Amber’s Journey: Struggles & Hope in Appalachia

Amber’s Journey: Struggles & Hope in Appalachia

How’s it going? Oh, miserable. I’m covered 
in bug bites. Oh my goodness. You’ve been camping? Yeah. Tank Springs one night. 
Yeah. Where were you at at Tank Springs? Uh, you know where the train 
trestle is? Right past it. And that’s about a week old. This is Olivia. 
She’s a associate of mine. She works with me on some different projects and we’ve been 
working today. She’s been in town. She’s from North Carolina. She has a Tik Tok channel 
and YouTube also. I can’t get on either. I’m out of data. Yeah. Well, we got you a solar 
charger and we brought you something to eat. So, I appreciate it. You’ve just um itching all 
over. Yeah. You need some something for that, don’t you? Nothing seems to help. I don’t know 
what uh Venice, she needs some cortisone cream for that for those bug bites. Benadryil, I’ve 
used cortisone. Neil cream. You put the cream on it. Lotion. Maybe that might work. Try it. Works, 
but I’m out of it. Well, seeine would probably be more just for like poison ivy or something. 
I guess I don’t have poison ivy. If I did, I’d be in big trouble. I use that hydrocortisone 
a lot of time. Anti-itchch. We can probably try to get you some tomorrow. Maybe. We got two or 
three projects tomorrow we’re working on, but we’ll try to gather you some up. Okay. We went to 
school together. Uhhuh. I’ve known you for a long time. For What’s keeping you stuck here right now? 
Like in Campbell County? My kids. What’s keeping you from getting your kids right now? Uh place to 
stay. No place to stay. An actual place to live. Would you be interested in going into a program 
in Middlesboro, Kentucky for women? I’m actually getting ready to go to treatment. Are you? Where 
you going to get to go to? As soon as man trans proves that I’m going to the one in Norse. Nor. 
Okay. Yeah. Journey Pier. Journey. Great. That’s great. Journey is a good We’re glad to hear that. 
That’s great. Yep. It’s either 30 days there or 30 days in the Crossbar Motel. I don’t want to go 
back there. One thing that I learned that I had to do was absolutely make the best of whatever 
it may have been that I was doing there. See, I went through rehab and then got right back out 
and went straight to the streets and then done it again and again and again until I was almost dead. 
Um, about a year and a half ago, I was pretty much about dead. I’ve seen I don’t know how many people 
from the streets here that I was on that you know, I’m sure too that are all dead and gone now. 
There’s hardly none of us left. No. Um, there’s there’s not. Um when when you leave the treatment 
there at Journey Pure that real quick um you you have some options with with leaving about going 
to um like PHP or an IOP program. If you decide when you leave that to go to PHP or IOP uh East 
Tennessee addiction specialist and then uh Evolve uh both are really good um basically an impatient 
program. They’re 30, 60, and 90 days. 90-day is a lot better. They help you with resources, getting 
food stamps back. They help you get a job. They they help you find housing, transitional living, 
things to to get you on your feet and keep you, you know, keep you going, get you back on, you 
know, I don’t know if you remember me about a year and a half or two or so ago, but I last 
time I remember actually seeing you when you had that little store. Uh, right before RG 
used to be. Is that the last time? Last time I remember seeing you. Well, I I changed a 
lot. I kind of lost it there for a little bit after dad died. That happened. Myself go numb. 
That That’s what a lot of people don’t realize that the drugs are about is numbing out the pain, 
numbing out the bull crap of life, basically. Um, it’s easier to numb it out than have to deal 
with it. Yeah, that’s the truth. Do you like the cottage pie? It’s really good. Thank you. I made 
it today. Just made it a little while ago. That’s why it was taking a minute to get here. Well, 
we’ve been out of town on and off quite a bit. So, but I’m glad was able to get you something 
tonight. I know you called me I think yesterday, didn’t you? Maybe. Yeah. Where? Last couple days 
I’ve called everybody. Where are you staying? Like do you sleep outside right now? Yeah, I’m 
in a basement. And whose basement? A friend of mine’s. It’s actually my ex-boyfriend’s cousin’s. 
