Ottawa · 4 Years Clean · No Clinical Distance
Josh Pearsall — Roofer, 3 years clean, Ottawa. Writing about recovery, the system, and what nobody else is saying from inside it. No stock photos. Just what I've actually seen.
Josh Pearsall — Roofer, 3 years clean, Ottawa. Writing about recovery, the system, and what nobody else is saying from inside it. No stock photos. Just what I've actually seen.
How the recovery system actually works — and where it breaks down.
The Drugs Got More Toxic, the Environment Got Harsher, and the Policy Response Got Softer
A frontline account of how Ottawa's opioid crisis became a poly-substance system current frameworks aren't built for.
Ontario's $3.8B Problem — Who Profits When You Don't Recover?
Here's where $3.8 billion actually went — and who gets paid when you stay sick.
Breaking Down the Compassionate Intervention Act — Part 1
A section-by-section walkthrough — what it's designed to do, how the system actually flows, and where it could break.
The Harm Threshold — CIA Part 2
Who qualifies for intervention, how "harm" gets defined, and why the real line is drawn by the people reading each application.
When Poly-Dope Withdrawal Breaks Informed Consent
What happens when safer supply meets a drug it wasn't built for.
When Small Systems Work
What Owen Sound taught me about why smaller reduces the friction.
Housing First in Ottawa: What I've Seen From the Inside
Why keys alone don't fix it — and what a real continuum looks like.
Cold Turkey Is Dead
Why medical detox is the only safe move with today's toxic supply.
Personal writing — the stuff that's harder to say but more important to hear.
Two Decades of Detox — Here's What I Actually Learned
From Acadia to Maplehurst to a flat roof. Twenty years of quitting and what the modern supply changed.
The Lifelong Contract
The same logic that created the epidemic is now running the treatment.
Life With a Record in Canada
From a fight at 18 to federal time — how a record locks the cycle in.
Shedding the Prison Identity
Why letting go of the old mindset is one of the hardest parts of recovery.
Concrete systems and tools for people trying to navigate recovery and the system right now.
When You Want to Challenge Everything: The Parole Rebellion Protocol I Built
Day 1 on parole my brain screamed "I could disappear right now." Here's the exact 5-step protocol I used when every part of me wanted to run or push back.
Pieces that try to show the system in a different way.
Rewind — A Reverse Timeline
Start at the end, go backwards. A roofer's path through housing instability and system failures.