Virginia first lady, AG team with recovering addict to launch initiatives targeting state's fentanyl crisis
Christine Wright of Roanoke, Virginia, never thought she would give birth with her wrist and an ankle handcuffed to the hospital bed, like she remembered seeing in a movie growing up showing a woman having a baby while incarcerated.
To the now 35-year-old mother, it was the "worst of the worst," and she struggled to wrap her head around how someone could put herself in that situation.
The long journey that landed Wright in the same situation involved drug addiction, a check-writing scheme, and a revolving door in and out of jail.
The journey also involved a 120-day substance abuse treatment program for inmates called "Alpha."
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Christine Wright of Roanoke, Va., has been in recovery from addiction for eight years, and helped start the Four Truths Recovery Housing initiative to find beds for those in recovery. (It Only Takes One campaign)
"It was just a spiral of events that all led there without me really knowing how," Wright told Fox News Digital. "I was an empty shell of a person that was numb and filled with self-loathing, and I had my daughter while in the Alpha program. Having one wrist and one ankle handcuffed to a hospital bed is a very humbling experience, and Alpha saved my life."
Now, after eight years of recovery, Wright and Virginia first lady Suzanne Youngkin — wife of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin — attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony in Roanoke on Tuesday for the first house obtained by Wright’s co-founded organization Four Truth’s Recovery, which will provide a space for those overcoming substance abuse. But even more fitting, the ceremony was held on National Fentanyl Awareness Day.
‘It only takes one’
Four Truths Recovery is just one of the many ways Wright has given her life to helping people with addiction. She not only works at the Bradley Free Clinic as a behavioral health manager, but she is also involved in first lady Youngkin’s "It Only Takes One" campaign, which focuses solely on the opioid crisis in Roanoke.
"Our messaging is very clear: It only takes one. Now, obviously, that speaks to the fact that you can take one pill, one joint, one vape to steal a light if it’s laced with fentanyl," Youngkin told Fox News Digital. "But simultaneously, what we’re saying is it only takes one serious conversation."
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Virginia first lady Suzanne Youngkin speaks during the "It Only Takes One" launch event in Roanoke, Jan. 30, 2024. (It Only Takes One campaign)
In 2022, nearly 2,000 people died from overdoses of fentanyl or other synthetic opioids in Virginia. The next year, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) seized 74.5 million fentanyl pills, exceeding the 58 million pills seized in 2022.
Lab tests show that about seven-in-10 pills seized by the DEA contain a lethal dose of fentanyl.
Roanoke has the highest per capita fentanyl-related deaths and ranks among the top 10 cities in the U.S. for the highest rate of overdose deaths.
Wright's brush with death
Wright had her own brush with death when she overdosed on fentanyl.
The Roanoke native was born into a family with extensive genetics of addiction.
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Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares speaks during the "It Only Takes One" launch event in Roanoke, Jan. 30, 2024. (It Only Takes One campaign)
"I always said that I was going to get out and be different," she said, explaining that her mother got her into dance classes when she was 5 years old, which became her escape from many things. "As the disease of addiction would have it, I began using around the age of 13."
It was not peer pressure that pulled Wright into the outermost rings of drug use. Instead, she wanted to have her own say about things, and the drug use began with what she described as a, "free-spirited, hippie kind of mindset.
Wright first dabbled with marijuana and alcohol before moving to cocaine, which she described as giving a feeling of living fast and rowdy. Her drug use continued to progress into hallucinogens, too.
"I wanted to expand my mind," she said. Wright wanted to try new things and went in with the naive perspective that she was not going to do too much.
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A pipe for methamphetamine use is shown at the People's Harm Reduction Alliance, the nation's largest needle-exchange program in Seattle. (Reuters/David Ryder)
While in high school, she tried methamphetamine for the first time and hated it so much she swore to never touch it again. She also saw a movie on MTV called "Smack," which was about heroin, thinking that is the worst, or "rock bottom."
"It just seemed terrible to me," she said. "It seemed like the dirtiest of drugs, you know, in my mind. And it was like, ‘Oh, I’ll never go that far.’"