Well, at least you got some place to stay. That’s good. Yeah, that’s a roof over my head. Not 
too fond of the spiders, though. Oh, yeah. Well, I think I’ve met you for food three or 
four times now, I think. And we haven’t ever interviewed you. What can you give us an idea 
of maybe what caused you to get this situation where you’re at? Honestly, running them with 
the wrong crowd and drugs. Drugs. Yeah. What type of drugs? Like uh first it was opiates and 
it was inetamine. That’s a a big transition that happens around here a lot is go from pain pills 
or other opiates to to meth pretty quick. Mhm. Well, we’ll what we’ll do is we saw Brian 
down there. Uh we’ll we’ll drop you back off downtown so you don’t have to walk. Okay. 
Yeah. He didn’t want to do an interview. His camera shot. I know. We told I think we 
gave him food not too long ago. Few days ago probably he wasn’t with him that day. 
He said, “Well, it’s been more than a few days ago.” It does. We We We get into so much 
stuff that it goes It goes by pretty quick. So, when do you have to be in the rehab by? 
My lawyer wants me to go before I go to court, which is August 5th. Now, what what are your 
charges in court about? Um, possession of schedule two with the intent manufacturer, delivery, sale, 
and drug paraphernalia. Yeah. So, he thinks if he gets you in rehab, you’re going to be able to get 
by that. The state’s agreed to drop it down from a felony to a misdemeanor. And I wasn’t even what 
they wanted. They wanted somebody else and he ran and I got caught. Oh, you was with somebody 
else. Yep. Was you selling it or something or just using I was just hanging out talking to him 
and they’ve been wanting for a while. I won’t put his name out there, but I’m sure with just a 
little bit of imagination, you figure out who it is. As long as it wasn’t me. I don’t care on 
this one. You know, it wasn’t me this time. Well, we don’t need no names. We’re just talking people 
say, “I’ve never watched anything from you.” Good, you know, good advice. Well, even that’s that’s 
great because um the opinions of the past and that are starting to be shed. Where did you 
grow up? Uh between Carl and Lake City out Shady Cove is where I spent the majority of my 
childhood. Not far from here. Next county over, right? Campbell County. No, it’s still in Campbell 
County. Camel. Okay. Um how do I describe? You take the old road between Carol and Lake City. 
Mhm. And right before you get into Lake City, there’s a little train trestle. Yeah. You turn 
left to Cherry Bottom. Yeah. It’s off of Cherry Bottom. Okay. You went to Campbell County High 
School except for like two weeks I transferred to Anderson County cuz Kobe Prince threatened to 
kill me. I’m sure you remember that one. Who? Kobe Prince. Kobe Prince. I’ve not heard that name in 
a while. He wrote me a letter threatening to kill me in school at him. Oh, it has been since school 
since I’ve heard from him. So anything about him? You know, I don’t remember that incident, but I 
can tell you every word that letter said word for word to this day. Did it bother you that bad? Oh, 
yeah. I’m having to testify and read it in court. And I’m sure you had to go to court over that. 
