Presently, Matt Maholic is the proud father of three sons and a full-time employee who spends much of his leftover time working with the Surr’enity House men’s sober-living home on Kennedy Street.

However, “I couldn’t be on a more polar opposite level than two years ago,” said Maholic.

He was a heroin addict for 21 years.

Today is International Overdose Awareness Day, and to recognize it, Maholic shared with The Era the more-than-two-decade story of his journey from promising young athlete to drug addict who hit bottom — then bounced back.

At the age of 14, Maholic had never even had a sip of alcohol.

It was at that age that he had a tumor removed from his spinal cord. He was prescribed OxyContin due to his medical problems and became hooked. Pill using soon turned into heroin use.

Heroin was “more accessible for a kid,” Maholic explained.

Maholic was always a “very good athlete,” and baseball was his favorite.

“That’s all I wanted as a kid was to play baseball,” he said.

Maholic added, “I had scholarships for high level baseball in college and tryouts with professional teams.”

But at the age 17, when high students start planning for college and careers, “I guess drugs were a bigger part of my life.”

Fast-forward two decades: he found himself with “three wonderful kids” — all very good athletes, too — but was still facing the drug problems that started in his teens.

Maholic attributed his eventual recovery to his oldest son.

“He pretty much told me he didn’t want me to be his dad if I couldn’t be a dad like everybody else’s,” Maholic said.

“He followed through with it, cut me out of his life and wouldn’t come around,” he said of his son, who was 12 or 13 at the time.

For Maholic, that was hitting bottom.

His son told him not to even come to his sporting events; if Maholic showed up, the boy wasn’t going to play.

“Finally, that was the one thing that clicked for me. Nothing else ever worked.”

He explained, “We call it hitting bottom. Everybody’s bottom is different. Nobody’s bottom is worse or less.”

But it’s the first thing that needs to happen before someone can make major changes to their lives.

“If somebody’s always there to stick a pillow under your bottom every time you fall, you’re never going to get to that bottom,” Maholic said.

“I was blessed with the gift of desperation,” he said. “It was either continue on and die or change everything about myself.” That means not just quitting drug and alcohol use: “You have to change the person the drugs have turned you into.”

Maholic said that when he was using, he didn’t care who he hurt or what he had to do. But people can rise above that version of themselves.

“Life is attainable if you want it,” he said.

He advises people who have family or friends struggling with addiction, “Tell them you love them but you’re not going to love them to death.” They’re going to have to live it on their own, without assistance.

“Eventually, my family did it to me,” he said. He explained they stopped supporting him with money knowing that “support is going to be what kills you.”

The thought of losing his sons was worse for Maholic than the thought of losing his own life, evidenced by the multiple overdoses he experienced that did not stop him from using.

“I’ve overdosed more times than you have fingers,” he told The Era. “Towards the end it was almost a weekly event.”

Maholic explained he was getting pure fentanyl “off the deep web,” and said “I would do it knowing what was going to happen.” He said he “had an active death wish, really.”

He went back to rehab after his son stopped talking to him. Many previous trips to rehab had not worked, but he knew it was his only chance.

He explained, “I didn’t really want to go, but I knew that it would be the only way that maybe I could get my son back.”

Another tool that helped in his recovery is his renewed faith in God.

“I was raised Catholic but kind of turned by back on God as a kid,” he said. “I couldn’t figure out why God chose this path for my life.”

But during rehab, “I kind of realized that I needed something greater than me to stop. Obviously, I tried every other avenue in 20 years to stop and couldn’t.”

Maholic started praying every day and reading the Bible.

“It was amazing the way he worked in my life,” he said.

He was initially only supposed to be in rehab for 14 to 20 days, but he knew it wouldn’t be enough.

“I’ve been an IV drug user for 20 years; 14 days doesn’t even clear your head,” he said.

Maholic asked God. He said, “If this is your plan for me, let me go home and stay clean, or give me a sign that I’m not supposed to.”

He asked for an extra week, which was granted.

“I ended up staying for treatment for about five months,” he said.

Maholic changed everything about his life and and got involved with good people, including Dan Minich, whom Maholic calls his brother.

The pair helped create The Ministry Network of the Spirit Ministries, which opened the Surr’enity House men’s sober-living home at 80 Kennedy St., Bradford. They want to open a women’s sober living home on Potter Street, too.

Another new friend is Joe Murphey, who is the house manager of the men’s home.

“He’s like a second dad to me,” said Maholic of Murphey.

Maholic is grateful for the opportunity to work with the home.

“I’m just trying to give back to the community,” he said.

A sober-living home was a much-needed entity here, too, according to Maholic.

“There was nothing like that around here when I was going in and out of rehab,” he said.

Having a home locally also means that tenants won’t have to be far from family, which was one of his concerns when he was at the point in his recovery that he needed the support.

“I had three kids and didn’t want to be away from them,” he said.

The people who run the Surr’enity House put great care into providing love and support for its tenants and provide “every opportunity for them to become productive members of society,” said Maholic.

Maholic’s advice to someone who is battling drug addiction?
“Don’t give up,” he said. “That’s one of the best things I can say.”

Maholic said that if someone like him can change his life, anyone can.

He recalls a time when he was very different than he is today.

“I was unemployable.” While he had family, “No one wanted to be around me.” He explained he was “in and out of trouble,” and would steal and lie.

Now, he works at KOA Speer Electronics and has a great relationship with his sons.

“(KOA Speer) were gracious enough to give me a chance to prove myself,” he said.

He noted, “You have to be willing to make some sacrifices. The first thing is to admit to having a problem.”

And not only admit it, but also accept it.

“You accept it when you chose to do something about it,” he said.

Also, “Surround yourself with good people,” Maholic added. For him, that means spending time with his sons and the people with The Ministry Network of the Spirit Ministries.

For people on the outside of addiction looking in, Maholic said, “I know there’s a stigma attached to people who are drug addicts, that we’re bad people or lazy people and that we chose this for our life.” While he agreed that to some degree it was a choice when he started, but eventually “it ceases to become a choice.”

And addicts, he said, are some of the kindest, smartest, hardworking people in the world — “if they have the chance to prove it.”

He said that when given a second chance, many can achieve amazing things.

“Being a drug addict is a more-than-24-hour-a-day job; it never ends,” he said. Now that he has overcome his life as an addict, working an eight-hour day is cake.

His day now typically begins at 5 a.m. with him working out with Minich from 5 to 7 a.m. He goes to work, then stops at the ministry and does recovery-based things usually until 9 or 10 p.m. He takes time to be there for his sons’ sporting events, too.

“My day couldn’t be any fuller,” he said.