Turning Obstacles and Suffering into Successful Recovery, with Patrick Babcock

ABOUT THE EPISODE:
After 14 treatment centers, 10 jails in six different states, and solitary confinement at Rikers Island prison, Patrick Babcock is lucky to be alive.  

His parents were barely adults themselves when he was born, dealing with their own alcoholism, physical abuse, and abandonment issues. Patrick’s own substance use began early, sneaking his father's Heinekens at age 7 and smoking marijuana with his friend's parents at age 10. He went from an Ivy League kindergarten to running "feral" in the streets of New York, attending the debaucherous Studio 54 at only 14 years old. Though he managed to get a degree in finance, his life was soon further destroyed by heroin.

Patrick's sobriety required a "spiritual awakening" that finally came while sitting alone in a car after escaping the police, drinking the dregs of a wine bottle he'd found in the street. He never returned to substance use after that night. But when the horror of 9/11 changed his life forever in a very personal way, he started down a path to help young people who had suffered in the same way he had.

In this episode, you'll hear why the program Patrick founded and runs, Foundation House, believes in failure, the unexpected power of the "inmates running the asylum," and how parents' own "dark inner rascals" may set their kids up to fail.

RESOURCES:

Foundation House website

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