You You may not realize it, but you know, that situation is probably a lot of your trauma, all 
your past that probably led to your situation now. Make sure when you go to rehab to start addressing 
those issues. Try to get to the underlying problem of what’s going on. Until you address what’s 
causing the addiction, you you can never get rid of the addiction. Um, you know, you always will be 
in recovery. There will be times your mind wants to seep back into the old habits, but um it takes 
work. You have to work it every day. Yep. I can’t believe I relapsed after being sober so long, but 
it happens. How old was you sober? See, close 5 years. How old was you when you first started 
using? How young? Yeah. I don’t even remember. A teenager. And what caused you to relapse after 
being sober for so long? Running with the wrong people again, wanting to feed people. The same 
thing that always causes relapses. People, places, and things. It’s the three leading causes 
to to every relapse and every addiction. You think you can do it once and it’ll be okay, 
but one time turns into 10 and so you know, you’re hooking. I I do the NA thing, not the 
AA thing. I was never an alpha, but you know, they’ve got a saying in AA, one’s too many and 
a thousand’s never enough. And it’s the truth. You don’t you you think after the first one, okay, 
yeah, I got myself. I can I I can do this. But no, you you know, but don’t don’t beat yourself up 
over it because 5 years is a major accomplishment that most people can’t have. Oh yeah. I’m going 
to wrap my food up while the boat gets so hot. I can I don’t want to eat a lot and get food 
right now. Yeah. I can’t because it’s so hot right now. But yeah, we can put your stuff in 
the bag and we’ll drop you off back downtown here so you don’t have to walk to Brown. Okay. I 
got to watch my baby graduate high school though. That’s awesome. Isaiah graduated high school. 
How old are your kids? 19 and 11. Yeah. How old are you? 38. Getting ready to be 39. Um, you 
know, a lot of people when I asked you this earlier about what was keeping you here, you 
said your kids and stuff, you know, make sure though when you when you go to tri to to do it 
for for yourself, though. Oh, yeah. You know, it’s great to have them in the back of your 
mind, but until you allow yourself to process it and go with it and work on your own things, 
you can’t allow yourself. My kids can’t get sober for me. I have to do it for myself. Mhm. But What 
would be something that could keep you from this situation? What what what is something mindset 
wise, physically wise, whatever that can that you feel like would get you out of this situation? 
What do you need? [Music] A break. Well, if you go dur you you’ll get a 28 day one, but that’s that’s 
not always enough. Which way? You’re wrong. I’ll get a break from the outside world. I won’t get 
a break from in here. Well, that’s why you got to work on this up here the whole time you’re in 
there. And if you remember anything about me, I’m my own worst enemy when it comes over. We all 
are. When it’s an addiction, we all are. But the one thing too to remember, be open and honest with 
yourself first and foremost and the people around you second. When you know, you walk into the NA 
room, you raise your hand and or or to speak, there there’s a saying, uh, hi, I’m Dustin. 
and I’m an addict. Mhm. Um the reason that is is that’s because in most cases that’s the first 
honest thing that we actually said to ourselves or anyone else in recovery was the admittance 
of knowing that we are an addict. Now once you process and you can understand that you’re that 
and the honesty and openness flows from there, you can work on yourself and begin to heal. You know, 
you really though make sure to be honest with, you know, in in your groups. Be honest with yourself 
and make sure to just let it all out. Don’t be afraid to break down and cry. Don’t be afraid to 
scream. Excuse me. I block I blocked so much of it out. The first time I went through rehab, I was 
so mad I slung a chair through a window. Excuse me. It happens. you know the emotions. See with 
meth especially uh serotonin, dopamine, you know, other chemicals in your body that are highly 
elevated during the use of it are depleted when you stop. You’ll start having a flood of emotions 
and and things come around you. But that’s where your support system, your NA, your groups, your 
meetings, everything come a part of that and help you build a support system. The people that’s 
around you on the streets right now, they are not your support system. They are out for themselves. 
It wasn’t until I got in recovery that I had a true support system of people. There’s nobody that 
I know of on the streets that I can call and ask for anything. But I have a list probably a mile 
long of people that I know that are in recovery that I’ve dealt with at other facilities that 
would at the drop of a hat be right here no matter what because they understand because they want to 
see better for other people. Um you know there was someone a few weeks ago uh you know Anthony Goins. 
