and my mother had to explain
(03:51):
to me that they were percentiles and there weren't any hundreds.
And I mean, but that was the level because it
was sort of all I had. He's afraid of losing it.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Ah, So you didn't realize you were like in the
elite one percent like you. Yeah, we might not have
hung out back then. Academically, I'm gonna tell you that
is fantastic. Okay, So you had abuse inside your house,
(04:22):
but a lot of times when people are out on
the streets using drugs, there's danger elsewhere outside of your house.
Speaker 2 (04:30):
And that was true for me. I mean there were
dangerous situations. I had several sexual assaults outside of the home,
including when I was in college. I was kidnapped off
the street three men six hours, rape by all. And
I also moved into a violent boyfriend in college, and
that's not an uncommon choice by women who have been
(04:50):
abused as children. So the violence was sort of deep
and wide, and it sort of built on itself. I
felt like I couldn't get away from it, like it
was following me wherever I went.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
And the kidnappers, you didn't know. This was just off
the street.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yes, I did not know them. It was off the street. Yes.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
And let me be clear, I'm not saying it would
be any better. I was just trying to understand, you're
just going about your life and you are snatched.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
Yes, And I mean I made a choice to get
in the van. So you know, I could have made
better decisions, but I didn't know that there were three
of them in the van. You know, they sort of
took me by surprise. And it's like interesting because with
an abuse history, sometimes you go back and forth between
being hyper alert and at other times not really recognizing danger.
(05:38):
And that's sort of how it played out for me.
And so sometimes I would, you know, jump if you
came up behind me, and other times I didn't understand
the risk that I was getting myself into because my
self preservation skills had been beaten out of me, and
so I wasn't always able to do that or to
recognize danger.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
Well, it's going to skew what is danger because sometimes
you're beat because you didn't do what you were told,
and sometimes you're beat for no reason, so there's no
way to know. And that to me, is how you
go into adulthood. Is this guy dangerous? No, it's a guy.
I'm gonna get in the van. We're going to party
a little bit, that's it. But then when you get
in the van, you've been conned, you've been swindled. That's
(06:18):
a whole different gig to me, that's true.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
And part of the reason I talk about that story
is because so many of us that have been through
a sexual assault, we second guess ourselves so much about,
you know, whatever we did leading up to it, And
I always want to make it clear like that, even
though I made a poor choice, that doesn't mean that
I was responsible for what happened. What happened was on them.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
Preach Listen. The youngest victim of a sexual assault that
I've ever worked was eighteen months old. The oldest was
ninety eight on her birthday. So let me just say
neither one of those victims did anything. No victim that
I have ever dealt with, brought it on themselves. Somebody
(07:00):
else made the decision to harm somebody. Doesn't matter what
they're wearing, doesn't matter what they say, doesn't matter what
car they get into. None of that matters. And certainly
we know that now. If we didn't know it in
past decades, we know it. So there's no conversation there
with me. I'll tell you. You get out of college,
(07:24):
you're still using math, and you develop a plan. Now
this kind of knocked me out, judge, because you attack
this thing almost academically. You know AA doesn't work for you,
it's not something you're gonna be able to subscribe to.
So you go and you build your own plan. Can
(07:46):
you walk us through what happened? Was there a dark moment?
Was there a rock bottom? Or was there I'm gonna
do something different and get myself out of this.
Speaker 2 (07:56):
Well by thirty two, I think I was in a
place where a lot of us, you substances for a
long time, get to, which is it's not necessarily sort
of a one time event that's a light bulb. It's
a wearing down process. And so by thirty two I
couldn't hold a job. I was having physical problems from
the math. I was really just you know, hopeless and
(08:18):
in despair and feeling like I'm living in this miserable
little box. And my partner was ready to throw me out.
