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Flight and Fight:
Interview with Cammie Wolf Rice
By Carin Chea
Cammie Wolf Rice is a staunch activist, author, speaker and former financial and technological services executive. She is not simply on a mission; she is the woman with a mission.
Rice is the epitome of immeasurable grief transformed into purpose and calling. Her book, The Flight: My Opioid Journey, chronicles a tragedy so indescribable that even the dictionary does not contain a word adequate enough to define it.
After losing her son to opioid overdose, Rice did more than sit in her grief, which (by the way) would have been expected. Rice summoned up the courage to fight for others so that they would never have to endure the unthinking agony of losing a child or loved one to the opioid epidemic.
Her work speaks volumes, as she lobbies tirelessly for a stronger presence of preventative care in our healthcare system. But, as it turns out, her words speak just as loudly as her actions.
Tell us about your background and the journey that led you toward penning The Flight: My Opioid Journey.
My son in his senior year of high school was diagnosed with colon disease and had to have his large intestine removed. This was when Oxycontin was being pushed to physicians as an effective painkiller and were told it wasn't addictive.
We went home with 90 Oxycontin followed by another prescription of 90 more. I didn't know what questions to ask. I was told to give them to him every 4 hours, so that's what I did.
My son immediately developed a problem. This was a kid who wanted to be a Navy Seal. He was very disciplined. He later went into multiple rehab centers. We were fortunate to have the resources, yet we still couldn't save his life.
We lost him February 26 of 2016. He fought for half his life and he was 32 when he passed away.
They say the sixth stage of grief is finding meaning, but I think I skipped several stages and went directly to the sixth stage and I found meaning and wanted to ring an alarm.
That's specifically why we developed the role in health care, the Life Care Specialist (LCS) also known the patients as a Care Coach.
In children's hospitals, they have Child Life Specialists (CLS), but once you're 18 or older, there's nothing. I was on the board for Alliance for Kids, which allowed me to become very familiar with the CLS role.
That's incredible.
Thank you. There's a lot of money spent for treatment, but we're not doing enough as a country preventively. Because I knew about the CLS role (what Christopher and I lacked) we developed the LCS role and started a clinical trial at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta, two years ago.
I felt it was a missing piece in our healthcare team.
Nurses and doctors don't have time to:
- Educate and warn you, if you have to be on opioids about the dangers of those medications
- Work with you to taper off the medication as quickly as possible
- Introduce the patient to non-opioid alternatives for pain management.
Life Care Specialists provide non-opioid pharmaceutical solutions to pain and have also been trained by the Trauma Resource Institute on mental health well-being techniques.
In the hospital you struggle with anxiety, PTSD, a myriad of things. Everyone in the hospital needs support mentally as well as psychologically. The Life Care Specialist provides both of those. Essentially we've created a new position in healthcare to address what Christopher and I didn't have.
In the book I use the metaphor of a plane. In this flight (journey of life), there are people who get you off the flight, people that you think would be with you on this whole journey. You land at happiness and joy and at grief and at sickness.
How do you keep moving on that journey? I'm sharing my opioid journey, the reader will think of their own journey, because everyone has been on a flight literally and metaphorically.
There is still stigma in our society surrounding substance abuse. Do you know it took me two years to be able to say "overdose?" So I had to deal with my grief and I had to get comfortable saying "overdose."
I didn't want people to think about the stereotype of addiction. It's a disease and we have to start treating it like a disease. If we reduce the stigma, people will talk about it. It's a family disease. It destroys families, not just the person.
Was there one specific moment in time where you knew you had to write about your experience?
I was journaling and thinking about reaching more people sooner "How can I reach the masses?”
I started Christopher Wolf Crusade (CwC) in 2018, launched on his birthday. It was soon after that I felt like I wasn't reaching enough people in enough time.
I've never had fire inside of me like I do now. I feel like I was chosen because God knew I was going to do something and in a way it was something Christopher scarified his life for.
People have been doing drugs for centuries. I went up to the DEA in DC and they said, "our country is at a chemical warfare with Fentanyl." Also with Adderall. It is literally killing our children.
Kids are going to experiment and try things. There are fake pills on the street that are being laced with Fentanyl. It's in Xanax, Adderall, Oxycontin, and even marijuana.
People are overdosing left and right and on average there are 160 to 300 reported deaths a day. Since Christopher's passing in 2016, over 300,000 people have died due to drug overdose.
God is leading my path. Here's what came to me… After every chapter in the book there's a QR code including a video that comes up when you scan it.
Before COVID people wouldn't know what to do with a QR code but now we all do because we go to restaurants, right? In the back of the book, I have a library of resources that are accessible via QR code that will continuously update and keep current.
If you need to find a treatment center or need to know how to talk to your kids about drugs - any resources about recovery and prevention - I'll keep current in the book via that QR code.
I also created a book trailer; it looks like a movie trailer. I'll be launching that on social media platforms.
Would you ever consider making a movie? If so, who would play your son?
My younger son is an actor and he's already told me "Mom, I'm playing Christopher." I would want my son to play Christopher. Nobody's going to know Christopher like Chase.
Who would play you?
Cate Blanchett, Reese Witherspoon, or Charlize Theron. Ultimately someone with extreme passion that cares about this issue.
What would be the central message of your book?
I'm very raw and I share a lot of trauma in addition to losing Christopher, so I talk about things I was always afraid to say. I want to give people hope but also prevent any mother or father from losing their child. I want to save lives.
That's cliche but I just want to help people. This is truly a time where everybody's stressed. Everybody needs a helping hand and someone to connect to. I think this book helps you heal inside and out.
Tell us about Christopher Wolf Crusade.
I'm working harder every day than I ever did in my corporate career. I feel like I'm in labor birthing a book without an epidural.
We wanted our swim lane to be prevention. There's a lot of effort on treatment but we have to have mental wellness skills and prevention tools. I wanted this position (of the Life Care Specialist) in healthcare right off the bat. You have to have scientific data when creating a position in healthcare.
CwC is all about prevention and mental well-being. I wanted to educate people and I have to do it through stories because people really don't read anymore.
I'm very into philanthropy. I've been on Usher's foundation board for 15 years. I'm going to be the chair of the board starting October 1. I'm using the opportunity to work with the kids.
I've had discussions with kids saying. "This has to come from you, not from adults.” How do we get young people and have them teach it, as opposed to us?
For anyone out there struggling with substance use, what encouragement would you like to offer them?
For families, the person you love is still in there. They're there. They don't want to relapse. They're the ones suffering. Don't give up on them.
Boundaries are important but you have got to keep the faith and stay connected. You have to have a support team. If you trigger, you have to have not just one person to call but a second, and a third person to call.
You have to work the program every day. Unfortunately, these drugs hijack your brain and say, "take me, take me, take me." You have to believe in a higher power and have a strong support team to beat it.
We need to be our own health advocates. We have to protect our kids and ask questions. Do you have a non-narcotic for my child? How long does my child need to be on this? We just assume that just because something is prescribed, it's safe.
For more information on the author's work, please visit CammieWolfRice.com.
To learn more about the Christopher Wolf Crusade, visit https://cwc.ngo.
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