Lil Yeah. Yeah. little aunt, well, his dad, um, Big Anthony, Big Anthony went to rehab, um, about 
2 months ago now. Me and dad met him down here and and we went, he graduated the program uh, last 
Wednesday. Oh, wow. Now he’s going into another sober living program and he’s moving into another 
house of his. Two months ago, he was living on a shed in somebody else’s yard that had no clue he 
was even there. They were just squatting and and and not know what to do. And now he’s got a place 
that he’s able to get into his own. He’s going to Mara to get a job. You know, he he got a grant for 
the housing over there. They they’ve done amazing things with him. Wow. It’s just you get out of it 
what you put into it. Yeah, that’s true. And make sure to put everything into it that that you can 
put into it. You work every day to get your fix, work every day to get better. I mean, look, you 
get tired and bored, whatever. You got a crackhead here. You got you, right? They’re going to get up. 
They’re going to hustle and they’re going to go get their fix no matter what. I love the meme that 
says, “Don’t get up and let a crackhead out hustle you today because it’s the truth. You’ll get up. 
If you’re willing to do anything for the high, you should be willing to do anything for the 
recovery.” Yeah, that’s Let’s get your thing back in that box and uh the food, Dustin. Help her with 
that right there and we’ll get her stuff loaded up and we’ll give her a ride back down to town. 
If I can find him, we saw him coming up. He was down at HY Woodson’s. We figured he didn’t want to 
talk down where? Well, we I call it Hy Woodsons. It’s a building downtown on Beach Street. He’s 
on Beach Street right on the corner. Okay. Cory, Indiana and Beach down here. Um Oh, he’s in 
a maint. Yeah. We’ll take you and drop you off down there. Okay. All right. The house that 
you’re at, the basement that you’re staying at, is it near is it like Why were you down here? 
Is it far away from here or See that white light up there? Yeah. And trees up there. So, are you 
going back up there tonight? Yeah. So, what are you going to town for? Just to walk around for a 
little bit, get out of that basement. Okay. All right. Yeah. Fleas are You think some of those are 
flea bites you got, Amber? It wouldn’t surprise me. Are they fleas in that basement? Maybe. Uh, 
there’s fleas in the yard. In the yard. Okay. When was the last time you had a got a fix or it’s been 
a couple days. Does it last a couple days? Like what do you do? Not at all. It not really last 
a couple of minutes, honestly. And is it is it meth like your drug of choice? Not really. I was 
always opiates. Oh, y’all put the naple down cold turkey. I should be able to kick everything else. 
It’s just getting away from the wrong crowd. Yeah. people, places, and things. Why I left Caribel? 
Most of my demons, per se, was in Caribel. What type of opiates do you do now? Or 
what was the last one that you did? Oh, pain pills. I’ve never been on heroin or nothing. 
[Music] I never will do heroin. I’ve had to bring too many people back from it. Yeah, fentanyl is 
really rampant nowadays. I feel like everything’s got fentanyl in it. Even the Well, most of the 
painkillers that you get are generally fake, uh, which are a pressed or a type of fentanyl 
pill. Weed’s got fentanol in it. Meth’s got it in it. Weed. They they’ll even cut uh weed with 
fentanyl. Um the reason they do so much cutting on the the dope a lot of times with fentanyl 
is um meth itself aside from the depression and stuff is fairly easy to come off with. But 
if you add a little bit of fentanyl to it, it makes it extremely more addictive and extremely 
harder to come off of. So, it ties a junkie or a user to a dealer because they don’t understand 
why that um you know, they’re not coming off of it like normal, why the the dopes changed or why 
there’s an issue. But yeah, it’s in everything about the dollar with the the dealers. 
They’ll do anything for that extra dollar. Well, thank you for talking to us tonight. 
We’ll try to get you some cortisone cream if you’ll call me. We got a real busy schedule, 
but we’ll we’ll see if we can help you with something else. Okay. Thank you. All right. 