And so it was all of that together where I
finally said, you know, well maybe I ought to go
to rehab. And so I did, and like you say,
when I got there, I found out it was twelve
step exclusive, which is, you know, Alcoholics Anonymous and all
(08:39):
of the anonymouses and those programs are a good fit
for many, but they're also not right for many. Others,
and they weren't right for me, and so I really
had to think about what to do, because they swore
to me there was no other way. But I decided,
like you saying, I decided I was going to sort
of that. I decided it was my job to listen, right,
to listen from people who had more success, you know,
(09:02):
further along in the process, people who had some knowledge,
to take what they said seriously, but at the same
time to filter it. Is this a strategy or a
technique or a philosophy or approach that I think I
can make work for me. And so I always feed
myself as the decision maker, but also as a decision
maker whose job was to keep her ears open, you know,
(09:24):
and not just reject anything out of hand. And so
that's how I did it. I synthesized. I did read
all the AA books. I found women for Sobriety. I
found the Parent Organization, the Smart Recovery, the Parent Organization,
the Life Rang Secular Recovery. I read all their books,
went to all their meetings, and I just always was
building the plan that I thought was going to work
(09:46):
for me, and then adjusting and over time, which is
what most recovery looks like, and then also adding in
trauma therapy because I knew that the violence was underneath
my drug use and if I didn't address that, I
wasn't going to be able to be so. But I
also would never be happy or productive, and so I
had to tackle everything together. And that was how I
(10:06):
was thinking about it.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
And you know what kind of knocked me out when
I read that, I'm like, you know what, She's approaching
her sobriety with logic, with rules for herself, with this process,
kind of like you do with a criminal case.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
It's true, It's true, And the truth is that I
was really sort of teaching myself. I didn't think of
it this way, but in retrospect, I was teaching myself
that I could guide myself forward. And it was the
same skills set that applies to everything. It was like
sort of analyzing where am I, where am I trying
to get to, how do I think I might get there?
(10:45):
Setting a goal, building a plan, implementing it. These are
all life skills that applied well beyond sobriety.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Correct. Yes, And you know the title of your book,
from Junkie to Judge. I mean, if that don't make
you want to pick the book up and at least
flipped through it. But you know, as I'm reading the book,
here's what you do six years into sobriety, which is
(11:11):
not that long, right, I mean you use drugs a
lot longer than six years. So six years into sobriety,
what do you decide to do? Mary Beth O'Connor.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
Go to law school.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Because there's no stress there, there's no drugs or alcohol there.
I mean, it's going to be a very soft, very
light hearted community for you, I'm sure.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
And I'm sitting there going law school, like, oh my gosh,
how so again? I knew you had to be bright.
But that's kind of a risk, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
It was a risk. Well. Also, I had actually gone
to law school right after college, but I was using
so much meth by the time I got there that
I couldn't do it. Like I literally couldn't get there.
I had handed back a top ten law school, Berkeley Law,
because of my meth addiction. And I knew it. And
so when I got sober, well, first of all, when
I got sober, my and I was thirty two, As
(12:12):
you said, my first professional goal was literally let's not
get fired again.
Speaker 4 (12:17):
That was my.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Hey wait a minute, sugar, I've never used math, but
I've got that same philosophy.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
And so I had to work my way up. I mean,
I had a Berkeley degree in good grace, but you know,
an embarrassing resume for the last ten years before I
got sober. And so I started like at a low
level temp job, and then I got you know, more
of a mid level job, and then I got a
supervisory job at a larger company, and then at six
and a half years sober, I went to Berkeley. I
went to law school for real when I was thirty
(12:50):
nine years old as well, So it took me that
long to get ready for it. But it was scary.
I hadn't been I hadn't taken a test in sixteen years,
and law school, of course, is very challenging. But I
will say I was actually in a pretty good place
in my life for it because my sobriety was solid.
I was I had resolved some of my PTSD, some
(13:12):
of my IT which showed up as very severe anxiety
some of that. So I was in a better emotional place.
My partner and I actually made it through and we
were still together. So I had sort of a safe,
supportive home environment, and I wasn't, you know, twenty two anymore,
sort of you know, trying to date and do all
the things that twenty two year olds do. So it
(13:32):
was scary, but I actually was in a good place
to tackle it the same way I tackled everything else,
which was systematically and with discipline, and you know, the
skills that I had developed during those six years of sobriety.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Well, I'm going to tell you you and that partner.
That's another book from Junkie to Judge to Partner, because
that's amazing that y'all could stay together and still be
on a foundation that's rock solid.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Yeah, I mean it definitely took work. When I mean
when I went into rehab, he was making no promises,
you know, like no promises. They have family group in rehab,
and he came and he told the therapist, I think
it's too late. You know, she heard too many bridges.
So it wasn't looking good. But he did let me
come home to sort of see whether I was going
to succeed or take it seriously. And we are still
(14:22):
together today.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
So it's been congratulations, Thank you.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
It's it's an unexpected joy. It's been a real help.
