Maddz Cavales

By Rooted Strategy & Training You finish a conversation with someone you support, but you keep thinking about it long after work. Should you have said more? Shared more of your story? Found a way to change their mind? When you care about someone’s recovery, it can be hard to know where your responsibility ends. That is why a clear foundation matters in peer support. In Rooted Strategy & Training’s Understanding The Cornerstone of Peer Services course, four cornerstones guide that foundation:...

Grief is not always loud. Sometimes grief cries. Sometimes grief sleeps all day. Sometimes grief keeps working because the bills still come. Sometimes grief reaches for something to numb the ache. As we recognize National Grief Awareness Day on August 30 and International Overdose Awareness Day on August 31, we have to tell the truth with compassion: grief and substance misuse can be connected. Not because grieving people are careless. Not because they are weak. But because pain looks for...

Loneliness does not always look like being alone. Sometimes loneliness sits in a crowded room. Sometimes it smiles at work. Sometimes it answers, “I’m fine,” because explaining the truth feels too heavy. As we recognize Loneliness Awareness Week, we are reminded that connection does not happen by accident. It happens in the spaces we create for one another. It happens when someone feels safe enough to be honest, and when someone else is willing to listen without rushing to fix, judge, or...