Director reaches out to area

Dawn Kryder asks for nothing but an open-mind and a willingness to learn from people who attend her community lectures on the signs and symptoms of chemical dependency.

Kryder, director of the Portales Senior Citizens Center, has dealt with drug and alcohol addiction professionally and personally and gives information about the psychological nature behind addiction and alcoholism.

"By the grace of God am I here today," Kryder said. "If it had been left up to me, I'd be dead."

Kryder has worked as a drug and alcohol councilor and administrator for 18 years and she has been clean and sober for 27.

Her recovery stemmed from what she calls, divine intervention.

Her goal is to reach out to others in the area through education. She holds community lectures quarterly at the Portales Senior Citizen.

"Nothing that I teach is based on my opinion," Kryder said. "It's based on facts and information I received working as a counselor."

Kryder said she stresses that alcohol and drug addiction are not a weaknesses and users aren't bad people.

"They suffer from an absolute mind-blowing disease of devastation," she said. "I want to help people gain an understanding of the disease."

She also discusses enablers in families and how they can be detrimental to the recovery process.

"I'm so passionate about getting the word out because of hope," Kryder said. "If you could educate people about what they're up against, then they learn how to get to the other side. I'll never forget the first time I felt hope."

She said it's common that family members of addicts attend to better understand the disease.

"Families of alcoholics and addicts feel like they're being taken hostage of this disease as well," Kryder said.

Kryder says her main motivation behind for free lectures is because she understands what addicts and alcoholics go through.

"I do it because of people's pain that they don't need to be going through," she said. "It's my responsibility to help."

Portales City Clerk Joan Martinez is a regular attendee at Kryder's lectures. Martinez said she has family members who struggle with alcoholism and feels Kryder's lectures are informative and helpful.

"I learned it's a genetic condition," Martinez said. "It's not that they feel great when using, they feel normal."

She added that she's witnessed people she loves become completely different when using and feels Kryder explains in her lectures why people change.

"She's a really good instructor," Martinez said. "She shows you how your brain reacts to alcohol."

She, too, hopes more will attend Kryder's lectures because she feels there are members in the community who hide their dependency on drugs and alcohol.

"They appear to be functioning but they have a problem," Martinez said. "It's not because they like (using), it's because they think they need it."