By Jason Evans
Staff Reporter
jevans@thepccourier.com

COUNTY — An area nonprofit now has a center in Pickens County to assist those with substance

LEASLEY PREGENZER

use disorders in finding and sustaining recovery.

Already established in five Upstate counties, FAVOR Upstate recently opened its Pickens County center in spaces at Brushy Creek Baptist Church in Easley.

CEO Lesley Pregenzer is in long-term recovery from substance use disorder.

“It’s only because of my sobriety that I’m able to serve as CEO of FAVOR Upstate,” she said. “FAVOR Upstate exists to provide everyone in the Upstate a fighting chance at recovery.”

FAVOR does that by focusing its work in three distinct areas — rebuilding lives, healing families and strengthening communities, Pregenzer said.

“FAVOR Upstate provides free addiction recovery services to individuals and families who are suffering with this brutal disease,” she said.

Incorporated in 2004 and then known as FAVOR Greenville, the organization’s first 10 years was devoted to spreading the word about addiction and developing a long-term capital campaign “to be able to open our first doors,” Pregenzer said.

A Pickens County center was “a part of that original vision from the very beginning,” she said.

FAVOR Upstate strives to have “zero barriers to receiving services from us,” Pregenzer said. “You can come to us, or we can come to you — the only thing we want you to do is to find health.”

For those accessing FAVOR’s services, there are no costs and no forms to fill out.

“Lots of times, if a person is struggling with substances, the general idea is that people go to treatment and they have to pay for it — and if they’re lucky enough they have insurance that they can get pre-authorized for,” Pregenzer said. “But that’s one of the differences about FAVOR — we don’t require any of that. No forms, no pre-authorizations, no survey information about what area do you live in, none of that.

“The only thing we want is for you to find your own path to recovery — period,” she continued. “Anything that gets in the way of that, we will help remove.”

A person may be using opiates because they’re struggling with relationship issues, “or you’re struggling with feeling the weight of the world on your shoulders,” Pregenzer said.

“There’s always a reason that people seek out substances,” she said. “It’s not the substance itself. So once we begin to remove what the substances are doing to a person, we can begin helping with the real issue.”

Pregenzer said FAVOR Upstate is “really good” at not only helping a person identify what they want to be working on, “but their personal capital to address those issues.”

That could range from a person wanting to read “every book ever written on co-dependency” to fast-tracking those interested in receiving medication-assisted treatment into the Addiction Medicine Institute, she said.

“So we really work with the individual to identify their preferred method of recovery, and then we help make it happen,” Pregenzer said.

Much of FAVOR’s work is centered around meeting people where they are.

“What does that mean? It means I look you in the eyes … and I ask ‘What does recovery look like to you?’ And we have a conversation,” Pregenzer said. “I ask, ‘What is it you want to do? Do you want to do anything?’ It’s your journey. It’s meeting you where you want to be, because everyone comes to the table with skills and abilities.

“It’s our job to help you utilize those,” she said. “We are not here to tell you what to do. Clearly, that hasn’t worked. As a woman in long-term recovery, the easiest way to get me to do something is to tell me not to do it. It wasn’t until someone said ‘Lesley, what do you want to be doing?’ that I was finally able to take control of my own health — and that’s exactly what we do for other people.”

Someone may be ready to stop injecting drugs, but not ready to give up marijuana, Pregenzer said.

“Every step toward health is a positive step, and we’re going to meet you where you are and help you achieve that,” she said.

FAVOR’s All Recovery meetings mean “come one, come all,” Pregenzer said.

“All Recovery approaches it as we don’t care what you struggle with,” she said. “The fact is that we struggle. It does not matter who you are or what you struggle with. It can be gambling, it can be sex, it can be shopping, it can be food, drugs, alcohol, pornography. It can be anything.

“But again, the fact remains that the internal behaviors are coming from something that’s missing in our life, and how that plays out is what we talk about,” Pregenzer continued.

Forcing “cold turkey” treatment on someone through incarceration isn’t effective, Pregenzer said.

“It does not address the underlying issue,” she said. “Recovery addresses behaviors.”

Jailing people is expensive and can create a “revolving-door situation,” Pregenzer said.

“With so many in our society, people sometimes get incarcerated at any early age,” she said. “If that happens, they don’t learn coping skills. They get released (and) they go back out to the same behaviors, to the same locations, to the same people, places and things — and somehow we are shocked that their behaviors are the same.”

Costs reduced through being supportive, not punitive, can be reinvested “to the betterment of our society,” Pregenzer said.

“What a beautiful thing that would be,” she said.

FAVOR Upstate has a free Helpline at (864) 430-1802.

An open house for the Pickens County center will be held from 4-6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 22, at the center at Brushy Creek Baptist Church.

Learn more about FAVOR Upstate and find a calendar of the Pickens County center’s programming at favorupstate.org