Heroin Addict to Instagram Husband – Celebrating 2 years sober

Today I am sharing a post about men’s Fall wardrobe basics and CELEBRATING my husband’s rise from heroin addict to Instagram husband in collaboration with Nordstrom.   While my blog is geared towards style – I didn’t want to let this sober milestone go by without recognition.

Since my hubby kindly played male model for me, I wanted to talk about him a bit.   One year ago today I took to my blog to speak to what my family had been through getting my husband out of the grips of a heroin addiction.   I have had such an outpouring of support and contact from hundreds of other families dealing with the same issues.

The intent with my original post (outside of the fundraiser included in it) was to show people that heroin is not just a street drug.  I am a nurse practitioner (with opiate prescribing privileges) and mom of 2 little boys (babies at the time) living in an ideal neighborhood and heroin almost took my husband’s life.   He didn’t get addicted overnight – it started with years of recreational use of pain pills.

In 2002 a little over 20,000 people died in the US from drug overdoses and last year the number was MORE THAN TRIPLE.  This puts overdose deaths in the top 10 causes of death in our country.

When my blog post went live a year ago it was picked up by our local newspaper.  Strangers I’d meet knew the story.   It was a great healing to be so public about a problem that was so fueled by secrecy.  Owning his flaws and mistakes has made Chris such a better father and husband.

It was just over 2 years ago that I tested my husband’s urine and gave him the ultimatum to leave our home or go to rehab.   Luckily he chose rehab.  Chris packed up and went to New Hampshire to a place where a friend of ours had gotten sober 18 months prior.   I can’t speak highly enough of the Plymouth House and how much they have impacted my family’s everyday life.  My husband returned from the Plymouth House like a new person.  If you’ve followed my charity closet sale on Facebook you know I’m still doing my best to raise scholarships for the Plymouth House because I believe in the way they are helping addicts.

In my opinion suboxone is not the answer to the opioid epidemic.   I know there are people who have had success with it but there are common personality traits amongst addicts that need to be recognized and reworked.  Having worked in the healthcare field for more than the last decade I was getting disheartened at how rich the pharmaceutical companies were becoming off the public’s misfortunes.   For every side effect from one medication pharmaceutical companies work hard to create a new drug to add to fix the ones their previous medications caused. While polypharmacy is getting Pharma-companies rich, these are short sighted solutions.   Rather than taking a pill to lose weight or prevent someone from opiate withdrawal symptoms why don’t we try to fix what’s causing people to overeat or abuse drugs?

This is a topic I am extremely passionate about but I don’t want to bore you (especially if you happened to come for my men’s fashion picks 🙂 ).  I simply want to celebrate the Plymouth House and my husband’s hard work to kick his addiction.   I say kick, but Chris still does daily work and weekly AA meetings to stay on track with all that he learned at the Plymouth House.

So 2 years ago I couldn’t have had a blog.   My husband was lost, angry, and completely consumed by his need for the comfort he got with using heroin.   It was only about 3 months after he got home from rehab that I decided to start blogging some of the DIY projects I was doing around my house.   I was doing DIY’s to save money because drugs had sucked up all our savings and I was still financially recovering from an unpaid maternity leave.

My blog has taken a much different turn in less than 2 years and I owe so much of my success to my Instagram husband.   When no one cared about my social media he still took pictures for me.   When I would get shy to take pictures in public he would remind to stop worrying about what other people were thinking.   When I told him I thought likes and comments might contribute to the popularity of my Instagram pictures he made sure to like and comment on every single post (and asked his best friend to like them too).   I can’t imagine having a blog without having an Instagram husband.

If you follow my Instagram you know my husband heckles me with snide remarks much of the time.   That’s our dynamic.   We tease each other in the most loving way you can belittle someone 🙂  So I wanted to make a little spoof video about Instagram husbands and turn the tables on Chris.  The video portrays him as the blogger and me as the Instagram spouse trying to make him laugh with mostly degrading remarks.   This is only meant to make you chuckle.   Most of these things he has said to me and NONE have hurt my feelings.   Please don’t be offended by our humor.

Men’s Fall Fashion Basics

And since this is a style blog I wanted to share some men’s Fall fashion wardrobe basics from Nordstrom.   My husband relies on me to purchases his clothes these days and since we can’t get into a dressing room together to try things on, I purchase online.   I usually order from Nordstrom (blessed to live 5 minutes away 🙂 ) and do curbside pick-up and bring back what doesn’t fit him.   Having free shipping and returns on Nordstrom.com makes it a great place to shop for husbands because it’s so easy to return what doesn’t fit.

Men’s Fall Outerwear Favorites:

Men’s Fall Tops:

Men’s Staple Denim and Accessories

 

Here is my favorite recovered heroin addict modeling the outfit I purchased for him.

All of Chris’ items fit true to size.

As always – if you have questions or want to speak to me about addiction, fashion, anything – I always respond to my emails.

If you’d like to consider donating to the Plymouth House Scholarship Fund to assist other addicts looking to get sober their address is:

Plymouth House Scholarship Fund

446 Main St

Plymouth, NH 03264

Thank you to Nordstrom for sponsoring this post.