Then came my electric guitar years, assistant roady for a couple of our high school garage bands, from which a few would make the pro cut into the the big time, like Timothy Schmit (Eagles) and Ed Robels (Ambrosa).īefore long I was working for Carico's Edison Light Co, a subcontrator for Bill Graham, and doing psychodelic light shows for the SF Bay areas - Dead, Quicksilver, Big Brother, Airplane and the likes. The Hillsborough County Anti-Drug Alliance website includes a list of programs available in our area.Īdditionally, the SAMHSA National Helpline for those seeking help is 1-80.So I bought a cheap acoustic guitar (Harmony) and started learning songs by Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, early Dylan, Bias, and Collins, songs popular for our generation at that time. Snelling’s biggest plea is for those who need help to seek it out quickly. “2022 is going to be my prediction, and I mean I’m just praying and hoping that that’s the year we’re going to start turning this around," she said. Her hope is that things do get better next year to prevent more families from experiencing what she did twice: a brother she’ll never get back and another family member who almost became one of more than 100,000. “All of those things have to be addressed,” Snelling concluded. Snelling said the Tampa Bay area is generally well-suited with a myriad of drug treatment programs, but she believes more can be done regionally and nationally, including better education starting at an earlier age, more funding for treatment and prevention, better access to quick treatment, and stronger border security to better prevent the flow of fentanyl from Mexico. “The one that is causing the most destruction and death is definitely fentanyl, and people are getting that in their drugs, and they’re not even aware of it.”
“It really is almost incomprehensible - how extensive the epidemic is, and it’s hitting us right here in the Tampa Bay area,” she said.
That statistic not only alarms Snelling as someone who’s lived through the crisis but also as someone who battles it daily as the board chair of the Hillsborough County Anti-Drug Alliance. Right now, so many families are being devastated nationwide.īack in November, the CDC announced that drug overdose deaths across the nation topped 100,000 from April 2020 to April 2021, which is a record-breaking amount.
“You know, I know the devastation it causes to a family.” “To think of losing anyone in your family over a drug is, you know, it’s just awful, and it can cause nightmares, and it makes you worry constantly,” said Snelling. In the more recent case, the family member impacted had no idea they had ingested fentanyl. Snelling said fentanyl, a powerful opioid that often contaminates other drugs, was to blame in both cases. “It’s almost like you can’t comprehend it,” said Snelling. “And got a phone call that he had overdosed and died - I just - I can’t describe how - it was just horrible.”Īnd then, in the summer of 2021, history nearly repeated itself when someone in her immediate family had a similar scare, and according to Snelling, “came very close to death” but miraculously survived. It was right before Christmas,” she remembered. Her brother died of a drug overdose in Miami. In 2016, she got the unexpected phone call no one ever wants. For Ellen Snelling, it’s still so surreal.
0 kommentar(er)
