What do feral kitties and using addicts have in common?

Please pause before you jump to the conclusion that my comparison between feral cats and addicts is intended to be a derogatory statement about a person with an addiction. And for all you cat lovers, I mean no disrespect. The similarity appeals to me as something surrealistic but also obscenely real. I discovered the relevance of this likeness over the last thirty years of trying to help addicts find their recovery. 

My background: I am a recovering heroin, cocaine, and alcoholic who grew up in a lower middle-income family.

Let’s start with the typical characteristics of a feral cat. 

Many feral cats are starving, injured, homeless, and sick. As a cat lover, I feel heartbroken seeing a feral kitty and want to help. I've always wondered how you help an animal that will run away even if you have food or treats? If I do happen to get close to a feral cat, they may scratch or bite me.  I turned to Google. I read successful caretakers of feral cats suggest giving them the opportunity to live on their own, be free and answer to their unique natures. Over extended periods of time, with food, kindness, health care, and shelter a feral cat may learn to socialize with human beings.

I was an addict. As a college student at UCLA, I started using heroin and cocaine. At the university, I became physically dependent on heroin and acquired an unstoppable desire for cocaine. As I fell deeper and deeper into my addiction, I would only associate with people who used. I didn’t trust my friends and family who would judge me and try to stop me from using. Once I started getting drugs on the streets of south central Los Angeles things got particularly bad. I made money to feed my habit by selling drugs or committing petty crimes. 

Let’s compare how my behavior mirrored that of a feral cat.

The important question is what steps are used to care for and socialize a feral cat and how do those mirror the best practices of techniques work with a using addict?

For as long as I’ve been in recovery I’ve heard, you can’t help a using addict until they hit bottom. Would this approach work with a feral kitty?

Feral kitties will starve to death or die from disease before accepting help. All too often, waiting for an addict to hit bottom results in death, irreparable harm, or trauma that complicates the recovery process. 

I haven’t seen a single report from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, or CASAColumbia ever recommended waiting for an addict to “hit bottom”. 

Over the years, many erroneous “beliefs” on how to help an addict do the opposite. Here are the best practices for helping feral cats and comparison to evidence-based practices of helping a recovering an addict:

On May 3, 2017, I achieved 13 consecutive years of abstinence, and for the majority of the last 30 years, I’ve been in recovery. Over that time, I’ve been in a happy marriage with Berni, I have a great relationship with my 15-year-old daughter Daniella, and I’ve helped create three successful technology businesses, two addiction treatment centers and a non-profit organization that uses entrepreneurship to create jobs and opportunities in the recovery community.