ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — When you see the bright smile in his Navy portrait from years ago, you would never know that Darryl Henderson struggled with addiction for much of his life.
“It took me about 30 years to sort of — get it,” Henderson said.
It wasn’t until he hit rock bottom during the pandemic that he finally reached out for help.
“When I was in my house when I had no power, and no food, and no money,” he said.
Now, he’s been clean and sober for three and a half years.
Henderson’s vice was alcohol. For others, it's drugs like fentanyl, which continues to cause overdoses daily in Tampa Bay.
“In the back end of Spring Break, what we saw was an increase in overdoses — not a decrease,” said Jennifer Webb, the CEO of Live Tampa Bay, a nonprofit that has made it its mission to reduce opioid deaths.
Despite the recent uptick, Webb says overdose numbers are starting to stabilize regionally, and she believes she knows why.
“It’s absolutely the work that our community organizations, our governments, coalitions like ours are doing,” she said.
Part of that work? Fighting the stigma of getting help, which Live Tampa Bay is now doing with a brand new ad campaign.
“It entails one-minute stories of people in recovery saying that recovery is possible. These are people from our community speaking to their community,” Webb explained.
More than a hundred people have already recorded their stories, which will appear as Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube ads. You can view many of the videos or submit your own at this link.
“I think that they are some of the most courageous people,” Webb said.
And Henderson is one of those courageous people. His story of recovery will be posted soon and he hopes it’ll help. Henderson has also taken a position with Live Tampa Bay, where he will help bring resources together by engaging with both law enforcement and recovery centers.
“The hope is that other folks who look like me in my community, other folks who are veterans, other folks who can identify, will understand that recovery is possible,” he said. “There is hope, there is a life after it, and all you have to do is do the work.”
