A Work IN Progress

Thirty-year-old Stevn Graupensperger was confined to the Kimball County Jail in December of last year. He was twice arrested for possession of methamphetamine in four weeks. His life was out of control, and he knew it.

Using meth was his excuse to cope with losses, heartbreaks and difficulties. Graupensperger mentality was "pity-poor me," or "I just wanted to escape because I didn't feel comfortable in my skin." He was "fair-warned before any ingestion" of the power of meth, "but I thought I was above it."

Yet today, he credits his arrests and jail time as the push that "helped me get there."

"Hands down, I give credit to the police for giving me that clean time," he said.

The Kimball County Sheriff's Office arrested him both times with a number of other individuals.

But today, Graupensperger is four months clean. He has a job, attends Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings, and is relying on his church to help him through this horrible disease. He has learned that "It is OK to be not OK; you can heal."

His first priority is to get his teeth fixed, and he lives in a positive environment and a household where people are not using. He does not use social media and has quit smoking cigarettes.

Graupensperger said, "I get it now; I know where I want to be and where I don't want to be."

The biggest thing to recovery is being productive, and Graupensperger has found productivity at Anderson Crude Transportation in a 9-5 job working in the shop. He needed a job, and no one was willing to step into the chaos and drama of a drug addict, but ACT gave him a chance, and he has not disappointed them.

"I am lucky to have them," he said.

Reflecting on his new found life, Graupensperger said that "not everyone is ready to climb out of a hole; people have to figure it out for themselves."

With two stints of treatment under his belt, his addiction and treatment were a revolving door.

Raised in Las Vegas, Graupensperger's life was not what many would consider typical. By the age of 13, he was living on the streets of Las Vegas and had experienced every kind of abuse possible. Smoking weed was his only drug of choice at the time, but that would soon change.

Throughout his juvenile years, Graupensperger was incarcerated for assault on police and other violent and criminal acts. At 16-17, he spent time in Nevada in a vocational school with juveniles headed in the same direction. The school had a program similar to the movie The Grid Iron Gang. Playing football helped Graupensperger release some of his aggression and violence, although he said he "got into it with the coach" and got kicked off the football team.

But off the football team, Graupensperger completed the program and proved he could be successful. He said, "I still use stuff I learned from that program to this day, which I am thankful for."

After graduating from the vocational program, at 18, Graupensperger came to Kimball to live with his grandma and escape the troubled life he had been living, but he was introduced to fentanyl and methamphetamine, and he spiraled out of control.

Finally, he was injecting meth and attempting suicide. With those years behind him, on Dec. 27, Graupensperger made the decision to embrace sobriety and he hasn't looked back.

Upbeat and excited about his recovery, Graupensperger said, "People have to figure it out for themselves."

The motto is change: Change people, places and playmates, and get out of your comfort zone.