Image Credit: Coast Mental Health - Courage To Come Back Awards

By Dave Barry

Overcoming Addictions

After decades of addiction struggles, former Kamloops woman recognized for helping others beat alcohol and drug abuse

Jul 14, 2020 | 5:19 PM

VANCOUVER — A Vancouver-based non-profit, established to support those living with mental challenges, has named a former Kamloops woman as a winner of one of its Courage to Come Back awards. Amanda Staller received her award in a virtual presentation hosted by the Coast Mental Health Foundation.

Staller was raised in Kamloops where she was a victim of an abusive stepfather. From the age of five, she found herself having to protect herself and her younger sister from mental, physical and sexual abuse. “I’ve been touched in places where I shouldn’t have been touched. I’ve been hit. I’ve seen things I shouldn’t have seen,” said Staller in her recognition video. “I can always remember trying to take care of my sister,” she added. “I was like, being an adult, at a very young age.”

WATCH: Amanda Staller’s recognition video (Video Credit: Courage to Come Back Awards)

By 19, Staller had quit high school and moved out. She became addicted to cocaine and earned money through prostitution to support her addiction. After years of working the streets and the birth of two children, she found an addictions program that worked for her.

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The program helped her to break away from drug and alcohol abuse. It also introduced her to a man that she would wed and eventually have a child with. “I got to be a Mom,” said Staller with a proud smile. But after seven years, her husband relapsed into drugs and the new life Staller had built fell apart.

Without the support of her husband, Staller returned to prostitution and then to drug trafficking. She was arrested and sent to prison for four years at the Okanagan Correctional Centre.

At 42, she emerged from jail with nothing. She met a man and agreed to help him develop a marijuana growing operation. She was taken to a remote location where the man held her captive. He beat her regularly, even punching out her teeth and chewing off one of her toes, all while threatening to harm her family if she ran away.

It was a simple Christmas present from her younger sister that turned her life around. It contained a card, a cell phone and some money. When the man holding her hostage passed out one night, Staller ran away and called her sister who brought her to safety.

Staller lived with her sister under a promise she would stay clean of drugs and alcohol. And with the support of her sister and her mother, she got her life back on track. She began by volunteering at a women’s recovery centre and eventually returned to school to earn a diploma in addictions community support.

Today she’s employed by the Matsqui-Abbotsford Impact Society which focuses on supporting youth who are dealing with substance abuse. She is also a public speaker, sharing her story with others in the hope they take a safer path in their lives. “Especially with the overdose crisis and the sensitivities that go with that, I feel that it’s really important that I find myself in a place that I can inspire people to live and help people to stop dying,” Staller recently said in Global News interview. “That’s the gift in my life.”

In accepting the award, Staller thanked her sister, her mother and many others for helping her to find her way. She also recognized Dr. Rob Baker of Kamloops who has supported her efforts to break free of her addictions.

The Courage to Come Back awards have been presented since 1999. Former recipients have included former Vancouver Mayor and B.C. M.L.A. Sam Sullivan and former Canucks goaltender Corey Hirsch.