‘I don’t fight it’: Navigating addiction, recovery during the holidays

AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - The CDC classifies December, January, and March as the most dangerous times of the year for drug and alcohol-related deaths.

Since 1999, nearly 91,000 deaths have been reported. The American Addiction Center says during the holidays, 29% of people say they drink more.

The holidays are known to be a joyful time, but for others, this can be a challenging time for those in recovery.

Spencer Wortley and Beau Bohling know the challenge all too well. Both Wortley and Bohling found help in recovery at The Hale House. They’ve been sober for nearly two years now.

Bohling said: “I was at a point where I just couldn’t live happily at all. I was worthless, useless to my family, to anybody.”

Wortley said: “I always had an issue with drugs and alcohol for a long time since I was about 15, and it was very apparent that it was the master of my life.”

Now Bohling and Wortley can say they are living a life drug and alcohol-free.

“The way it works is good to keep sharing that hope that we didn’t have,” said Bohling. “The hope that we got here to give it to someone else.”

After all, it was hope that got the two of them help in the first place.

“I saw guys that were still sober, and I call those guys hope in human form because I saw that they were just once as hopeless as I was, and they were still sober, and they looked happier every time I was coming back,” said Wortley.

It was at The Hale House that the two of them were able to see life on the other side of addiction.

Wortley said: “I think it’s a big misunderstanding on the outside world looking in on guys and women staying sober that we’re just fighting it off during the holidays or not on the holidays. I don’t fight it at all today.”

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