Michael DeLeon with Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy Jim Carroll

Today’s popular culture likes to casually bandy about the phrase so-and-so “opens up about” something-or-other in hopes of gaining your viewership, subscription or site click. Typically that terminology is used for something trivial that was never really hidden and hardly a confession. Michael DeLeon thinks of it a bit differently—and his most fervent hope is that through his own openness and talks, and through the free educational materials he distributes, those who listen will open up to him, their counselors, their church, their family members or anyone who can listen and help.

“I don’t know what it is about this guy but when he talks, people listen,” said Dustin Mayers, director of marketing for Steered Straight, a nationwide leading expert in recovery, prevention and suicide prevention. CEO Michael DeLeon is the number-one-booked school presenter in America. Last year he spoke to over 700 schools, and, fresh off of speaking on a panel in Florida with United States White House drug czar Jim Carroll, he spoke with the Pulse about the organization and its recently-opened thrift store element.

Sometimes all we need is the right person to find us, pick us up, and steer us in the right direction. Michael DeLeon founded Steered Straight to educate youth and other leaders about the real-life dangers of addictions and abuse. Having been imprisoned for 12 years, and having since taken giant-sized measures to share his story and level with others, DeLeon isn’t your typical one-size-fits-all classroom speaker. He believes there’s no such thing as a non-gateway drug. And his wide-reaching story’s mission is far from simple to summarize.

“There’s no chemical solution to a spiritual problem,” DeLeon firmly stated. “This is everywhere. We’re in an addiction pandemic. There’s not a county in America that doesn’t have a problem.

“To enhance my workload [years ago] I started taking caffeine pills. My best friend came to me and said, ‘You’re still eating those pills? I know why you take ’em, you want to work 24 hours a day seven days a week, but those pills are gonna kill you, man . . . ,” he recalled about the period when his drug gateway began. “‘You need cocaine,’” DeLeon’s friend shrewdly continued, “. . . and I quickly became a crack cocaine addict.”

After his lifestyle led him to a 12-year prison term, the mission for Steered Straight took hold the day of DeLeon’s release.

Road to Recovery

“I walked out of the door and my wife was waiting for me in the parking lot . . . I’m sitting in the passenger seat and I look in the side view mirror and behind me was the prison. Then God directs my eyes to the words ‘objects in mirror may be closer than they appear.’ It was eerie. It was like He was saying ‘see what’s in your past, son? It’ll be in your windshield tomorrow if you go back to doing what you were doing.’”

He didn’t go back. He knew he wanted to help others and give them hope to turn their lives around, too. But before he could, he went through extensive training. (Turns out school administrators weren’t too thrilled when he would cold-call and say “Hey, I just got out of prison and I want to talk to your kids”). Among other things DeLeon did to educate himself, he went to college to become a drug counselor, during which time he had to counsel 1,500 hours to take the state exam. He quit after losing four of his cases to overdoses.

He then went on the road to make a documentary called Kids Are Dying and in the process had an all-too-clear realization that he had never even had a clue how bad the addiction crisis actually was. DeLeon said he is proud of his films and wants them to offer some hope, “but they are not enough.

“So, the program ‘Scared Straight,’ it’s a TV show and it was a documentary and it’s been around since 1972. In 2002 through 2007, in those five years, in prison I got involved in the Scared Straight program. And I felt you can’t really scare kids—all you can do is steer them,” DeLeon explained to the Pulse. “So the name Steered Straight really came out of my belief that Scared Straight doesn’t work. With kids you have to steer them toward a positive lifestyle—steer them toward their purpose. When we visit a school, 80 percent of the kids go home and have a conversation with their parents. Now we can have material in their hands, so that when they go home they’re armed with education to have a conversation. People don’t realize this, but one out of four child abuse cases in America originate from a school counselor and school—one out of four.

“So, the child’s getting abused at home, the child’s been around addiction at home, they’re not really going to get help from that parent, or from that uncle or from that grandparent, or who’s using. So you have to talk to educators a little bit differently than you do parents,” DeLeon said. “And they’re going to see things in school that parents are not going to see as much. Sometimes kids are going to hide things from parents or sometimes parents, unfortunately, want to believe it’s not going to be their kid. Because no parent wants to raise a drug addict. I mean, no parent, when their baby’s born, says ‘I hope he grows up to be a heroin addict.’

“After every presentation in a school, the kids literally line up 20 students deep to talk to me about what they heard and what they’re experiencing, because I bring up the emotions, and I get them to think about what they’re going through,” he said. “And about 30 percent of the kids that are talking to me afterwards come up to me and confide in me that they’re being or they have been sexually abused. Because part of my story, in the beginning, which started my addiction at age 11, was because I was sexually abused. So when I talk about it openly, kids kind of get the courage to come forward.

