Middle school students from St. Joseph Catholic School tied more than 100 pairs of shoes to the fence surrounding the school’s playground in the 1300 block of 6th Avenue on Tuesday, August 30, 2016. Each pair of shoes represented a life lost to drug overdoses.
HUNTINGTON,W.Va. — Three years ago this month, Ann Niday lost her only son after he overdosed, just 13 days before his 27th birthday.
More than a year ago, 23-year-old Dustina Spears found herself pregnant with her third child and addicted to heroin. She had already lost custody of her two sons after becoming addicted to heroin at 19.
Wednesday, the two mothers stood in the same room, both healing from the addiction that rocked their lives, hoping to spread hope to others still on the other side at Prestera Center’s International Overdose Awareness Day program.
Niday spoke on the support groups in the area for families and loved ones of people with substance use disorders, including Grief Recovery After a Substance Passing, or GRASP, which she is a part of.
“The fight for this problem doesn’t end when you lose your loved one,” Niday said. “Even though my addict is gone, it’s so important for me to be a part of this community and hopefully find a way to solve it. I do it for my son. If there is a person I can impact that then goes on to recovery, then that is for him.”
Every day in America, 129 people die from an overdose. Cabell County had 70 overdose deaths last year. Seventy pairs of shoes and 129 balloons represented those lost lives…
