From McDonald's to Trying to Save Lives

Most of the people that have worked with me know that I have always been a hard worker and would go above and beyond for my job. Some said I was a "suck up" but I always looked at it as me actually caring about my job and wanting to excel at it, so it came as a surprise to everyone when I decided to leave my job to pursue my passions.

This is the journey of how a nervous 16-year old boy (me), that could hardly string two words together at his first job interview, is now on a mission to save lives. Enjoy!

As soon as I turned sixteen I started begging my parents to let me get a job. I wanted to be able to buy my own video games because they, and my grandma, could only ever afford to get me one game a year, for Christmas. That simply wasn't enough, I wanted them all.

If I recall correctly, my dad was all for it, he didn't care as long as I maintained my grades in school, which isn't saying much, they were never that great anyway, although not the worst. My mom however was a lot more hesitant about it and my grandma thought it was a terrible idea and was against it. I was persistent though, I begged and begged.

My dad finally started taking me around town. I applied at a local grocery store, the same store he started his first job at. They told me I'd be second on the list to call for a job interview, a call I'm still waiting on nearly twenty years later. I didn't stop there though, I went to a locally owned burger joint, then Burger King, and several other places, including McDonald's.

Finally, I struck gold(en arches) with McDonald's! I was called for an interview and the manager, an old friend of my dad's, took pity on me and told me she'd give me a chance and not to let her down.

I'd say I succeeded in not letting her down, by the time I left McDonald's, four years later, I could do any job and position they asked me to, outside of actual managerial duties. I could work in the grill making food, both breakfast, and the regular menu, I could open, close, make salads, biscuits (when you still had to mix them), run the register, the drive-thru, do maintenance (the deep cleaning of the store, not fixing things), so much more. I also had a knowledge of procedures that couldn't be rivaled, even by most of the managers. That fact in itself put me as the team lead when we had our "crew trainer" meetings and played a trivia game. I think we always won. I was also the only person she, the manager, called or at least the only person that answered the call to go work at another store for a day after one of the hurricanes.

After leaving McDonald's, something that my grandma was again against (she was worried) I started at Walmart where I worked for five years. Just like McDonald's, I could just about work and stock any department, run the registers, unload trucks, help maintain inventory, reset the shelves, use the floor cleaning machines, and just about everything else.

My next job is the one that helped me come out of my shell, something completely different, and easily my most exciting "regular" job, I became a poker dealer.

I loved my job, I got to meet a lot of amazing people there and, like my other jobs, I went above and beyond to know and learn everything about it. There I eventually became a "dual rate," meaning I would deal sometimes and help run the room, including running the tournaments, other times.

I stayed there for eight years and loved my job, until one day I didn't. At some point, and a story for another day, I started considering leaving the job for many reasons but I never had the courage to actually do so. This changed when COVID hit.

Our casino shut down for a time due to state mandates. Even when the casino opened back up the poker room remained closed for a while. All in all, I was out of work for around three months. During my time off I got to spend a lot more time with my family, my wife, and our son. It's also worth mentioning that we had found out my wife was expecting just a couple of months before the shutdown. My wife and I talked a lot during my time off, she, nor I wanted me to miss our baby growing up because my hours were unpredictable. This, coupled with the fact that I no longer loved my job, on top of other things, made us decide to give it a few months and see if I wanted to stay there or pursue my passion of being a photographer and starting a YouTube channel.

I finally got the call to go back and was told our first day would be spent doing "COVID training," going over new procedures, cleaning the poker room, moving chairs out, and other things. It was really nice seeing my coworkers, most of whom I had not seen during the break.

Then came the first day back to dealing. I sat down at my first table and it was like I never left. I might have been a tiny bit rusty but I picked it back up in no time. The only problem, the love for my job still wasn't there, if anything it was worse and by the time it was time for me to go to the next table, 30-minutes later, my mind was set, I was done with the job.

I went home, talked to my wife, explained everything to her, and she said we could pray about it and look for a sign.

That sign, or what we took for the sign came the very next night when I found out one of my friends quit. I immediately called my wife, told her, and we agreed that it was time for me to leave but to do It in the proper way, with a two-week notice (it was more of a 3 ½  week notice), which I put in the following night. Honestly, I was nervous about doing it, I was about to quit a job that I had been working for the better part of a decade. A job that I had made many friends at. A job that had helped me grow as a person because I was able to break out of my shell. It was a job that I had once loved very much but I no longer did.

Oh yes, I was so nervous but once I put that sheet down on the boss's table I felt an overwhelming sense of calm, I felt as though I made the right choice.

To say that my coworkers were shocked would be an understatement. No one knew that I was thinking of leaving, no one knew the love for my job was gone, and everyone thought I was insane to leave to pursue my dreams and not have a backup job.

My last day at the casino was July 5th, 2020; my independence day.

It has been nearly a year and a half since I left the casino. It hasn't been sunshine and rainbows, not that I really expected it to be but it really hasn't been easy. My photography journey didn't play out and my YouTube channel took a dramatic turn after my mother-in-law died and I decided to focus on something else.

Now, I'm doing something completely different, something I never saw myself doing, I'm working with a harm reduction site that helps those that use drugs, use safely. No, I'm not enabling them, no I don't encourage them to continue to use. No, I'm trying to keep them alive.

My community is overrun by meth yet, instead of trying to help, everyone wants to make jokes and judge them, that's where I come in.

I'm trying to educate my community (as well as outside of my community) about substance use disorder and help them understand that there is a lot more to addiction than "getting high." It's a lot deeper than that. Most who use are treating much deeper problems such as PTSD, anxiety, depression, chronic pain, trauma, and so much more. This education and the supplies I hand out can literally save lives. Yet, it's a depressing thing to do because so many people don't understand, so many judges those that use, so many think it's the "addict's" fault. So many are caught up in the stigma and are uneducated about substance use disorder, just like I once was.

I'm not giving up on YouTube, I'm going to use YouTube to help pass information about substance use disorder on by talking to those suffering from it, helping them get their stories out there for the public to see that not everyone that uses substances is terrible people, most aren't. Many who suffer from SUD are actually wonderful, wonderful people.

It's time for a change, it's time for more people to understand substance use disorder, it's time to stop judging, it's time to stop locking them up (just for using), it's time to stop the stigma surrounding substance use disorder and actually get these people the help they need.

How do we make these changes?

You can start by educating yourself about substance use disorder. If you don't know where to start, simply reach out to me on my Facebook page and I will gladly answer any questions you might have, or at least do my best. If I don't know the answer, I'll find it for you or put you in contact with someone that can.

As for me, I asked myself this same question and my answer came from Michael Jackson.

I'm starting with the man in the mirror

I'm asking him to change his ways

And no message could've been any clearer

If they wanna make the world a better place

Take a look at yourself and then make a change

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