“Mine’s like the catalytic kickoff to get them to call the hotline or to get them to ask for help, or to get them to go to their counselor. So I’m not trying to replace anything. I want to enhance what’s already there. I’m just trying to direct education and overcome misconceptions. Change social norms.”

If it hadn’t been for Michael I would probably have dropped out of school.
I can relate to it. He just really inspired me to go harder and help people. These are a just a couple of student testimonials about the effect of hearing DeLeon speak.

DeLeon wants to be clear, though; although trouble starts at childhood, he believes the crisis will not end without the education and serious involvement of community officials.

“I have several college degrees. But all the life experience I have really educated me a lot more than any college degree. And I also go into prisons and jails. I do the 940 building in Murfreesboro. I go in there with programs. I go into Rutherford County Work Center. I bring programs in there to show people who are incarcerated, whether they’re going off to prison, or whether they’re coming home, to show them how to change the way they think, and to stay clean in recovery. I’m 17 years in recovery from drugs and alcohol. That’s my life experience. . . . I know what I’m talking about.”

DeLeon has also produced five documentary films on addiction, drugs and recovery and published a book for parents that’s a year’s worth of conversations that families can have about prevention, likely the first of its kind.

Steered Straight Thrift

Bottom line—most of us are gently used (both inside and out). Thus the Steered Straight Thrift concept was born.

“I didn’t want to be in the thrift store business, but when COVID hit, you know, the nonprofit organization has zero revenue, nothing coming in. And I didn’t want to close the organization. I know that kids need our message now more than ever, families need our message now more than ever, because of the lockdown, because of COVID, because of the anxiety and the fear, loss of hope and loss of jobs, and everything’s changed. The isolation is the biggest factor in what’s happening across the country. So kids need the message more than ever.

“I didn’t want to shut down. So I opened up a thrift store, keep it going to pay the overhead to keep the websites, the marketing going to keep the employees hired. One-hundred percent of every penny that comes out of the thrift store goes directly to our programs to fund what we’re doing. Eventually what I want the thrift store to fund is school districts that have no money, no funding for educational programs for drugs and suicide prevention. So the schools that have no budgets and the schools that have no money, I want to fund those schools for free through our program, through our Steered Straight Thrift Store proceeds. So that’s what the store funds—suicide prevention and drug education.”

Always thinking of growth and the next steps, DeLeon already has expansion in mind for the thrift store concept.

“I’m going to open up 10 thrift stores throughout the Nashville area—Columbia, Lebanon, Smyrna or La Vergne up into Hendersonville. And 100 percent of that revenue is going to bring drug education to schools and it’s going to fund the national suicide helpline to prevent suicide. So that’s my eventual goal—10 stores.”

Steered Straight Thrift is always seeking donations even if—much like with humans—there’s some wear and tear. Don’t throw yourself away even if you are feeling a little worn. Somewhere out there there’s always someone who can benefit from what you’ve gone through and where you’ve been. Anything and everything should be put to good use.

The store accepts about everything you’d usually find at a thrift store, according to staff.

“Honestly, we really need to raise money. So we’re looking for antiques and collectibles or if someone donated some artwork collections that would be wonderful. But I don’t want to say we don’t need any more clothes, because I don’t want people to not bring clothes. So new and gently used clothes, antiques and collectibles and things where we can make more money. Stovetop cookers, microwaves, mugs, Tupperware, all of these things that people just amass, instead of throwing it away, bring it to their store. For some of the more worn clothes, I have storage units for putting together boxes of clothes to send to third world countries. I’m working with two pastors that are setting me up. And I’ll be able to send winter clothes and heavy-duty clothes and coats to Russia, and then to Sudan. And Somalia, I’ve talked to missionaries in those places. So we’re trying to figure out how to get the summer clothes and the T-shirts and the shorts there. I don’t want anything to go to waste,” DeLeon said. “Whatever people give us we will be glad to sell. There is quite a lot of MTSU clothing here. Some Nashville Predators items and some UT stuff. I know we have brand-new MTSU pennants.”

The store also offers special sales on certain days, so be sure to check their Facebook and other pages for more information on what to expect. A grand opening celebration is tentatively planned for the weekend of Oct. 17.

Steered Straight is also part of the AmazonSmile program, so that is another way to donate.

For more on Steered Straight and resources and videos on addiction, prevention, recovery, depression and more, visit steeredstraight.org.

Steered Straight Thrift Store is currently located at 1222 Park Ave., but will soon move into a new location just across the street at 845 Middle Tennessee Blvd. For more information, or to shop online, visit steeredstraightthriftstore.org.