I never wanted to start a nonprofit. I have no dreams of leading an organization. I don’t have a passion for administration.

I just wanted to hand out naloxone, talk with law makers about needle exchange, and spend time talking to people about what is most meaningful to them.

I wanted an opportunity to connect with people in a way that I don’t think is possible in currenr medical culture or the settings in which medicine is practiced.

I wanted Iowans to have the same simple things that people in many places obtain easily in order to avoid illness.

I wanted to be seen by other people, and I became increasingly aware that that would not likely happen in medicine.

I wanted the women I had met thru ethnographic research to feel like they could walk into an institution built to help and not risk losing everything.

What I wanted to do is encapsulated in 1 simple story:

Last summer I got a text from a person in Des Moines thru the @IAHarmReduction number. I met up with him in a parking lot outside a motel, where he was staying after doing 45 days in jail on some possession charges.

He was homeless, jobless, lonely, using drugs more than he cared to.

Flash forward to last night. I met him outside of the upscale hotel where he is working as security. He works 2 other jobs as a mechanic and lives with his girlfriend who he loves.

He gave me a big hug (even tho I protested bc Covid) and bragged to me about how much narcan he had given out recently (he is now well over 3,000 doses). For “my Christmas present” he told me that he had stopped using heroin for 8 weeks. He’s been decreasing his drug use since.

When he told me that this was his Xmas surprise, I laughed and told him that he should know better than to know this was how I defined success. He said he was just feeling so good and couldn’t believe that after 20 years of “feeling like a piece of shit,” he felt like he mattered

He had written a letter to me in February. It was detailed and had taken him a long time. In it he outlined how he had been transformed over 6 months. First from saving someone else’s life with naloxone, to becoming energized and turning naloxone distro into some kind of game...

Seeing how much naloxone he could give out and how many friends would save a life with it.

Everytime he met up with us to pick up naloxone, he felt something unfamiliar - a warm welcome, an interest, a sense of unconditional care.

That led him to conclude that perhaps he may have had the wrong idea about who he was meant to be in the world. That every small town sheriffs deputy who had slammed his face into the gravel, and told him he was a worthless piece of shit, might not have been right about that.

His conclusion: if these strangers could hear an admission of his greatest flaws and still greet him with a hug and invite him to speak to reporters and attend award ceremonies... well then he might have some value.

This is the kind of thing that happens EVERYDAY at a Harm Reduction program. It is a privilege to witness people connect with a love for themselves and the world, and it is what binds is to one another and gives us grace.

But here’s the thing:

It takes a whole lot to build the container in which you can build these relationships and make connections and hustle narcan. And if you are 1 of a few ppl trying to build that kind of container, you’re going to have to grow into something much more formal

I get the sense this is common across an infinite number of social movements, and almost a cliche in nonprofits: people start them because they have a particular passion or subject matter expertise, but not necessarily desire to run / found / build an organization.

I wrote this thread a while ago and never finished my draft.

But it seemed like a good a day as any to share it.

I am stepping down from my involvement with Iowa Harm Reduction Coalition after 3 years of trying (and failing) to convince other people that this work needs them