Pubdate: Sun, 06 Aug 2006 Source: Mail Tribune, The (Medford, OR) Copyright: 2006 The Mail Tribune Contact: http://www.mailtribune.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/642 Note: Only prints LTEs from within it's circulation area. Author: Sarah Lemon Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth) DAD'S SECOND CHANCE EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the fourth in a series of stories on addicts recovering from meth use. The stories run on the first Sunday of each month. When child welfare workers came to collect his son and daughter, Louie Soto blamed them for all his problems, including addiction to methamphetamine. After all, theirs was the system that raised him. "I'm a total throw-away," the 38-year-old said. But after years of enduring abuse, homelessness and pain that he masked with drugs, losing his children was the incentive Soto needed to stop wishing he would die and to start living life. Drug-free for the past three and a half years and a full-time father again, Soto encourages other addicts on the path to sobriety. Preaching hope, he's found, exorcises his own demons and helps him give his children the childhood he never had. A self-proclaimed "product of the system," Soto said he was taken as a baby to the New York Foundling Hospital. His earliest memories are of numerous foster homes. At age 6, Soto was adopted by a family who subjected him to beatings and long hours locked in a basement. At age 13, he ran away for good. When he wasn't on the streets, Soto lived in shelters, group homes and juvenile detention. He slept in trees and ate out of trash cans. He knew about drugs, but the simple fact of survival kept him too busy to get high, he said. "Then it was about 'Where was I going to lay my head?' " he said. Soto knew other teens in his situation, but none totally bereft of family. "I couldn't call up Grandma, or I couldn't call up Mom," he said. "I felt like a mistake ... I was an absolute mistake." At age 19, a judge told him he could either join the Army or keep trying to stay out of prison. Later, stationed in Tacoma, Wash., Soto said the criminal trade on the city's "hilltop" came to him easily. "I've always had that love of the criminal element," he said. "I grew up with crooks." Following an ex-girlfriend, Soto brought his habits of crime and drug use to Medford, where he soon started selling and using meth. "I couldn't stand the way I felt on it, but I could not stop doing it," Soto said. "Meth damn near killed me." The stimulant drug helped Soto enjoy "the other half of the day" after he worked 10 hours installing central heating and air systems. Avoiding Medford's multi-colored meth that is "cut" with any number of powdery substances, Soto drove to Portland or California to buy a purer form of the drug that he could smoke in "rock" or "crystal" forms. In a story similar to those told by most other meth addicts, Soto lost his job, his freedom and his family to the drug. He spent four years in and out of jail, "coming to" every morning instead of waking up. Several times he was hospitalized for severe dehydration that left him feeling like his heart had turned to stone in his chest. "I know I would have died within that next year," Soto said. When his children went to live with relatives, Soto said he tried to tell himself they were better off. If he overdosed or got killed by the police, at least his kids would have his Social Security, he figured. But the hole in his life that should have been filled by parents still gaped. "That started getting to me," Soto said. "I just wanted my kids back, and I wanted the state to get out of my life." Determined to claim some self-worth, Soto spent a month in residential treatment at Addictions Recovery Center in Medford and six months in intensive group therapy at OnTrack Inc. Although he had once found them laughable, the testimonials of recovering addicts seemed to relate to his own life. After a year and a half apart, Soto reunited with his children. He's never relapsed. Soto now is among a group of about 30 recovering addicts who visit local treatment centers, the jail and juvenile detention center sharing their success in sobriety. "He volunteers all over the place," said John Hamilton, Jackson County drug-court coordinator. "He sponsors many people." And before the year's end, when his third child is born, Soto will get a fresh chance as a drug-free dad and will add another small branch to his seedling family tree. "This child will have a better start," Soto said. "I'm just happy to have another relative." - --- MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman