His Hands

Non-profit automotive garage helps heroin addict recover

By Brad Devereaux
MLive.com

MIDLAND COUNTY, Mich. (AP) — Sometimes the greatest obstacle to leaving the past behind is getting the wheels to drive away from it.

His Hands, a nonprofit, full-service automotive garage open to the public, is a Midland County church’s way of helping out. The garage is at Messiah Lutheran Church in Bullock Creek, where customers pay based on ability, according to MLive.com.

Among those in need: Lou Rich, 44, a Midland man whose past includes trauma, loss and heroin addiction. Rich received a van from His Hands, and he is using his new ride to help others.

“It just gave me so much freedom,” Rich said, noting that before he depended on others for rides to Narcotics Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings, “Now that I have a van, I can help out and give back and help people get to meetings daily.”

Rich started using drugs in the 1980s, when he was a teenager living in Mount Pleasant, “just to be in the ‘in’ crowd,” he said. His continued drug use cost him two jobs in Mount Pleasant and his marriage, he said.

He became addicted after doctors prescribed him Vicodin for a broken foot in 2010, and his dosage increased as he used drugs to cope with the deaths of several family members, he said. He tried treatment more than once but was not successful, he said.

The crippling emotional blow that sent Rich further into depression and self-medication was when his 10-year-old son, Caleb, suffered cardiac arrest after an asthma attack and died in Rich’s arms in October 2011 in the Mount Pleasant area.

“I lost him when I was doing CPR on him,” Rich said. “It was the worst moment of my life.”

Rich became increasingly angry with God, he said, and his addiction peaked when he switched to snorting heroin, as much as a gram per day (about four lines).

In the grips of addiction, Rich said he didn’t feel like he had a choice but to use opiates.

“You’re in this darkness, you know? You’re depressed and lonely,” Rich said. “You feel like you don’t have any way out.”

He would take extra pills at times, “hoping I wouldn’t wake up,” Rich said. “It’s something I never want to go back to.”

A friend helped Rich begin a relationship with God, and soon he felt the desire to stop using substances, Rich said, though he still was addicted. With encouragement, he called to get help.

He checked into detox in Mount Pleasant, then moved into a residential living space in Midland. He then lived at Midland’s Open Door before he moved into a newly remodeled sober living house in Midland. He lived there for the next 10 months, getting rides every day to Narcotics Anonymous and Alcohol Anonymous meetings in Midland.

He was baptized in June 2012 and attended services at Restoration Fellowship, a recovery-based church that operates as part of Messiah Lutheran Church.

Rich began serving communion at the church and spending time with the pastors there when he found out about the Rev. Ed Doerner’s plan to start an auto repair garage to help citizens and motorists in need.

Some patrons, called customers, pay full price for repairs and maintenance, while others, called clients, apply and must be approved to receive discounted mechanic service at Messiah Lutheran Church, Director of Communications Lindsay Henry said.

“The profits we make from full-paying customers are used to cover operating costs and assist those with limited means,” Henry said.

His Hands employs one full-time mechanic. Delta College students working for college credit help with the workload.

Rich volunteered to help with oil changes during the grand opening of His Hands in June. He worked to pay for parts to make repairs to the vehicle.

Soon after, he received a van that had been donated and fixed up at His Hands. The Salvation Army paid for the car, Rich said, and he only had to pay about $160 for registration and insurance.

His Hands was partly inspired by a community study that identified transportation as an important issue for people in Midland, the Rev. Tige Culbertson of Restoration Fellowship said.
Culbertson said he has watched Rich transform over the past year since he met him.

“As soon as he took possession of the van, he was already thinking about how to use it to bless other people,” Culbertson said.

Rich recently was trained as a recovery coach and is helping others trying to overcome addictions, which he believes may be his calling in life. He volunteers as house manager at the sober house.

He now works part-time as a janitor at a nearby department store to pay rent at the sober house. He is seeing therapists to address his emotional issues.

“Until I got clean and sober, I didn’t accept the loss of my son,” he said. “I was using the substances to cover the pain.”

As of mid-July, Rich had been clean of all non-prescription drugs and alcohol for 14 1/2 months.

He’s looking forward.

“My whole outlook on life has changed,” he said. “I’m grateful to wake up in the morning and have a job to go to. I’m looking forward to the next day to see whatever opportunities and blessings come my way and what doors are going to be opened.”