I mean, I will say when when I got out
of rehab, things like having you know, a safe home
to go to with a relative partner who was at
least letting willing to let me try to succeed. That
was an advantage. Not everyone has that situation, Amen, and
I was grateful for it. Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
So twenty fourteen, you're appointed a judge. Ship Yeah, I
mean that's got to be one of those moments. I
mean you're driving home going, girl, you did it. Nobody
could say anything to you at that point, to me,
but just honor it and celebrate it.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
I mean it was a real accomplishment. I you know,
I had been working as a lawyer for let's say,
about twenty years at that point, and I mean I
was I was twenty years sober at that point. I
was twenty years sober. And I had worked in big
law after I got out of law school, and then
I did class action work for the federal government, and
then I was appointed a federal administrative law juze. So
(15:29):
it was really a time of reflection. That's when I
started thinking about the memoir, you know, because it was
a how the heck, did I go from shooting method
seventeen until thirty two? That was not a short period
of time. And now I'm a federal judge. And it
really made me start to think, is my story unusual
enough that it would would capture attention to allow me
(15:54):
to share information and educate and talk about multiple pathways
to recovery and offer reassurance to those struggling or to
their friends and their family, help reduce stigma by saying,
you know, I mean, we really don't want to give
up on anybody, not even if they're shooting met for
fifteen years, you know, because look where they could end up.
So I was thinking about all those things, and that's
(16:16):
sort of how I started taking notes for the book,
thinking that perhaps it could be useful.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Perhaps, And here's what's so remarkable to me. One element
to your story as a parent that is shocking to
me is you know, you don't go to Macy's to
get your math. You are street wise. You are street
(16:42):
level buying from pretty accomplished drug dealers. This is not
something that you were not in danger doing every day.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
That's true, Although the other side of that is that
a lot of times there is a community among drug users, right,
I mean, of course, like when I was in high school,
I mean these are I grew up in a small
town in central Jersey. You know, the drug dealers are
guys three years older than me, you know, from my town,
or their buddy from two towns away. So there there
(17:16):
is danger to a certain extmp, but there's also a community.
You know these people, and then when you're on math,
you spend days with them, you know, like days without sleeping,
And so there's that side of it. You choose your
friends based on your drug use, because when you're using
at that level, you really don't want to be around
people who don't support that. But you know, I mean,
(17:40):
there are relationships that you develop, and so there's some
risk and you have to be aware of it, but
there is also a sense of community, which is one
of the reasons that some people keep going with the
drugs because it does give you that community that you
may be feeling because of your family situation when you're
when you're a teenager or whatever others struggles you have,
(18:01):
that these are people that you can sort of hang
out with and that you're all going to sort of
have a a common lifestyle, a common way of life,
and that the pain that we all share. Sometimes we
see it, but a lot of times we all just
mutually agree not to discuss it.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Again, not a whole lot different than the law, all right.
Speaker 4 (18:22):
So you know, I've often told people, especially rookies, you
can't arrest addiction out of somebody.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
You've got to get them help. And one thing that
has recently happened in our criminal justice community, a judge
was killed by a sheriff in Kentucky. And both of
those men, independently and working together, ran programs to help
people with drug problems. If there was an arrest, they
(18:54):
went to drug court and then they were sentenced to
get some help, and they followed up and they gave
them up their tools to help them be successful. And
this is a tragedy for both families, for the court,
for the sheriff's department, but it is a complete tragedy
for that community because the next person may not have
(19:18):
that same belief. I want to ask your opinion on
drug court.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
Yeah, there's a wide range of quality of drug courts
around the country. Some are good, some are evidence based,
and some are not. And so it really depends on
the specific court. And so For example, if somebody had
a perfect abstinence it from day one is unusual in recovery.
(19:45):
I didn't have perfect abstinence from day one. I used
three times in my first five months, which was a
vast improvement, but not perfection, right, yeah, and so.
