'This is our community; we are cleaning it together': Addiction recovery home helps clean Windsor's west end

Windsor, Ont. -

One local addiction recovery home is stepping up and giving back to the community, cleaning up the west end while combatting addiction.

“I’ve been battling with drug addiction pretty much my entire life,” said 35-year-old Bradley Currie. 

Currie is one of 44 men in recovery at the Hand in Hand Support home.

“While being here I started to believe in myself. I started to see things, I’ve never seen in myself,” said Currie.

Hand in Hand Support is a non-profit sober living facility helping people with addiction-recovery.

“We want to help these individuals get into recovery because everyone deserves a second chance,” said Liz Geddes, board president of Hand in Hand Support.

“We are offering this as a way to gap that need so for someone who is going into treatment. They can stay here until they are ready to go into treatment or they can do their whole treatment with us."

After a 10-year battle with drugs and alcohol, Currie found the help he needed at Hand in Hand.

“I ended up graduating here and we decided to integrate a new phase which is a working program,” said Currie. “So it gives me a chance to have opportunity in my life, coming from where I was before, it was very hard for me to see the opportunity.”

Local food delivery service Jubzi teamed up with the non-profit organization to clean up Windsor's west-end streets Saturday.

“There’s a portion of the community that feels individuals that suffer addiction should fend for themselves, they’re a burden in our community,” said Jubzi CEO Thanos Zikantas. “These individuals appreciate the support they are getting and they are giving back. This is our community, we are cleaning it together.”

Giving back throughout the recovery proccess helps residents work towards reconciliation, according to Hand in Hand.

“When someone is in recovery they have to be accountable and be able to go out there and give back,” said Geddes. “Going out and feeling good about themselves, going out and doing the cleanup, it gives them self-worth. That they are worth it and recovery is worth it.”

For Currie, he now feels free and is grateful for his second chance at life.

“The only way, I find, to open my heart is to reach out and to give back to the community, to people, to Mother Earth we live on," said Currie.

"There is a certain gratitude that’s comes from giving back that puts you in a good, healthy state of mind."