Since opening TLC in January 1992 we have had over 500,000 addicts and alcoholics come through our doors.
And as one might suspect, we've had all types. Some who come through our doors are quite functional and after a 90 day stay return to the community and hopefully remain sober and clean from then on. And, periodically, we get reports back from those who are once more with their families, raising their children, working, going to school, or doing something else positive with their lives. And those are the reports that are gratifying.
Other clients come to us and stay with us for years. They like living in a sober environment. They like being part of our surrogate family. They contribute to our community, and in turn, we see to their needs. They often end up working for TLC, becoming part of our success story – assisting us with our mission of helping addicts and alcoholics rebuilding their lives.
And then, as within any large population of people, we get a small percentage of those who are seriously mentally ill (SMI), bipolar, or who have borderline personality disorders or other psychological issues. And these we also try to help because many of them use drugs or alcohol to self-medicate and to quiet the demons in their heads. Sometimes we are successful even with this group because once we take the drugs and alcohol out of their lives they sometimes become healed. But there are others among this group, that are intractable. They are so mentally ill that we must refer them to another facility, although many of them just disappear on their own before we can make a referral.
We had one man at our facility who was quite brilliant, yet we had to discharge him because he all of a sudden started having delusions about his house manager being Jesus. We dealt with another man for over 20 years, during the periods that he was out of prison, who thought he was one of the owners of TLC because he was among the first five residents into the program. We finally had to get a series of restraining orders to keep him from coming onto the property.
And we just won a case in the state Supreme Court last year against a transgender client who falsely claimed that our managers had given clients permission to have sex with him/her whenever they chose. And while we "won" the case, we still spent over $25,000 defending ourselves. That's money that could have been spent on our mission of helping other people.
And at the moment we're defending ourselves against two other lawsuits. And while I have no doubt that we'll prevail with both of them, it still takes a lot of research and time providing information to the attorneys. In one of the cases, we've been sued for the same type of matter on three occasions and each time the state courts have ruled in our behalf. One of the cases went clear to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals before we prevailed – but it set a great precedent.
In the second case, our lawyers are defending against a former client who has a long history of trying to make a living suing anyone and everyone for imaginary damages. This is a case that our insurance company will waste resources on, but another case we'll ultimately win.
If people like this would use their energy trying to help others, instead of attempting to make a dishonest dollar, they might be surprised at how much further along they'd be in life.
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