You get your bags. You got your stuff. You got it. I got your bag over here. I got the 
door, Amber. I got it for you, sweetheart. Be careful tonight. Bye. Byebye. [Music] We don’t ever know what they’re going to do 
with the things we give them. The solar charger is about a $30 item and it keeps their phones 
charged, but whether they um trade it for dope, somebody will steal it soon as they go to 
sleep if they’re staying somewhere. Um, so we we don’t always give them two solar 
chargers, but this is about the fifth or sixth time I’ve worked with Amber to bring her 
stuff. And then we’ve tucked her boyfriend, he didn’t want to be on video. And a lot of 
people, you a lot of times you’re not seeing the food we’re giving out because especially 
the first three or four times we give it out, we try to not film necessarily uh to get to know 
them, right? I want them to get familiar with us, what we’re doing, who, what, when, where, why, 
how, and so on. That way they’re not put in a position or or an uncomfortable situation that 
prevents them from reaching out from help, you know, for help. All right, guys. Yeah, it’s dark 
in here. The camera’s not picking up real good, but we wanted to do a little bit of closing. I 
know a lot of people’s been asking about James, and so we’re going to do an update on 
James tonight on this little video. Um James got uh a couple individuals that live in 
the mountains that offer to let James come there and stay on their property. And um so were there 
a little more isolated communication? We can’t get a hold of James, but we know he’s we know he’s 
doing okay. He was doing okay. He has lost his Facebook account somehow. Uh somebody hacked it. 
That happens a lot. He couldn’t get back into it. So, we we haven’t directly talked to James in a 
while. Uh James stayed at the lake for a couple weeks. That’s as long as he could stay there 
and thankfully these guys offered him a place to stay. Um so, we’ve not really been in contact 
with James. James really needs to go to rehab and everybody knows that. He knows that, but he has 
the dog Dodo and that’s not his dog really. The owner of that dog is actually in rehab herself. 
So, so we don’t know until somebody, you know, goes to rehab. Like we’re talking to Amber there 
about rehab. And she might go, you know, well, it sounds to me like in her circumstances, she 
has no option. Yeah. She’s in trouble. And that’s usually gets them in there until they get out of 
trouble. Then they’re back on the street and they serve how much time they got to in rehab. And and 
I get that and I I I do understand the the process and the program of it. But saying okay 30 days in 
rehab versus 30 days in jail to me that don’t work because you’re you’re just going now incarcerate 
well rehabilitation before incarceration is something that I firmly believe in if it’s allowed 
due process and giving a lengthy program in it. uh the county started doing through uh volunteers 
for recovery an 18-month program that’s really allowed drug court and stuff here to s 
you know start to succeed. U Miss Lawson uh Ray she she does a phenomenal job getting these 
guys uh into a rehab but the problem is too short a time sometimes or or just not the mindset and 
willingness to want to go feeling forced and they come straight back to the streets without any 
options or the ability to do anything. So you get right back with the same people. What’s the actual 
percentage? You know, what’s the percentage of them that actually make it to rehab and stay out 
of drugs? Uh about 2% maybe. Um I know the drug court percentage of successful completion is 2%. 
So two and 100 people according to the statistics that I was shown last um is all that actually 
makes it through recovery and succeeds with it. So, we we have a lot of people’s asked about the 
Johnson City people um that we were going to. I was working with Rebecca up there for uh several 
months and me and Rebecca stopped seeing each other. So, um that uh that is not happening right 
now. Uh Johnson City is about a 3-hour drive for us, 6 hours round trip. And we will get back to 
Johnson City. We just had so much going on with the uh building process of the barn dominium. We 
couldn’t leave town hardly for a day and it’s a full day or two-day trip to go up there. So, um we 
you know even if it was a day trip, we would be so packed and it was so hard. Yes, it’s it was very 
hard to get done in a day and we were spending the night sometimes. Uh very it was a very expensive 
trip for us gas-wise, motel wise and all that to go up there. We’re here in town in Lfallet. 