The consequences of using drugs in high school soon crept up on her as she totaled her Ford Mustang due to driving while on hallucinogens, and later got a DUI after driving while on marijuana. Despite the two incidents during her senior year, she never received treatment or changed anything about her life.
In her early 20s, she got married and became pregnant with her daughter in 2011. She and her husband were both recreational drug users, and Wright said she did not develop dependency on the drugs and was able to put everything down during her pregnancy.
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Bottles of prescription painkiller oxycodone hydrochloride sit on a pharmacy shelf in 2017. (Reuters/George Frey)
After giving birth, the doctor prescribed Wright the powerful opiod oxycodone hydrochloride — aka oxy — for her back pain.
"The scratch there was just sort of lying dormant inside of me," she said. "I hadn’t addressed any trauma in my life. I hadn’t gained any new coping skills. I just put down the substances but didn’t really change anything in my life. So, that really is where things started."
The downward spiral
Within the first month of using oxy, Wright was taking more than she was prescribed to help get through the day and not feel "utterly defeated" by her new tasks of being a mom — diaper changes, nursing, meals, laundry and a litany of other new responsibilities.
She was requesting early refills of oxy and continued using drugs recreationally until, eventually, the doctor cut her off from the medication because of the abuse.
Without a prescription, Wright started purchasing oxy on the street, where dealers charge $1 per milligram for the pills, or $30 per pill. She had built her tolerance up to about 10 pills, or $300 per day, despite her being a stay-at-home mom.
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This undated photo provided by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's Phoenix Division shows a closeup of the fentanyl-laced sky blue pills known on the street as "Mexican oxy." (DEA)
To keep up with the habit, Wright pawned items, bribed family members and manipulated people for money.
One day she went to her dealer’s house to get more oxy, and he could not find the pills. Instead, he presented her with a bag of heroin.
"I was dope sick enough and desperate enough that I tried it," she said. "My mind told me it’s cheaper, it’s more potent, it’s going to last longer…and I did it. From that day on, I would sell my soul for the next fix, and I did it for so long. I became someone I didn’t even recognize, and it was all of this fear and desperation."
Wright said being dope sick is difficult to explain, but for her, the symptoms were "grueling," and involved nausea, diarrhea, sweating, cold chills, and dry mouth.
"Your skin is crawling, almost like melting off your bones. Restless legs. You can’t sleep. It’s excruciating," she said.
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A man prepares to inject heroin. (Reuters/Bor Slana)
Her daily routine involved waking up, chasing money and chasing drugs, all while dragging her child around with her.
Pregnant again
Amid the struggle to find and use drugs, Wright found out she was pregnant again and realized she could not stop cold turkey like she did during her previous pregnancy.
She sought help and was told she was too far along in her pregnancy to stop using it because it could be fatal to her son. Instead, Wright said she was told to continue using it until her son was born, then return for help.
"That was the most soul-shattering experience to know that I didn’t have to just chase the money, to chase the dope, to not be sick, but now to keep my son alive," she said. "It just wrecked my soul."
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Virginia first lady Suzanne Youngkin speaks during the "It Only Takes One" launch event in Roanoke in January. (It Only Takes One campaign)
Wright continued using drugs while also robbing and stealing from people.
When her son was born, she immediately began nursing him, so he did not go through withdrawal, until eventually mixing breast milk with formula to wean him off heroin.
Depression also sat in, and she chose not to get help.
"I thought everyone would be better off without me. I wouldn’t be a burden on my family, and my kids would have a better life," she said. "Every time I used was to not wake up, and that’s when I, for the first time, came across fentanyl."
Powerful fentanyl
After getting her next fix of drugs from her dealer, Wright went to get high and realized the color of the heroin was off. Instead of being brownish gray, it was white. Immediately, she thought she was ripped off, and she began scheming a way to sell the drugs to get more money and get a different supply.
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The Drug Enforcement Administration's office in Houston said it seized more than 7 million fatal fentanyl doses in 2022. (U.S. State Department )
She also did some of the "tarnished" drugs, and before getting halfway through a cigarette, overdosed.
