Benjamin Edward Lucas

Ben loved life and loved others deeply. Sensitive, intelligent, caring, strongly athletic, introverted, often suffered in silence, very capable, quietly confident. He suffered a knee injury playing ice hockey and was given an opioid painkiller. He must have been susceptible to these substances and developed a regular pattern of substance use. He fought hard against the disease, including successful rehab and halfway house programs. I don’t think he got the medical treatment he needed to heal his brain; he was very wary of programs that basically tried to argue or counsel you into health—ultimately he was cheated by recovery systems supposedly there to help.