Speaker 1 (19:56):
That's a remarkable change that was.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
But did I feel fail three times and succeed? I
don't look at it that way. It's just when you
first get sober. First of all, you've been using the
drugs to keep down the pain. Now there's nothing keeping
it down. It comes up, and you don't have the
skills to handle it. Plus your brain is screaming at
you you need drugs like you need them, and so
it's a challenge, right. Some drug courts understand that, and
(20:21):
they will have some consequence for having a you know,
a lack of perfect absence, and others, you know, there's
a very heavy penalty for lack of perfect absence, which
is really not understanding how recovery and addiction work because
it's very difficult and not possible for most people to
do that. Some drug courts will put people in treatment
(20:44):
that's evidence based, and others put everybody in one program
regardless of whether it's a good fit or not. Some
drug courts recognize that often often over half the time,
people have another mental health condition in addition to their addiction,
which is a mental health condition, so they need treatment
for both if they're to succeed, and others just don't.
(21:04):
It's just we'll treat you for the drugs and pretend
there's nothing else is going on. And so there's a
variety of qualities. Certainly I would rather have people in
drug court than incarcerated, But I really think the better
option is that we take the money from the criminal
justice system when we put it into the treatment system.
Because a lot of our drug policy there's sort of
we talk about it as if there's treatment on demand
(21:27):
for everybody who wants it, and that's just not true.
I mean, we don't have a very good treatment system
in the US that you know, for people that don't
have insurance or don't have cash. And so is drug
court better than going to jail? Yes? Could there be
a better use of our dollars? Often there could if
we would take the money out of the criminal justice
(21:48):
system and put more of it into the treatment side.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You know, I have a sister that is a level
one trauma nurse. A lot of times people ask her,
you know, how many people do you see that have
been using drugs or alcohol? And she's like almost all
of them, you know. And I'm a crime scene investigator
and I can tell you the same thing. So to
your point, sometimes money might be better spent on the
(22:19):
front end of that thing.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
Yes, yes, for sure, Yes, that's right. I mean, and
there's just a lot of positives from getting people to
help they need it. Does it reduces crime? I mean,
incarcerating someone is expensive. You know, the data shays you
could treat three or four people for the price of
incarcerating one. I mean, it's just a much. You know,
it's an expensive system. And that just counts the price
(22:42):
of the incarceration, not the police and you know, all
the lawyers and all the other parts of it. And
so it is better to try to get the system
ready so that when someone's ready to get help, that
there's a door open for them. That's the ideal scenario.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
So is there any person from your past when you
were drinking and drugging that you are still connected to,
still friends with.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, there are people that I'm still connected to, especially
as I've gotten older, more and more of them got
sober as well. I mean, of course a lot of
people died, right not everyone is still here with us,
and that's that's always a loss. But there are definitely
people that I used drugs with when I was a
teenager that I'm still friends with. Few were in the
last ten years of my drug use, which is a
(23:29):
little more isolated, but I do have still some of
those relationships.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Yes, well, I think that's important for people to hear,
because you always hear, oh, everybody's going to abandon you
or you're going to abandon them once you get sober,
and that doesn't have to be true. So I just
wanted to have that for people to know that doesn't
have to be part of the story.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
That's right, I mean. But also, you can peer support groups,
whether it's Twelve Steps, you know, the Alcoholics Anonymous or
other peer support groups that you can build old a
sober community through them. That's one of the benefits of
pure support is that you meet other people that are
committed to sobriety as well, so there is some replacement
of some of the people that you were hanging out
(24:12):
with with new sober friends. And that's one of the
advantages of going to support meetings because you get to
meet people in your community that have the same goal
and path as you do. The other thing is that
in the beginning of sobriety, it is important to evaluate
your relationships as far as who can I safely have
in my life today? So you don't always have to
(24:35):
cut people out forever. But sometimes, let's say even a
family member. There may be a family member who just
isn't very supportive or who triggers you because of the
way they interact with you, and you may have to say,
you know what, I have to put my cousin on
sort of a longer leash for a while. I can
talk to her or email with her, but I can't
(24:56):
be in the same room with her for a while.
And it's just whatever, whatever the relationships are, it's important
to think in early recovery about who can I safely
have around me. Now, those don't have to be permanent decisions,
but in the beginning you may have to be more
protective than you need to be. Let's say three months
later or six months later.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
What a great way to say that though, And again
for people that are listening trying to maybe find the
right fit for them for them to know, hey, I
don't have to cut this cousin out forever. Just maybe
six weeks, maybe six months, maybe six years, but not forever.
I think that's great.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
Yeah, I mean you have to protect your sobriety. Look,
you know, I had thirty one years in January, and
one of the things I say is going from thirty
to thirty one that is not the hard part. That's
not the hard part. The time that you need to
be sort of hyper focused on your sobriety is typically
eighteen to thirty six months, and at that point, people
(25:57):
tend to be very stabilized, you know, as I'm saying.