Instead of getting ripped off, Wright was sold something much more potent.
The overdose was the most bizarre thing Wright said she had ever experienced.
"I was not fully unconscious, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t open my eyes, I couldn’t speak, but I could still hear everything that was going on around me, and I could hear my children running up and down the hallway," she said. "I could hear people in the living room, but I couldn’t ask for help."
One individual went into the bathroom where Wright was located and picked her up. She said she remembered thinking, "Oh God. Yes, God. They’re saving my life."
The person carried Wright into a bedroom, dropped her on the bed, and after struggling, her respiratory system held on, and she was later able to gasp for air.
"I think that one breath literally was the brink of either you stop breathing or you breathe now and live."
— Christine Wright
"I think that one breath literally was the brink of either you stop breathing or you breathe now and live," she said.
Wright began to rationalize that it was good stuff and regular heroin was not enough.
She knew someone who was manufacturing drugs and got involved in the process.
Wright also got involved with check writing to help fuel her drug habit.
One night, after a drug manufacturing session, Wright was high and heading home when she got pulled over by police with drugs and her children inside the car.
The law enforcement official who pulled her over told her she had 21 federal felony warrants for her arrest because of the check-writing scheme.
In and out of jail, pregnant again
A judge offered Wright to participate in the drug court program, which involved multiple weekly group meetings, random drug screenings, working or going to school full-time, weekly check-ins, and 100 hours of community service.
She said she was unable to meet the requirements as a person who, at that point, could not eat, sleep or shower on a consistent basis.
"I found out in an intake, in a cold, dark, jail cell, that I was pregnant again."
— Christine Wright
"I was in and out of jail for sanctions for drug court," Wright said. "In one of them, I found out in an intake, in a cold, dark, jail cell, that I was pregnant again, and I was terrified."
Wright knew what the drugs did to her son, and at this point, she knew what they were doing to her body, as she had sores all over her face, teeth falling out and hair thinning.
During one of her 20-day jail stints, she considered having an abortion.
After getting out of jail, she made an appointment with a doctor the next day and was scheduled to have the abortion the following Saturday.
The day before the scheduled abortion, Wright met with her probation officer for a weekly check-in. The officer was aware she was using drugs, and she was arrested.
"That day saved my, and my daughter’s life. That was May 6, 2016," she said. "My daughter would not be here today had that not happened, and I would not be in recovery had that not happened."
The court told Wright she was not getting out of jail until after she had the baby and received treatment.
She was sentenced to a substance abuse program in the Western Virginia Regional Jail, and oftentimes had to go back and forth to doctor appointments while wearing a jumpsuit and handcuffs, until eventually she had her daughter, all while having a wrist and ankle handcuffed to the hospital bed.
Wright was in and out of jail because of sanctions by the drug court. (iStock)
After giving birth, Wright had a mental breakdown and was rushed to the psychiatric unit of the jail where she began an antidepressant medication program for about a month.
"I can look back now and recognize that one day it just seemed like the lighting was different in the room, and I was coming out from a fog of depression," she said.
She also became part of the Alpha program, which included a therapeutic approach to substance abuse. Wright described the program as jail meets rehab, meets boot camp, meets college, all in one program.
"It basically tore me down just to build me back up in a very healthy way," Wright said.
After about six months, she completed the program.
While in the program, she started reading about the Hope Initiative at the Bradley Free Clinic and thought she wanted to help people like her one day to show them they do not have to go so far down the rabbit hole.
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The Bradley Free Clinic in Roanoke, Va. (Google Maps)
The Hope Initiative opened in August 2016, and Wright graduated from Alpha in October the same year. The court required her to complete 100 hours of community service, and she decided to help the Hope Initiative as a volunteer.
"My life had totally changed at this point," she said. "I felt like I had a fighting chance at life. I felt like maybe I wasn’t a terrible person, and maybe I could be a good mom, and I wanted it. I was hungry for it. I didn’t want to go back to the life of hopelessness."
