Waterford — Dillon McCarthy, home with his family for a few days from a sober house in Lake Worth, Fla., said he is "working the kinks out" of his heroin recovery program.

While sober, he was featured in a Scholastic Magazine publication, met with former New York Giants wide receiver Bobby Johnson and played in a sober softball tournament organized by Groton-based grass-roots nonprofit Community Speaks Out. But then the 20-year-old former high school wrestling captain and aspiring model relapsed in March. He had moved from a sober house into his own place after completing inpatient treatment and therapy.

While working as a dishwasher at a restaurant, McCarthy said he took a couple of hits off a vaporizer that his friend said contained nicotine but no intoxicating substances. It turned out he had ingested synthetic marijuana. Nothing bad happened right away, he said, but the high he experienced triggered his cravings for heroin.

"Your brain switches," he said. "Once it happens, my mind is always going to say, 'Tomorrow doesn't matter. All that matters is right now.'"

He used heroin again, but said he didn't enjoy the high as much as he had in the past. The relapse lasted seven days.

"Being intoxicated when you've been in recovery doesn't feel right," McCarthy said. "You can't unsee recovery."

McCarthy's older brother, Collin McCarthy, 24, is in recovery, too, and relapsed around the same time. He is sober again and is living at the same house in Florida. The brothers are working, paying rent and surrounding themselves with others in recovery.

Dillon said he goes to 12-step meetings and has a sponsor, but he also does fun things with those in his recovery network, like play beach volleyball.  

While Dillon finds it helpful to speak out about his struggle, his brother prefers to work on his sobriety quietly.

The relapse rate for those in their first year of recovery from opioid addiction can be as high as 90 percent.

"We look at it as something that can happen," said Michelle Melendez, manager of substance use services at United Community & Family Services. "It doesn't happen with everybody, but it can be part of a person's recovery journey."

She said statistics show it can take as many as seven times for clients to maintain sobriety.

"I say to them, 'I'm glad you're back,'" Melendez said in a phone interview. "I'm glad you're here. I want to help you maintain your sobriety and get back to where you need to be. Let's process it, talk about it and make a plan to help you identify triggers that might come along and help you stay sober."

She said avoiding the people, places and things associated with one's addiction is helpful, but she also works with clients to prepare them to handle their thoughts about using drugs.

"I do believe recovery is an individual process and you have to work with the person you're in front of," Melendez said. "What can help you get out of your own head. For some people it's meditation, for some it's arts, for some it's sports."

Deadly relapses

Jack Malone, executive director of the Southeastern Council on Alcohol and Drug Dependence, said many overdose deaths are related to relapse rather than continuous use of heroin. The person who relapses doesn't realize the body can no longer tolerate the same amount of the drug they used before they were detoxified.

"The relapse is a very dangerous place because of the muscle memory and brain memory that changes during a period of clean time," Malone said. "They decide to go back to heroin and say, 'I used to do this much.' But the amount they used before might now be a deadly overdose. Also, if they get a bag with a speck of fentanyl or carfentanil, that too can be deadly."

He said people tend to relapse under the pressure of things like work, child support obligations and legal problems, such as the felony convictions that often result when users commit crimes to support their habits. As a recovering alcoholic, with 24 years of sobriety, Malone said it's easy for him to find support from his peers at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. For some of the young people who are getting addicted to heroin, it might be more difficult to find a sober support network.

Kelley McCarthy, mother of Dillon and Collin, is fully aware of the fragility of her sons' recovery and is committed to helping them stay clean. She continues to be active with Community Speaks Out and said she has learned to set boundaries when they are needed.

"It's rough on everybody," she said. "It's definitely a family disease. I think it's natural that moms go into, 'This is my life and I'm going to deal with it.' Some people can cut their kids off and say, 'I need to gather myself up and I need to close my kids out of my life.' But I just feel like I have to do what I can do. I have a lot of addiction in my life, and I'm going to do what I do, with love."

Dillon McCarthy said he is enjoying time with his family but realizes that for the foreseeable future he can't live in Connecticut, where there are too many "people, places and things" that might serve as triggers for relapse.

'Dillon is a fighter'

Six feet tall and 205 pounds, Dillon McCarthy said he was photographed professionally recently and plans to shop around his portfolio with the goal of landing modeling jobs. He has been working hard to get fit and experimenting with new looks. On Thursday, he asked his older sister, Morganne, a hair stylist at Utopia Salon in Waterford, to paint his hair, which he has cut into a pompadour.

Modeling is a dream job, he said, but in the meantime, McCarthy is working for a company called Reliance Treatment Centers to help people get help as he did. McCarthy has formed a close bond with Community Speaks Out cofounder Lisa Cote Johns, whose son Christopher died from an overdose on Oct. 2, 2014.

She said she is honored that McCarthy seeks her out and "tattles on himself" when he needs help.

She didn't see his latest relapse coming but said the expectation that something like that would happen is always there with those recovering from opioid addiction. She said relapse is not always a part of recovery, though it is for most people.

"Dillon is a fighter, and he catches himself immediately, within days," she said. "He misses himself when he relapses, and he wants himself back. I'm so glad I'm able to be part of the process to make him get him back on track quicker."

Johns said she would do anything to help the McCarthy family avoid the loss she is experiencing.

"When I know somebody has relapsed, I'm looking death in the face and I see my son," she said. "I can't have that. That's my strength. That's my energy right there. I will do everything I can not to have a mother mourn a child."

McCarthy said he wants to lead a normal life but knows in some ways he can never be like others. Most people don't drink a beer and end up stealing things within hours to buy drugs, he said. He said it's not helpful for him to beat himself up about his relapse. If he hadn't seen the dark, he said, he wouldn't appreciate the light.  

"You're not going to be able to see, if you're in addiction, that it is possible to get out of it, that life can be enjoyable without it," he said. "There's simply something better than using heroin."

k.florin@theday.com