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If you see Scott Strode in a gym or on a hike, he’ll likely be wearing a black shirt with a single, silver word, all caps, blaring across his chest: SOBER.
That word, and his commitment to fitness, are Strode’s mission and passion. Strode is the founder of The Phoenix, an addiction recovery organization that uses social events and sports — from mountain climbing to CrossFit — to help members rebuild their lives. He started The Phoenix (thephoenix.org) in 2006 based on his own experiences with both addiction and the transformative power of exercise and community.
“When you wear sober on your chest, you make space for people to be more vulnerable,” explains Strode, 52. The idea, he says, is to be proud of your recovery. Hiding your shame — the shame of abuse, of pain, of addiction — gives it “power and momentum,” Strode believes. “By sharing it with others, it loses its power.”
That focus on self-esteem, trust, and camaraderie is changing lives. Over the past 19 years, The Phoenix has served roughly 565,000 members nationwide and hosted nearly 150,000 events. Eighty-three percent of members new to recovery remain sober three months after joining. For most programs, relapse rates after treatment are between 40 and 60 percent; at The Phoenix, the rate is 17 percent.
“Our ethos is that we’re here to lift each other up,” Strode says. Membership is free, with one condition: Participants must be clean and sober for 48 hours before attending events.
Strode’s own struggles with addiction began with a difficult childhood in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a story he tells in a new memoir, Rise. Recover. Thrive. How I Got Strong, Got Sober, and Built a Movement of Hope. His father suffered from untreated mental health issues (Strode suspects he was bipolar). After his parents divorced, he and his siblings endured stressful visits to their dad’s rural home. They were often hungry. The home had three walls: His dad had removed a wall for renovation but never replaced it, instead covering the space with plastic. The biggest challenge, however, was the unpredictability of their father’s mood. Would he be manic? Angry? Depressed?
Strode’s mother, meanwhile, was a workaholic. He remembers her frequently snapping her fingers, quieting the kids so she could finish a call. His stepfather was an alcoholic.
“When he first came into the family, we hadn’t really had a present dad, so it was great having him,” Strode recalls. “But after work, he’d have a glass of wine or a martini, and then another one, and then a few beers, and then a couple martinis after that, and it was very much like our dad, trying to predict who he was going to be in that moment. Sometimes he’d fall asleep on the chair reading the newspaper or a book. Other times he wanted to relive his wrestling days from when he was in college, and he’d call us to the living room and want to wrestle. Between that and my father’s ups and downs, I didn’t know who I had to be to be loved. It’s exhausting. And being a kid, I felt like most of this was my fault. It chipped away at my self-esteem.”
The strain led to substance abuse. He had his first drink at age 11. By 15, he was using cocaine. He sought not only numbness, but acceptance. When he learned how to steal the family’s booze and beer without anyone noticing, “All of a sudden, kids wanted to hang out with me,” he says. “I felt cool and I liked I was in a group. I just wanted to feel connected with others. I wanted to feel valued. But I was being valued for the wrong things.
“I felt like I was destined for something more than just closing down the bar and going to the after-party and blacking out and buying coke and barely making it to work or calling in sick because I was too hungover,” he says.
On a trip to the outdoor adventure gear store REI, he saw a brochure for ice-climbing. He signed up. He struggled throughout the climb, but it gave him a goal: Maybe someday he could climb as confidently as his guide. He found he would stay sober on a Friday night so he could climb on Saturday.
Soon he was boxing, which was empowering. “Every time I would learn those combinations of punches and execute them more effectively, I started to feel more confident,” he says. “And then my coach was turning to me to help teach the new guys how to wrap their hands and how to throw their foundational punches. All of those things — and the courage that it took to get into the ring — helped to lift me.”
But addiction remained his toughest foe. At age 24, after a night of staggering-yet-routine barhopping and drinking that included 10 to 15 pints of Guinness, six or seven shots, a bottle of champagne, and cocaine, he found himself on the bathroom floor of his Boston apartment, paranoid, holding a flashlight, doing lines of coke off a CD case.
“I knew that’s how I was going to die,” he says. “And I couldn’t imagine someone having to tell my mom that her son died from an overdose on a bathroom floor.”
The date: April 7, 1997. It was the last time he drank or used drugs. He continued to push himself physically, whether mountain climbing in the Himalayas or competing in an Ironman. And yet he still felt incomplete. Then he started sharing his lessons with others.
“I realized that we had built this little tribe of people that helped each other imagine what’s possible in life,” he says. “I saw so many of my friends struggling with substance use or in recovery, and I was like, ‘Man, you need to go climb a mountain with me,’ or, ‘We need to do a triathlon together.’ And that’s how it started.”
The first year, about 70 people attended Phoenix events. The organization is now on track to help 10 million people by 2030. They are people like Todd and Kaley Jones, both of whom experienced childhood trauma, both of whom abused drugs and alcohol. They met through a Phoenix event in Colorado, got married, and have a child. Both have volunteered and worked on staff. Both are sober. And yes, both are fit. Exercise is a vital part of The Phoenix’s approach to recovery, but building community is as important as building muscles, whether it’s a book club or a music night.
“I built these deep relationships and I’d never experienced that,” Todd Jones says.
That’s the magic of The Phoenix, Strode says. It creates an emotionally safe space where you’re accepted and supported.
“We always say that the heaviest weight at the gym is the front door,” he says. “Walking through the first time without a drink or a drug in your system is tough. We know how much courage it takes. So anytime somebody walks in, we scoop them up in a way that they feel welcome, because somebody did that for us. Many of these folks are coming from a dark place. We want to connect them to the light.”
Click here to view the article at Saturday Evening Post.
Ken Budd has written for The Washington Post Magazine, The Atlantic, and many more. To hear his conversation with Scott Strode, listen to the Upstart Crow podcast on Spotify or Apple.