Four days after graduating from drug court, Wright was offered the first full-time staff position at the Hope Initiative. She said she thought they lost their minds when they offered her the position after everything she had gone through.
While they understood Wright had been through a lot, the people who wanted to hire her said that made her the perfect person to run the program.
Fentanyl poisoning
In September 2020, first lady Youngkin learned about a family friend who had died.
Youngkin said the family friend was a football player whom she described as a "very wonderful young man," who was an athlete and grew up with her children in Great Falls.
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The young man was a walk-on football player at Clemson University and suddenly died.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin addresses a crowd during an early voting rally in Petersburg, Va., in September. (AP Photo/Steve Helber)
"Not only were we traumatized and terrorized by his death, but his autopsy took a long time to come back because of the COVID pandemic," she said.
It was not until the end of the year that she and the governor learned through the football player’s family that he died from fentanyl poisoning.
At the time, Youngkin admitted, she and her husband were not well versed on fentanyl, and the two of them looked at each other in shock and did not understand what it meant.
So, they decided to find out more about the illicit drugs until Youngkin was elected to serve as governor, giving them the ability to take the lead on issues facing Virginia residents.
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"I cannot sit idly by and ignore the fact that I was hearing and learning more and more about the tragedy associated with fentanyl, than I could ever imagine," the first lady said. "We know that on average, five Virginians die a day from poisoning. Just last year, we lost more than 2,000 to fentanyl. That does not account for all the overdose deaths."
She also said it takes the equivalent of two grains of salt to kill a human being, and even less to kill a young child.
"Needless to say, this leading cause of unnatural death in the Commonwealth of Virginia is an area of concern, and it’s something that I’m really talking a lot about because I want to break down the barriers of shame and a lack of education and make sure that Virginians, and in particular parents and educators, are empowered with the information they need to save lives," Youngkin said.
"I want to break down the barriers of sham and a lack of education and make sure that Virginians, and in particular parents and educators, are empowered with the information they need to save lives."
— Suzanne Youngkin
The first lady launched the "It Only Takes One" campaign earlier this year in Roanoke, because the city had seen a high percentage of overdose deaths.
The Roanoke Valley Collective, which Wright helped co-found, encompassed health care providers and recovery centers well on their way to educating citizens about the fentanyl crisis. The mayor of Roanoke was also interested in working with Youngkin, as was the school district superintendent, faith-based communities, the local sheriff, and a bipartisan group of legislators.
Youngkin said she partnered with a communication firm, Attorney General Jason Miyares, the Virginia Foundation for Healthy Youth, the Department of Health and the local stakeholders to launch the "It Only Takes One" campaign in Roanoke.
The program includes training the community on how to use naloxone to save someone from an overdose.
And rather than sit back and watch the progress, she gets involved and even carries naloxone next to her lipstick in the first lady’s handbag.
"If we could get that out to the communities, and we could empower people with that, I think it’ll go a very long way to addressing these really horrifying situations, like the one we saw in Travis County."
Youngkin was referring to Travis County, Texas, where last week the City of Austin saw an unusual string of over 60 overdoses and nine deaths due to overdoses.
Youngkin, who is originally from Travis County, said a friend of hers in Texas, texted to inform her about the string of overdoses.
"Interestingly, there were a lot of lives saved, and you know why they were saved? Because so many first responders and individuals, caring individuals, are now learning how to administer lifesaving naloxone, or Narcan," Youngkin said.
She acknowledged the changes in the danger of experimental drug use, where it could just be someone offering a Xanax or other pills to deal with attention deficit disorder or depression, which are now resulting in the loss of life.
We’re dealing with something very, very sinister that I think is going to require all of us to sit back and say, this is not a time to judge, this is a time to love,
— Suzanne Youngkin
"We’re dealing with something very, very sinister that I think is going to require all of us to sit back and say, this is not a time to judge, this is a time to love," Youngkin said. "If I can do anything to encourage people to come out of the shadows and really step into a place of recovery and of addressing mental health and substance abuse disorder issues, I stand at the ready to do that."
