Anna Junker - Yesterday -Edmonton Journal
Rhonda Pouliot will be attending her first International Overdose Awareness Day on Wednesday.
Participants in International Overdose Awareness Day march through Edmonton on Aug. 31, 2021.
Her 34-year-old son, Chris Shea, died on April 12 of this year, six days after he experienced an overdose and was admitted to the intensive care unit at the Misericordia Hospital.
“I’m on my own healing journey right now. I’m trying to make sense of what happened in a situation where there is no sense,” Pouliot said. “I want to feel connected to other people who have experienced something similar.”
Shea had been using drugs since he was 19. He had been attending 12-step treatment programs and focused on going to the gym when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and he could no longer attend in person.
“That’s when things started to go downhill,” said Pouliot. Shea relapsed in February and wasn’t able to get a spot in treatment until April 9.
“He continuously used in that time because there were no resources and of course, his use wasn’t supervised by anybody,” Pouliot said. “There was nobody prescribing him a specific dose. He was getting the supplies from whomever.”
On April 6 he took a fatal dose. A friend administered Naloxone to Shea, who believed he was fine because he was breathing, and she ended up falling asleep because she was also using drugs.
“When she woke up later, he was unresponsive again and that was it,” Pouliot said.
Shea is one of 817 Albertans who have died between January and June of this year from a drug poisoning. Since the province began tracking records six years ago, 7,319 Albertans have died.
Moms Stop the Harm, a Canada-wide group advocating for better drug policies, is hosting its annual event marking International Overdose Awareness Day (IOAD) at Victoria Park Site 6 in Edmonton at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. The event commemorates loved ones lost to the drug poisoning crisis that experts believe is largely due to a toxic drug supply.
Edmonton’s IOAD event will include a formal program, a raffle to raise funds for a memorial garden, and Naloxone training. Pictures of loved ones will be on display and the evening will end with a candlelight vigil at the High Level Bridge that will also be lit up in purple.
Angela Welz, a member of Moms Stop the Harm organizing Wednesday’s event, said it will be an evening of support.
“We want to build a circle of love and understanding to family members who have lost a loved one and have a hard time sometimes with this type of disenfranchised and stigmatized grief,” she said. “Society doesn’t seem to understand what’s involved when you lose a loved one to substance use harm.”
In a statement, Mike Ellis, associate minister of mental health and addictions, said IOAD is a reminder of lives lost.
“Alberta’s government is building a recovery-oriented system of care to ensure that people with addiction have access to treatment and recovery resources that save lives,” he said.
With drug poisoning numbers on a bumpy decline, Ellis noted the province is cautiously optimistic the trend will continue.
“We will carry on working tirelessly to reduce deaths even further,” he said.
Meanwhile, Wetaskiwin will also be hosting its inaugural event for IOAD. The vigil will take place at Jubilee Park at 7 p.m. Wednesday and will also highlight resources available to the community.
According to data obtained by Postmedia , 15 people died of a drug poisoning in Wetaskiwin County last year.
Rhonda Watt has been doing outreach to address drug poisonings in the community. Her son, Eric, was 19 when he died of an overdose in 2017.
Watt said about two weeks ago, a girl overdosed and was revived at a low-barrier clinic located at the Wetaskiwin Mall. That same day, four other overdoses occurred in the vicinity of the clinic.
“It’s hitting hard right now and I’m tired,” she said. “I’m tired of saying the same thing over and over again and getting the same response that they’re choosing it. No, they aren’t.”
ajunker@postmedia.com
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