But I'd also like to share some positive data with
your with your listeners, because we hear so much, we
hear so much negative data as if nobody recovers or
hardly anyone. The truth is that seventy five percent of
the people who have a substance use disorder, which is,
you know, the modern name for addiction, seventy five percent
(26:18):
will recover. They will get to a point where they
no longer meet the criteria for having an addiction seventy
five percent. The other positive data point is that once
you hit five years of continuous sobriety, you only have
a fifteen percent chance of ever relapsing again.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
That is incredible. I've never heard either one of those statistics.
Speaker 2 (26:38):
So you know, to me, it's light at the end
of the tunnel, right. I mean, don't ever give up
on your loved one because there's always, you know, still
hope that they'll they will get well, and the longer
that they stay sober, the more likely the less likely
they are to ever go back to it.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Yeah, and reset in the clock, man, I'm a big
believer in that in all things. If you have a
fight with your husband, honey, reset the clack. That got
to be the end of your marriage. It's a fight,
big deal, right, And I don't mean physical, I'm talking
about arguing, y'all, come on. But I do believe in
second chances. I believe you've been sober three four years
(27:14):
and you relapse one night, that's one night. Yes, reset
that clock and then maybe go seven years. If you relapse,
it's all good. I mean, I would rather somebody relapse
for a night or four than five years.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah. In the recoverage comunity, we actually use different terminology
that can be often referred to as a slip versus
a relapse because it doesn't go on, you know, it's
like sort of a momentary impulse loss.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
And well I like that better too, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
Yeah, because there's a distinction in any time that someone
has any kind of a slip or relapse, you know,
the focus shouldn't be on blame or making them feel bad.
The focus should be on how can we help you
to sort of refocus on your recovery and to get
whatever additional techniques or strategies or help you need so
that you can stabilize yourself again. That should be the focus.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
Amen. And you know it's so crazy because you know,
you try to remind people this is a disease. Nobody
chooses it. Nobody sits in that third grade class and goes, ooh,
I hope I'm a drug addict when I'm seventeen. Nobody
wants that they can't help it.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
It's miserable. And the truth is that that there are
the two primary causes of developing an addiction are childhood
trauma and untreated mental health. You know, and so when
you people get sober, they usually also have to do
that other work. What was what is underneath my my addiction,
what was sort of causing me to have the compulsion
(28:44):
to use to access because you need to address that
to increase your odds of sobriety, of staying sober, but
also just being happy, being productive, having a good life,
healing whatever wounds were there before you picked up that
first substance. That's why the subset out of my book is,
you know, triumph over trauma and addiction, because they are interrelated,
(29:06):
as was the PTSD that I didn't know I have.
I had in the severe anxiety. So there's usually more
than one thing to work on when people start their
recovery process.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
And that's the hard part, right I'm paleling those layers
back and admitting it, putting a spotlight on it, dealing
with it.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
It's the hard part, but it's also ultimately the way out,
you know, it's ultimately the way out.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
You know, you are so open and you are just
a tremendous source of not just information but giving people
such a playbook. How can people read you if they won't.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
To well, my memoir again from Junkie to judges on
Amazon and all the usual sites. My website junkidjudge dot
com that has like my opinion pieces I've been in
the Wall Street Journal, in the La Times. It has
a messaging feature so people can message me through my
website and I answer all messages. And then also I
do do a lot of conferences, workshops, other types of
(30:04):
speaking engagements. So reach out with opportunities, reach out with questions.
I'm happy to answer questions from anyone struggling or the
people who love them.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Judge Mary Beth O'Connor, I cannot tell you how much
I appreciate you coming on given all this incredible information,
but specifically those statistics, because I do believe in spreading
good news. I do believe that people deserve second chances
and help and support and just anything we can do
(30:37):
to make sure people are the best they can possibly be.
And you are doing that every day. So I appreciate
you coming on to Zone seven and I applaud what
you are doing well.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Thank you for having me. I've enjoyed it.
Speaker 4 (30:50):
I'm going to end Zone seven the way that I
always do with a quote, sometimes you can only find
heaven by slowly backing away from hell, actress Carrie Fisher.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is Zone seven
Host
Sheryl McCollum
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