Peer support workers helping and connecting with others through shared experiences

Nick Baumann was just 13 years old when he started drinking and using substances. By the time he was in high school, he was using daily.

Living on the streets, he was in and out of jail, mental health institutions, and treatment centres. By the age of 36, he’d had enough. He reached out to the last family member speaking to him — his aunt — and moved into her Medicine Hat home.

Today at 50, Baumann is back on the streets, but this time helping others as a peer support worker with Recovery Alberta.

“No one’s a failure who keeps trying,” he says. “Just love them until they can love their selves, like it happened to me.”

Nick Baumann walking through downtown Medicine Hat. Photo by Leah Hennel

Baumann regularly walks through Medicine Hat’s downtown, meeting people where they are and sharing his story.

“I can relate to them about the homelessness; I can relate to them about the drug use and the obsession of the mind. I can relate to them about eating out of a dumpster, like everything that I’ve done,” Baumann says.

For him, the heart of the work is simple: connection.

“It’s the connection with the clients, because the opposite of addiction is connection.”

Today, Baumann is described as cheerful, warm and kind and works out of the Medicine Hat Opioid Dependency Clinic. It’s there that he works alongside addiction counsellors, social workers, nurse practitioners and licensed practical nurses. The clinic uses a recovery-oriented system of care approach, offering a coordinated, person-centred continuum of services all under one roof.

“It’s saving lives,” Baumann says. “I’m proud of that.”

“Addiction does not discriminate,” he adds. “It could be your kid. It could be your husband. It could be your wife.”

By sharing his story, he hopes to show others who are struggling that, “If I can do it, you can do it.”