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You are here: Home / Archives for Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery

Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery

A Lifeline to Recovery

May 1, 2023 By quadcities Leave a Comment

Onlife Foundation raises funds to treat addiction, support sober living.

Sometimes, life’s struggles can seem insurmountable. This is especially true when an individual is drowning in problems created by the ravages of addiction or mental illness.

Help might seem just out of reach as families struggle to afford effective treatment for loved ones who are suffering. However, a private non-profit, Onlife Foundation, was founded in Flagstaff about a year ago to help soften this dilemma by raising funds and creating a network of partnerships that can provide innovative and varied resources for those in need.

“The goal really is trying to meet an audience that’s stuck,” said Onlife President and co-founder Roy DuPrez. “There are so many treatment programs out there, including a lot of expensive programs with minimal results. Families don’t even know what they getting into. We often have scenarios where the potential family may have good private insurance but not enough to cover their out-of-pocket or insurance policy deductions. We’re trying to help them bridge that, so they can participate in better quality programs.”

The motto of Onlife Foundation is “Placing the Impossible Within Reach.” Critical to the non-profit’s success are its partnerships with effective programs that have proven to be successful in helping individuals recover from addiction and other mental health conditions and go on to maintain sober and enriching lives.

DuPrez also started two programs in the Flagstaff area that are affiliated with and benefit from the efforts of Onlife Foundation – Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery and Beyond the Basics. The Back2Basics program is for young adult males, ages 18 to 35, who have substance abuse issues and are looking for a positive and meaningful life. Its success lies in a combination of concentrated direct care therapy and life-skill building. The program maintains four residential facilities for clients in Flagstaff and is a hybrid residential and outdoor adventure recovery program.

“Young adults truly benefit from various activities that are satisfying and engaging,” DuPrez said. “There needs to be some sort of carrot, not just another relapse prevention lecture. That isn’t going to do it for most young people at that age. My vision is we need to broaden their experiences and offer them an opportunity to see what life can look like while being sober.”

Adventures include trips to places like Moab, Utah, Grand Canyon, the Superstition Mountains and Sedona. Activities may feature camping, backpacking, kayaking and river rafting, with cross-country and downhill skiing in the winter.

Beyond the Basics is an additional six-month transition program that follows the Back2Basics program. It is focused on giving clients the groundwork to gradually transition from rehabilitation and recovery into living in the “real world” with long-term sobriety goals.

The roots of the Onlife Foundation story, as well as the Back2Basics and Beyond the Basics stories, are grounded in the longtime friendship of DuPrez and Sean Orlando that began in high school in Scottsdale and continued on to college in Flagstaff.

“We’ve been best friends since we were teens,” DuPrez said. “Sean’s always had an altruistic background; my family, too. We have a background of being of service that’s always bound us together. We both moved up here in 1993 for higher learning at NAU.”

The two were college roommates. “Coming of age together and facing the many social challenges as teens and young adults allowed us to connect around a shared perspective and common purpose regarding life in general,” Orlando said.

DuPrez majored in Latin American studies and Spanish, and earned his master’s degree in academic administration. Orlando majored in Spanish and earned master’s degrees in sustainable communities and oriental medicine.

Between 2000 and 2006, their first collaboration in Flagstaff was the Indigo Movement, which met in the historic El Divino Redentor church on South San Francisco Street in downtown Flagstaff and sought to prevent youth violence and delinquency through self-empowerment initiatives.

After almost a decade of working together on projects, the two men took separate paths: DuPrez moving into the field of recovery and mental health, eventually starting Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery in 2010; Orlando went on to establish his own clinical practice.

The Onlife Foundation is closely allied with the Back2Basics program with a direct line of financial aid and program support to those on the path to sobriety and recovery. “It’s composed of alumni families and community members who have their own professional backgrounds and want to do something to support those trying to get help and hopefully get into treatment,” said DuPrez.

A key member of the Onlife leadership team is co-founder Laura LeVee, who serves as treasurer on the board of directors. She says her son was greatly helped by the Back2Basics program. “Connor became an alcoholic while in college, and he didn’t get good treatment for many years,” she said. “He tried various inpatient and outpatient solutions, but all were for 90 days or so, at which point, he would quickly relapse. In addition, the short-term centers did not specialize in mental health issues, which Connor desperately needed. Indeed, most addicts really need mental health support in order to sustain sobriety.”

