Local mom calling for acts of kindness after son's overdose death

Jul. 24—Tammy Kelley's favorite picture of her son, Travis Noe, is a 1992 snapshot of him about 1 year old wearing blue striped bibs, his dad's tan cowboy hat, and a look of innocence.

"How does that turn into somebody who is going to stick a needle in their arm and die?" she asked, tears welling in her eyes as she caressed the photograph.

Next to her was another picture of him, this one attached to his obituary. The 29-year-old died of an overdose June 30.

"One hit is what he went to the drug dealer and got, and one hit killed him," Mrs. Kelley said, stressing the impact a single moment can have. "One simple choice, one simple interaction can change everything."

She now aims to turn the tragedy into countless good acts, calling on the Toledo community to join her in an experiment to "Do something kind for someone who needs help, encouragement, or a little extra support. Share your love," she wrote in Mr. Noe's obituary.

Positivity breeds positivity, she said, and one positive interaction, conversation, kindness, or helping hand can change a life.

"What gets you through [tough situations] is love and kindness and that needs to be extended to strangers, because you never know what someone is going through," she said.

Mr. Noe had been battling drug addiction for eight years, committing to longer stays each time he checked himself into rehab — but always relapsing.

He last completed treatment in April, but by May told his mother he was shooting heroin again. She hoped his June decision to move in with friends who didn't use drugs would provide more stability and supervision to end the cycle.

But none of the friends knew he'd bought a single hit his first night in the new apartment; it's uncertain whether he knew it also contained the synthetic opioid fentanyl.

Alone in the bathroom, while everyone slept, he pushed a needle into his arm for the last time. When they found him in the morning, it was too late for Narcan or other life-saving measures.

"He's gone. They couldn't save him," Mrs. Kelley remembers her son's friend telling her over the phone that morning.

It was a call she'd tried to prepare herself for after his two previous overdoses, one of which took six doses of naloxone to revive him, but one she could never fully accept might come.

"He cried to me about it so many times," she said of her son's desire to quit using. "He described it to me as, 'I don't do it to get high, I do it just to feel normal. If I don't, depression and clawing anxiety is like a fire burning in me.'"

That addiction is something health and law enforcement officials hear often when working with people with substance use disorder, a clinically recognized disease that affects a person's brain and behavior and leads to an inability to control the use of a legal or illegal drug or medication.

It has resulted in many stories like Mr. Noe's in Lucas County.

In 2019, 265 people died from drug overdoses, according to the Lucas County Coroner's Office. Last year's numbers still aren't final, but a preliminary count last listed 219 deaths from January to November.

Mahjida Steffin, the Toledo-Lucas County Health Department's opioid prevention program coordinator, thinks 2020's fatal overdose count will actually end higher than 2019's. And this year appears to be following suit.

"2020 has surpassed every other year as far as fatal overdoses go, and I don't expect that the problem is going to get any better anytime soon," she said. "I know that sounds pessimistic and I'm not trying to be, but until we really get people to understand their risk of fentanyl and the dangers of fentanyl ... that problem is going to continue to grow."

Fentanyl use isn't always intentional, she said. Sometimes cross contamination occurs while dealers are packaging other drugs. The health department has found the substance in heroin, cocaine, marijuana, and ecstasy/Molly.

Officials warned about an active supply of pure fentanyl in the community in June, after an April report showed 18 people in Lucas County had died of combinations of the synthetic opioid with other drugs and alcohol. Mr. Noe died three days after a story in The Blade about it.

Lt. Steve Rogers, who heads the Lucas County Sheriff's Office Drug Abuse Response Team, understands that relapses occur. Successful treatment and recovery aren't linear, he said, but it is possible.

He cited the story of Toledo native Matt Bell, who checked into rehab 28 times before getting sober. Mr. Bell now runs his own outpatient treatment facility, Midwest Recovery.

"There are times where we've taken a person to treatment and then five minutes later they walk right out of the door, but that doesn't mean we give up on them," Lieutenant Rogers said. "Don't be afraid to make that call. Addiction doesn't discriminate. We're not here to judge or criticize, we're here to help anyway possible."

Toledo City Council voted on July 13 to accept future opioid settlement money from OxyContin maker Purdue Pharma as it tries to reach a deal through bankruptcy court that could be worth a total of $10 billion over time. Purdue is one of several pharmaceutical companies that state and local governments have been trying to hold accountable for their role in the national opioid addiction and overdose crisis.

How the money might be used locally to address the county's opioid crisis, though, isn't clear, officials said.

Mrs. Kelley isn't sure what exactly could have helped save her son. She feels they tried everything.

He'd been in touch with a DART officer. He'd tried two different treatment facilities four times. He'd taken Suboxone. He'd been prescribed several anti-depression medications.

"I don't know what we could have done differently," she said. "I could question that all day long, but if good things can come, he didn't live in vain."

Good things are already happening in Mr. Noe's memory, Mrs. Kelley said.

After reading his obituary, one relative donated money to her church for needed repairs. A local organization donated items for auction in his name to help raise money for suicide prevention and awareness. A woman from Mrs. Kelley's childhood told her the obituary compelled her to pay the bill for needed car repairs of a stranger trying to flee domestic violence.

"Think how much that one little thing could maybe change that woman's life," Mrs. Kelley said of the act of kindness.

Something good can come from something bad, she said, and this could be her son's legacy:

"People helping people. What more could you ask for?"