We have just as many people right here in town that we can help pretty much on a daily basis. Uh 
although I miss Bender and and I do I I love the guys up there. I miss them. But I do enjoy being 
able to work with people here, people that I knew was on the streets in the same, you know, same 
city, same situation that I was dealing with. Um, you know, it it feels great to me, you know, to 
be able to walk up to police officers that I know and they they double take, you know, wanting 
to or trying to figure out who I was because of the progress been made with it. But, um, it it 
does it it feels great to get to help the people here. Yeah. Um, so but you know, we’ve been some 
comments on some of the other videos about James. James is okay as far as we know. James does not 
wretch out to us. Uh, the people in Johnson City, uh, we’re going to try to get back there uh, at 
some point. Then we also was helping people in Knoxville. Those longer trips like that, gaswise, 
travelwise, all that was getting quite expensive at this point. But, uh, here locally, we do this a 
couple times a day. Sometimes, take food out. It’s 11:00. We’re coming in right now. It’s 11:00. And 
so, that’s not unusual to be out giving out food. So, you’ve not seen us uh filming giving out food 
recently, but we have been doing that with uh in some of the same people. We continue at least once 
a week take food to them. So, yeah. And you know, they’re very appreciative of of what we bring 
them and the things that you want. Most of them are. Most of them are. I mean, don’t get me wrong, 
there there’s the occasional. There’s some people that feel like we need to bring them more and more 
every time. And we most cases will. Yeah. But, you know, if it wasn’t for you all and the things 
that you all send, we we couldn’t do the things that we do. And we greatly greatly appreciate 
the And the only thing we’re needing right now is Gatorade. That there we’ve got some food 
left. Uh we our stock is getting a little low on things unfortunately. But we but we’ve got some 
food. We’re just right now with it being so hot, we could use some more Gatorade if anybody wants 
to buy any Gatorade off the Amazon list. Uh I think you can get it for $8. So for as low as $8, 
you can for I think what is it like a 12-pack of the the bottles or something like that. It’s on 
the Amazon list. I don’t know. So it’s on the list. The Gatorade’s on there. I’ll have that 
list on this video. Um, I’ll add that on mine, too. And we’ll uh we’ll try to uh there’s um 
we really don’t need a whole lot of food at the moment outside the Gatorade or anything else 
really. That’s it. Uh we can get some Gatorade to start giving out. We’ll try to get some ice and 
some coolers and and take that and just start giving that out. Make some videos of that. And 
uh this is your first trip with us out, I think, ain’t it, with giving out food, Olivia? So, um 
other than James. Oh, yeah. That’s right. He was with us with James. She went with us to take 
stuff to James. So last time she was here. Um so we’re going to get off here. We’re back to our 
place here to the Appalachian Channel Studios and uh this is where we live. It still feels so 
strange pulling in with the garage door opening and all kind of it is. So, we’ll uh we’ll turn the 
uh if you haven’t seen the video, we made a video of the whole tour of the uh the barnaminium and 
you can watch that and see what we’ve done. But uh uh guys, we’re going to get off here. Thank 
you all. Thanks for watching. Make sure to like, subscribe, and if you want to follow Olivia, 
that’s uh Chronicles of Olivia on Tik Tok and YouTube. And guys, we’ll see you 
on the next video. Bye-bye. [Music]

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Amber’s journey through the struggles of addiction and homelessness in Appalachia reveals a troubling series of events but also shines a light on hope and resilience. Join me as we connect with Amber, who candidly shares her story of battling addiction, her fight for stability, and her dreams of reuniting with her children. From navigating life in a basement to her determination to seek treatment at JourneyPure, this video showcases the raw reality of life on the streets and the efforts to bring hope for stability.

Through heartfelt conversations, we uncover the challenges Amber faces—from her painful past to seeking a way out of the cycle of addiction. This video not only highlights the importance of programs like inpatient and transitional living but also demonstrates the power of community and support in making a difference.

Unfortunately, the path to recovery is never easy, but Amber’s strength and her willingness to take the next steps show that change is possible. Let’s explore her story and the efforts to provide her food, resources, and guidance. Together, we aim to support those in need and bring attention to the struggles and triumphs of individuals in similar situations.

Watch now to learn more about Amber’s journey and the realities of homeless outreach in Appalachia. Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share to help spread awareness and support these vital efforts. Your engagement can make a real difference. Thank you for being part of this community.

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