Rod Harvey: 'Cracking' Through The Pain To Find The Love

by Cyrus Webb
I first heard Rod Harvey's story in 2010 when I read his book CRACK, LOVE N PAIN, a powerful memoir about his fall due to addiction and the road to redemption that followed. It was during his first appearance on Conversations LIVE, however, that gave me a larger perspective not just on where he had come from but where he saw himself today.

Rod shared with me that after a dishonorable discharge from the Navy his life was really a mess. The catalyst of the mess was drugs, but he had to realize something more before he was able to fully battle what he called 'the monster' that had gripped him.

The book that I had read, he shared, may cover 20 years but it took him 10 years to complete because he was still fighting his demons during the writing process.

The man many have gotten to know online through Facebook and his book is not the man who seemed to reach his lowest of lows before he was able to pick himself up and talk anew. In fact Rod told me that he hadn't lifted himself up. God had.

Though many had come and gone through his years of drug abuse and consequent times in jail, his mother never gave up on him. In the book Rod tells readers that though he was a crackhead he was his mother's son first. This meant that he kept the lessons that she tried to instill in him close, even though he didn't always apply them.

What finally helped Rod to turn things around? Rod remembered his mother telling him that you can't help someone who doesn't want to help themselves. That told him that this 'help' had to come from someone greater than him. He had to change the way he was thinking in order to change his life. And that was something that he knew God would have to step in and do. "I had to make a concrete decision that i needed help," says Rod. "I needed God. This (the addiction) was something that was more powerful than I was. My thoughts became my actions, so I had to change my actions. None of that could happen without God."

What was really telling about Rod's story is that it is really the story of so many people today. The road to drugs didn't begin in his home while growing up. He told me in that radio interview that he was offered drugs one time by a friend and was hooked. That one time is all it took to cause havoc in his life that would affect not just him but those he said he loved.

The great lesson, however, is that not all has to be lost. When you realize what the problem is in your life you can change. You can make the decision that you want better and that you deserve better. It worked for Rod, and it will work for any of us who are willing to do the work. This doesn't mean there won't be problems, but it does ensure that no matter what comes out way we don't have to go through it alone.

You can find Rod's book CRACK, LOVE N PAIN online on Amazon.com and on his website www.createspace.com/3394947.