One night in 91原创’s Downtown Eastside, street artist James Hardy was working in a quiet alley, the hiss of his spray paint can echoing as he brought a new mural to life on a weathered brick wall.
Following his latest relapse in October, Hardy — known as Smokey-D for his murals raising awareness of the opioid crisis and memorializing those lost to a toxic drug supply — had shifted from using graffiti to help others, to using it as an outlet for his own pain.
“It was 1 a.m. and these two guys showed up out of nowhere,” said Hardy, 55.
“One of them was Kevin, someone I used to party with back in the day. He said, ‘Hey man, we’re here for you. Do you want to go to Thailand?’I laughed and told him, ‘Yeah, right.’ ”
But Kevin Parker wasn’t joking.
Parker, a peer worker in the Downtown Eastside, wanted to help his friend Hardy overcome his opioid addiction, just as he had overcome his own in 2009 after serving time in prison for stealing to fund his habit. And he had a plan.
“People in the community had been worried about [Hardy]. We found people in Thailand who were willing to give back and sponsor his treatment.”
Hardy is part of a growing number of British Columbians heading to Thailand for addiction treatment, driven by a public health system stretched to its limits and the high costs of private treatment centres.
A 2017 91原创 Medical Association report estimates 60,000 91原创s travel abroad for medical treatment annually, but there is no data on how many are British Columbians seeking addiction treatment.
“Word has been getting out about Thailand,” said Parker. “People in both the harm-reduction and recovery community are deciding to spend their money on addiction treatment there because their money goes much further.”
Postmedia interviewed Hardy on Tuesday, about a month into his medical detox at The Hills, a licensed in-patient detox and addiction treatment facility in Chiang Mai, Thailand. He was granted a six- to nine-month scholarship for treatment.
Parker accompanied his friend Hardy on the journey overseas for the treatment.
In four weeks, Hardy has been medically detoxed from all illicit drugs and has received one-on-one trauma counselling three times a week with a registered psychologist, along with additional services such as life skills training, fitness programs, and art therapy.
“The worst part was detoxing from GHB [a type of depressant]. I was curled up on the couch watching Netflix for about a week — but I had nurses and doctors checking in on me, giving me medication and food,” he said. “They’ve even put up fresh walls here for me to graffiti.”
For the past 17 years, Hardy had been using a mix of fentanyl, methamphetamine, crack cocaine, and GHB, along with legally prescribed methadone, an opioid agonist, from a Downtown Eastside addiction clinic to manage withdrawal symptoms.
A childhood marked by poverty and violence led Hardy to turn to drugs for escape — first marijuana at age 13, then heroin, laced into a joint he smoked with a friend, at age 16.
“I was addicted right away, and that’s how I became Smokey,” he said. “I’ve tried to stay clean more times than I can count, but I was never able to stay off the dope for more than a few days.”
Every time Hardy tried to kick his deadly drug habit in B.C., help was hard to find. He was just another name on a long provincial waiting list for publicly funded residential treatment.
“The places with available beds, like recovery homes in Surrey, didn’t offer counselling or services to help me other than 12-step group meetings. I would leave whenever my cravings took over,” Hardy said.
Former Downtown Eastside resident Brendan Fleury found himself in the same situation almost a year ago, having exhausted much of B.C.’s addiction treatment options for his opioid use disorder, including recovery homes offering abstinence-based programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous.
Nearly a year ago, Fleury tried again to recover, travelling to Start Today, a licensed rehabilitation centre in Chiang Mai, Thailand, after medically detoxing at a 91原创 hospital.
The private rehab, which costs $7,000 a month, is not only more affordable than most in Canada — where, according to the Canada Drug Rehab Addiction Services Directory, the average cost for the same duration is $9,000 — but Fleury also noted it offered more in terms of individual counselling sessions with licensed psychologists and life-skills training.
“The sessions helped me understand the reasons behind my substance use and taught me how to address my mental health,” he said, reflecting on his three-month stay at a rehab facility in Thailand, funded by the Metro 91原创-based Nate D Foundation.
For Hardy, recovery is just beginning, but he is hopeful that with wraparound services that he’s receiving, he will finally turn his life around for good.
“The last time I was clean for more than a few days was when my son was born 18 years ago,” said Hardy, who’s overdosed more times than he can count.
“In the last six months, everyone around me who has been using has been dying so quickly. I felt like I was next.”
After his detox at The Hills, Hardy plans to enter treatment at the Start Today rehabilitation centre until he feels ready and equipped to return home.
“I want to start a new life and be someone that others in the Downtown Eastside — and my son — can look to as an example.”
His friend Parker says he has been an emotional wreck since watching his long-time friend finally undertake a recovery journey.
“I cried for a week before we left, and a week after, about just how special it was to witness Smokey’s bravery,” Parker said.
“He’s been inspiring so many people in the Downtown Eastside community. In the last 30 days, I’ve had so many people come up to me crying and hugging me, saying: ‘If Smokey can do it, I can do it too.’ ”
