Employee with Substance Abuse Issues

James: I worked full-time in a chemical plant. I'm a power engineer and operator. I never went to work under the influence or anything, but I was very negative and angry at work all the time. It was quite uh, scary and stressful I guess to think about going to my management, my manager, and tell him what was going on and ask him for help and the labels... kind of coming out in the open. Being an alcoholic, or an addict. I was nervous about losing my job, being able to support my family and all that stuff that goes with it. It was a big step to go in there and tell them that I was abusing alcohol and I needed help and I needed to take some time off work. I expected to be, you know, put on the spot and accusations and threatened to be fired or fired maybe. Kinda, as I told my story to them they were just like "well as long as you're willing to do the work we're willing to back you." On the way out the door, the man from HR told me that his daughter had seven years and that I was going to be okay. And that was quite heart-warming, really. I came to the Last Door. We had investigated a few treatment centres but we kind of came here first for the entry interview and I felt really good about it right away. Right away I felt like this was the place. We had looked at some other ones that were like twenty eight days. I knew that that wasn't going to be enough for me. I had spent a long time trying to do this on my own, and I just knew that it was going to take more than that. You know, take some time off from my job because you know, without it, I'm not a good employee, I'm not a good father, I'm not a good partner, I'm not a good brother, until I get my stuff sorted out. I just took that time to come here and do the work. It can be all those things. It's been huge. It's been the most important thing I've done in my life for sure. It's really hard for me to even describe how much my thinking has changed and people that I haven't seen in a while they tell me they don't even recognize me and I don' t look the same because I don' t have an angry scowl on my face all the time. I feel like I got my heart back. Every relationship in my life is so much better. My son, we can get along now. I guess there's a little bit of anxiety with it, but I'm also eager to go back and prove myself and show 'em how far I've come and take responsibility by going back and doing my job, you know?