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For most of Michael’s adult life, addiction, crime and incarceration were a cycle he couldn’t seem to escape. What began as a desire to fit in with friends as a teenager eventually led to substance use, violence, repeated jail sentences and what Michael describes as “a lifestyle of a lot of darkness.”
He spent the majority of his adult life in and out of custody. Jobs didn’t last. Stability disappeared. His sentences grew longer, and addiction increasingly dictated the choices he made and the people he hurt.
But when Michael talks about that life today, he makes an important distinction.
“That’s not a way to live,” Michael said. “Unfortunately the path I lived, it’s not who I am today. Because who I am today is a different person.”
Michael’s path to becoming that different person has not been simple. It has required him to confront decades of behaviours, learn to ask for help, accept structure and begin building a life he had never really known how to live.
Michael began using tobacco at 13 and soon started smoking marijuana with friends. Wanting to fit in eventually led to drinking, skipping school and committing crimes.
“I started smoking weed with my friends. Peer pressure was a big part of it,” Michael said. “In order to fit in with them, I followed along. Eventually it led me to drinking. It was like the next step for me.”
As his focus shifted away from school and toward his friends, Michael began skipping classes and getting into trouble at home. He remembers rebelling against the discipline and structure his father tried to give him. At 17, he left home, still searching for acceptance and continuing to drink.
Over time, the consequences became more serious. Crime escalated into violence and intimidation, and Michael began spending more and more time behind bars. Addiction and crime became intertwined, each one feeding the other.
“I’ve spent the majority of my adult life in and out of custody,” Michael said. “I wasn’t able to hold a job. I wasn’t able to secure my place of living. My addiction got to a point where it was dependent. I was depending on crimes to get what I wanted, I was harming people and not caring what happened.”
His sentences became longer, his drug use became more serious, and the life he was living grew darker. The people around him were not encouraging him toward success, and Michael admits there was a time when he gave little thought to who he might hurt to get what he wanted.
Michael once believed prison itself might be enough to change him. In 2019, he thought serving time would finally “scare him straight.” Instead, he left prison carrying the same attitudes and behaviours he had entered with.
After violating parole three times and returning to custody repeatedly, he found himself back behind bars less than three months after finally completing parole, this time serving an 18-month sentence.
“That was the time I was like, I can’t keep living like this,” Michael said. “I am letting my family down, and the people that care about me I am hurting the most.”
He wanted to change, but wanting something different and knowing how to live differently were two separate things.
That began to change when Michael came to Harvest House in September 2024.
He arrived carrying the weight of a long criminal history, broken relationships and years of habits that had become deeply ingrained. Living sober was unfamiliar territory. Michael knew the old way of life, but he didn’t yet know how to build a new one.
Harvest House began giving him something he had been missing: structure, accountability, support and a safe place to bring his struggles into the open.
“Harvest House is teaching me to share my struggles with the guys who are here to help me,” Michael said. “As I do it each day and bring it to the light, I am getting direction on how to change my thinking.”
Instead of responding to challenges through isolation, intimidation or violence, Michael is learning to talk about what he is experiencing and accept guidance from the people around him.
“As much as I am looking for ways to self-destruct, I have people who are looking out for me and guiding me so that I don’t,” he said. “I feel like Harvest House has really helped change my life.”
The changes are visible in both large and small ways.
Since arriving at Harvest House, Michael has pursued his education, completed food-handling training, taken on responsibilities within the program and begun rebuilding relationships with his family. Most importantly, he has remained abstinent from drugs and alcohol.
“I’ve changed the way I think each day,” Michael said. “I am not calling someone looking for drugs. I’m not using. I’ve been completely abstinent from drugs and alcohol since I’ve been here in the program.”
For someone whose adult life had so often been defined by incarceration, instability and unfinished opportunities, these accomplishments have given Michael a new understanding of what success can look like.
Harvest House, he says, has not simply shown him how to get sober. It is teaching him how to live sober.
That distinction is one of the reasons Michael chose to continue at Harvest House beyond his first year. After years of losing relationships, opportunities and nearly everything he had built, he knew he needed more time before trying to navigate life on his own.
“My life was in shambles,” he said. “I destroyed all my relationships. I lost everything I ever gained, and I just didn’t feel like I was ready to go back into society and feel like I could do it all alone, because of all the years that I couldn’t. Harvest House has been there. They have supported me. They are guiding me in the direction that is benefiting my future.”
Michael completed the first year of the program in September 2025, but he knows recovery is still a daily process.
Faith has become part of that process too.
When Michael first arrived, he struggled to believe that the kind of transformation he saw in others could happen for someone like him. His relationship with God is something he is still developing, and he speaks openly about the fact that faith has not always come easily.
“I am still working on that. That is something I am struggling with,” Michael said. “But my life is ultimately better by the things that I am doing, and I can’t say that it is all me, because if it was me, I would have already left.”
For Michael, faith has increasingly meant recognizing that while he has to put in the work, he does not have to carry everything by himself.
“I’m putting in the work, yes, but there is a higher power that is guiding me,” he said. “I am very thankful that I have the staff and counsellors here in the program and the men that were before me to help me realize this.”
Today, Michael is learning to measure success differently. It is no longer about getting what he wants or proving himself to others. Success means staying sober, accepting correction, rebuilding trust and living free from the criminal behaviours that controlled so much of his past.
He has taken on responsibilities in the kitchen, helped with fundraising and become involved in many aspects of life at Harvest House. Each responsibility gives him another opportunity to practice the kind of life he once believed was out of reach.
“One thing about Harvest House is that they really made me realize that if you have structure and you follow the plan, great things can happen,” Michael said. “I am a part of so many things here that life is a lot better than it was.”
Michael does not pretend that his past has disappeared. There are things he wishes he could change and decisions he wishes he had made differently. But rather than allowing those regrets to pull him backward, he is learning to focus on what he can do today.
For years, asking for help was one of Michael’s greatest struggles. So was trusting people. Now, those very things have become essential parts of his recovery.
His message to anyone who feels trapped by addiction, past decisions or repeated failure is simple: where you are today does not have to determine where you end up.
“It doesn’t matter where you are in life,” Michael said. “If you have support and are willing to accept the help, you can make changes in life. I’ve had a lot of failure in my life and I never thought that today I would be in this position.”
Today, Michael can say something he could not say for much of his adult life: he is free of charges. He no longer has to spend each day looking over his shoulder or wondering when the consequences of his lifestyle will catch up with him.
Instead, he is learning to trust the process, build his relationship with God and believe there may be a purpose for his life beyond the one he once knew.
“I’m trying to do the best I can with what I have today,” Michael said. “I am really grateful that Harvest House has given me this chance.”
Michael knows he cannot go back and change the choices he made. What he can change is what he chooses to do today — and he hopes others who are struggling will be willing to do the same.
“There are a lot of things in my life that I am not proud of,” Michael said. “If I could have gone back to those times, obviously I would make changes along the way, but I can’t. The only thing I can do is just keep doing what is asked, focus on today, know that what I am doing today will make my life better for tomorrow and just for all the people that need help, just ask for it.”