Years ago I was working as a support to man who was formerly unhoused and living with a mental health concern. He would visit me in my office with near-jubilation on a daily basis. “What’s happening Jay?!” was his catch-phrase and I usually heard it before he strode through the door and grabbed the free seat in my office. I had started coming in at 7:00 AM to get paperwork done in quiet, and he’d be in my face at 7:01 - which I actually loved. I don’t know if he watched the block or what, but he was first before “first” was a thing.

Most of the time he wanted to chat about money-making ideas. I was supportive of his endeavors of course. I was attracted to his ambition. He had trouble following through, but no trouble dreaming. I would help him with the follow-through.

“Jay - you gotta help me make some money,” he started in on me with a grin. This was expected. What was next, was not, “I need money for more cocaine.”

How to proceed?

I’m a dyed-in-the-wool harm reductionist. He had my attention. I work daily with people who use drugs and I try to create environments where people are comfortable talking about their drug use. But “Lenny” rarely was so up-front, and I was a younger helper.

I think part of the way I created a comfortable environment is (then and now) openly identifying as a person who used to use drugs. Although I restrict myself to coffee and nicotine gum currently, the past was very different.

Maybe more important to relationship building around drug use is this: I respect people’s choices. I don’t use drugs anymore, but what you do with your body is your choice and your right. That’s one of my core beliefs.

So we brainstormed money-making ideas. In the end we landed on him flyer-ing the neighborhood offering clean-up services and manual labor. This was in his wheelhouse but he had never had a flyer. We designed one together. He came up with a business name and we listed him on google. I printed him 100 sheets to get started.

He started getting gigs and making some money. He was absolutely overjoyed. He’d come to my office every time he got a job and thank me. Sometimes he come and bemoan his bad luck (no work) and we’d print some more flyers while I normalized the difficulty of selling your services. I shared - with permission - some tactics such as asking for referrals to others who might be looking for an odd-job man, and collecting contact info for follow-ups.

He developed a lot of pride in his business. It was something that was his, and he hadn’t had much in his life. This was a start.

Meet’m where they’re at

My comfort level with working with people who use drugs did not come easily. As a person who formerly used drugs it would have been easy for me to recommend quitting and have a nice day. That would have been the end of our relationship, and I’m supposed to be a relationship builder. Worse, I would be playing into the same shaming that society and most professional “helpers” default to when we get uncomfortable. The dignified approach is instead to meet them where they’re at.

I see professional helpers misunderstand “meeting them where they’re at” as code for “I’ll accept them for now so I can change them later.” This is the opposite of the point. Meeting someone where they are at is about respect. Disguising my intentions so that I can satisfy my own need to reach a desired outcome is manipulative and disgusting. I don’t do it. Instead, I process any discomfort I have with my supervisor. I name to her and myself out loud that I might want something different for Lenny than he wants for himself, and I don’t put my biases and judgments into my relationship with a person I’m tasked with supporting.

This isn’t easy, and it’s worth it. Whether I’m working with someone who is surviving IPV while living with the one causing harm, a person who is risking the street instead of risking the shelter, or a person who is using drugs (sometimes) problematically I need to center this truth: people do things for very good reasons. The more often I can bring my curiosity to the conversation (“How is this working for you/what do you like about it?”) the more likely I am to stay in community with someone.

Connection is the greatest healer available. Why not create more, instead of breaking bonds?