Connor completed the Back2Basics program last summer and has returned to school to finish his undergraduate degree. He now works full-time for a gym in Flagstaff.

“I am enormously grateful to Roy and his program, and I hope that Onlife can send many addicts to Roy’s program, as well as others, that specialize in long-term solutions,” said LeVee.

Currently, Onlife is planning community-based fundraising events, as well as pursuing grant opportunities, in an effort to support more people suffering from addiction and help them maintain sober lives. QCBN

By Betsey Bruner, QCBN

Courtesy Photo: Onlife is designed to help support young men seeking recovery through Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery and Beyond the Basics, which include outdoor activities like river rafting in their programs. 

Filed Under: Business, Education, Local News Tagged With: addiction recovery, Back 2 Basics, Back2Basics, Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery, Onlife Foundation, Roy Duprez

Cleansing through Forest Bathing and Chocolate

January 27, 2022 By quadcities Leave a Comment

“The healing ability of nature we use in our program is based on experience and research,” said founder Roy DuPrez.

Actress Mariel Hemingway walked barefoot through the red rocks of Sedona on a brisk March morning before joining directors, producers and writers in a news conference without her shoes. The event was designed to promote and explain the film, “Down to Earth: The Remarkable Science of Grounding.”

Grounding or “Earthing” means connecting one’s body to the earth to restore electromagnetic balance. Scientists, doctors and researchers in the film say this act restores and maintains optimal health. Earthing proponents say grounding increases circulation, which carries away waste and results in more energy.

But you might say, “It’s winter and I am not taking off my shoes!”

And I might say, “Fair enough.” Because, whether barefoot or not, there’s a mountain of evidence that suggests just plain being outdoors is good for us.

According to Time magazine, the Forest Agency of Japan recommended in the early 1980s that people stroll in the woods for better health. The practice was called forest bathing, or shinrin-yoku.

Time reporter Alexandra Sifferlin wrote, “In one early study, Yoshifumi Miyazaki, a forest-therapy expert and researcher at Chiba University in Japan, found that people who spent 40 minutes walking in a cedar forest had lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which is involved in blood pressure and immune-system function, compared with when they spent 40 minutes walking in a lab. ‘I was surprised,’ Miyazaki said. ‘Spending time in the forest induces a state of physiologic relaxation.’’’

Another study suggests a 120-minute dose of nature can make us feel healthier and have a stronger sense of well-being. In Yale Environment 360, a newsletter produced at the Yale School of the Environment, Jim Robbins authored an article called “Ecopsychology: How Immersion in Nature Benefits Your Health.” He wrote, “A study of 20,000 people, led by Mathew White of the European Centre for Environment and Human Health at the University of Exeter, found that people who spend two hours a week in green spaces – local parks or other natural environments, either all at once or spaced over several visits – were substantially more likely to report good health and psychological well-being than those who don’t.”

Other studies have shown even looking out a window at nature or viewing pictures of natural settings, reduces anger, fear, tension, high blood pressure and the production of stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol. At the same time, connecting with nature also is credited with the increase of pleasant feelings.

Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery is a Northern Arizona experiential therapy program for young men with addictions. “The healing ability of nature we use in our program is based on experience and research,” said founder Roy DuPrez. “We invite our clients into the environment that’s bigger than they are. We’re introducing them to the outdoors and wilderness as often and organically as we can; organically, meaning we aren’t forcing an agenda, just exposing them to the outdoors. What transpires internally in these individuals is often an epiphany of awareness about themselves and others. Among the benefits, they gain peace, confidence and a sense of self in the world.”

In the high country, we are so fortunate to live close to nature with hiking trails and outdoor recreational opportunities readily available all around us. For Valentine’s Day, consider forest bathing as a gift to yourself and your loved ones. And to further elevate that mood boost and toxic hormone cleanse, no one says you can’t bring jewelry and dark chocolate along. I’m just sayin’. QCBN

By Bonnie Stevens, QCBN

Bonnie Stevens is a public relations consultant. She can be reached at bonnie.stevens@gmail.com.

Filed Under: Local News Tagged With: Back2Basics Outdoor Adventure Recovery, Bonnie Stevens

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