One pill can kill
Attorney General Miyares also launched the "One Pill Can Kill" campaign alongside Youngkin’s "It Only Takes One" campaign, to help reduce opioid deaths, educate Virginians on the dangers of fentanyl-laced drugs and improve community resources.
The "One Pill Can Kill" campaign includes a website with resources for Virginians, statewide billboards, and cable, broadcast and social media efforts.
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Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares speaks during the "It Only Takes One" launch event in Roanoke in January. (It Only Takes One campaign)
It was modeled after a national campaign launched by the DEA in 2022, which aired public service announcements statewide.
"At the end of the day, the addiction deaths in America are unlike anything we’ve ever seen, and now fentanyl is crossing our southern border to kill every man, woman and child in America, three times over," Miyares told Fox News Digital. "Roughly 55,000 Americans died in the Vietnam War over the course of 15 years. So, we’re losing basically the equivalent to the Vietnam War every 12 months in this country."
Over 70% of the counterfeit pills being taken off the streets are laced with fentanyl, he explained, adding that children sharing counterfeit Adderall pills to focus on final exams, or taking a counterfeit Xanax or Percocet, could ultimately overdose from fentanyl.
But he also said many of the overdoses are linked to counterfeit pills being purchased illegally online.
"You think you’re taking one thing, and you’re actually taking something very, very different."
— Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares
"You think you’re taking one thing, and you’re actually taking something very, very different," Miyares said. "It is the worst addiction epidemic and overdose epidemic the United States has ever faced, and it is an unholy alliance. It’s an unholy alliance between the People’s Republic of China that sends the precursor chemicals to Mexico with the cartels. They have joined an unholy alliance to poison our kids. That’s what they’re doing, and that’s exactly what’s happening."
Finding her way
Four years after being offered a full-time position with the Hope Initiative, Wright was offered the behavioral health program manager position.
As she built the program, Wright also found gaps in the care system and became a founding member of the Roanoke Valley Collective Response, bringing people together from all sectors to help fill the gaps.
The group started mapping the gaps, and one of the biggest gaps was housing for recovering addicts.
In 2021, she said the collective response and Virginia Tech did a recovery housing study that identified the need for over 900 recovery housing beds in the Roanoke community.
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Christine Wright and Virginia first lady Suzanne Youngkin attend the ribbon cutting for the first Four Truths Recovery house on May 7. (Four Truths Recovery)
But expectations were deflated when action did not happen immediately, or even within the first two years.
Wright and one of her colleagues continued to talk about the next steps and started a recovery housing program.
The two found an opportunity for funding and established the Four Truths Recovery Housing program as a nonprofit organization. By April 1, they obtained their first house, which was celebrated with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Tuesday.
"My favorite quote is, ‘Where there is breath, there is hope,’" Wright said. "If you are still alive and breathing, there is hope for a way out."
Today, Wright is a mother in recovery with children. She is trying to break the generation's cycle of addiction, by educating them on all the things she experienced and all the things they may encounter.
Her philosophy is: "The more people know, the better chance they have to avoid a very tragic and often unexpected outcome."
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Christine Wright and Virginia first lady Suzanne Youngkin attend the ribbon cutting for the first Four Truths Recovery house on May 7. (Four Truths Recovery)
Since starting with the Hope Initiative, Wright estimates that she has helped over 2,500 people in the program, of which more than 80% had successful access to treatment and recovery resources of their choice.
But that’s just on data she has access to. The numbers do not reflect the countless number of people she has affected through conversations about her past, whether speaking at schools, churches and other places.
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When asked if she could, would she ever go back and warn her 13-year-old self about the decisions she made, Wright had mixed feelings.
"As absolutely horrific as the journey has been, and the pain and suffering that it has inflicted on my child and my family and my community, I honestly can’t say that I would change a thing," she said. "I would not be the person that I am today, had I not been through such struggles. I don’t think I would have the gratitude that I have for just the simplest of things: my kids’ laugh, the sunshine.
"I think I would take a lot of things for granted, had I not been through the struggles I went through. So, I don’t know. But I would tell her that what she needs is healing."
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