 Back to profile of MykeC |
|
Blog
> View Blog Entry |
[] |
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
| |
 |
|
 |
| |
| Monday, November 19 2007 02:53 PM |
|
Subject: Base Weblog |
|
AUSTIN AMERICAN STATESMAN |
Tattoo shop signals man's victory over addiction
Chambers was homeless, in prison before turning his life around.
By Claire Osborn
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Monday, November 20, 2006
Mike Chambers said he has spent almost half his 30 years eating out of Dumpsters and living on the streets.
He has panhandled on the Drag, spent four years in prison, hopped on freight trains across the country, spent every waking moment trying to get high and lost one of his brothers to the streets, he said.
"I was 'Psycho Mike' because I was completely insane," Chambers said.
The son of a law enforcement officer and the brother of a former Williamson County sheriff's deputy, he said he has now kicked his 15-year drug addiction, and in September, he opened his own business: a tattoo studio called Eternally Bound Tattoo, on North Lamar Boulevard.
Using a business loan and money from his brother, he leased a former glassworks store and spent a month renovating it by putting up new walls, refinishing the floors and painting the interior, Chambers said. Other friends in the tattoo business helped with licensing.
"This is a direct result of me turning my life around and doing the right thing," he said. "It shows people that feel like life has dealt them a bad hand that it's possible to come up kind of like a phoenix rising from the ashes."
His brother Larry Chambers Jr., who works security for a contractor in Iraq, said he invested in the business because he knew that Mike had worked as a tattoo artist for years and had a good business plan.
"If he had asked me for the money two years ago, I would have said absolutely not," Larry Chambers said.
Mike Chambers said he was addicted to marijuana, cocaine, heroin and alcohol.
But 14 months ago, when he was in jail again after being arrested for drunken driving and drug possession, he prayed for help — and found it. He said he became sober after finding Austin Recovery, a rehabilitation center.
"He's back from the dead," said his mother, Sandi Sikes, who lives in Austin. "I really think it's a miracle."
Chambers, whose late father, Larry T. Chambers, worked for U.S. Customs in Brownsville, said he began smoking marijuana and drinking in the 10th grade at Westwood High School.
"I was a really angry kid," he said. "I thought my parents divorced because I was a bad kid. I didn't understand things."
Chambers said he was kicked out of school and began living on the Drag, panhandling with his brother Stephen. He was convicted of robbery when he was 17 after helping several other teenagers break into a house and rob a man of $27,000 in gold coins, he said.
He was put on probation but broke it by using drugs again and not checking in with his probation officer.
"I made a bad decision about the robbery and figured my life was over," he said. "Basically, I thought I was going to prison for a long time, and I was just fed up with society, and I was ready to die."
He said he traveled around the country on freight trains with Stephen, who was following the Grateful Dead.
Along the way, he said he learned how to tattoo in New Orleans from a tattoo artist and had his own face tattooed when he was 18 in an abandoned house in Denver.
In 1996, Stephen Chambers passed out drunk in an abandoned house in Hollywood and died in a fire at age 19, Mike Chambers said.
Mike said he came back to Austin for his brother's funeral and in 1997 was arrested for driving while intoxicated. He spent the next four years in a Texas prison for breaking his robbery probation.
In prison he learned that his 17-year-old girlfriend, Stephanie Hester, had drowned in a swollen drainage ditch.
"It completely ripped me apart," he said. "Everything just came down on me really fast; the prison, my brother dying, her dying."
By 2002, he said he was living under bridges in Austin and getting arrested for various misdemeanors, including theft and public intoxication. He was in jail again last year when he decided to change his life.
After his release from jail a few weeks later, he checked into Austin Recovery, where listening to other men in recovery talk about their experiences without preaching helped him overcome his own addiction, Chambers said.
Now he helps other people by telling his story at Austin Recovery and at the Oaks Treatment Center, a juvenile psychiatric facility.
Rev. Mike Falls, an Episcopal priest who does counseling at Austin Recovery, said Chambers helped get a 19-year-old boy into rehabilitation this month.
"Nobody I've worked with has come back and done as much work with other people as much as Mike has," Falls said.
"He was formerly known as 'Bad Mike' on the streets because he would just get mean when he got high," Falls said. "And here he's turned into this warm, loving person."
|
|
| Author |
Comments |
HolyRukus
  |
 Posted: Sat Mar 14, 2009 13:31 |
  |
|
|
|
|
|
|
RelentlessSOHF
|
| Posted: Fri Dec 05, 2008 16:24 |
|
|
|
I started reading some of the stuff that was in the magazine you had open at the convention but never got a chance to finish it all. But, after reading this some of my curiosity about you has been uplifted and in my opinion just from this alone you truly are an amazing person.
If only more people could overcome situations like those the way you have. |
|
|
|
jenine
|
| Posted: Tue Aug 05, 2008 21:52 |
|
|
|
i saw your spread in savage a few months ago and totally dug your work and in seeing you i assumed by the facial tattoo's that you where a fellow traveler...its cool to hear your story dude!! i myself have been clean off dope for coming on 7 years!!
friends i know still on the road are dropping like flies from the shit and it breaks my heart...so good on ya for getting clean and pulling your self up...you always have to walk a lot of miles before you reach your destination don't you...and im glad you did...you look like your in a good place...take care j9 |
|
|
|
tantrix
|
| Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 11:16 |
|
|
|
| I have a new found respect for you |
|
|
|
BeautifulMstrss
|
| Posted: Fri Mar 21, 2008 20:43 |
|
|
|
| ......Wow.....we have alot in common........unbelieveable.......Heroin, and Cocaine is a motherfucker, huh?........I was the kind that if I could shoot dope 20 times a day........that was not enough..........I was an addict actively addicted to heroin for 19 years. Recovery is fun isn't it? I laugh like never before........I am so glad your clean.....I wa in prison for 3 years 2 months and 10 days for Bank Robbery. I got probation, and violated it. Sat my ass down for the first time, ever. When it is quiet at night.....thats when you can't help but take a good look at your life huh?.......You are Fuckin Smokin Hot........Damn........nice to meet you........:) |
|
 |
|
|
jfoerster
|
| Posted: Fri Feb 22, 2008 16:26 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
nzingha
|
| Posted: Fri Feb 08, 2008 11:41 |
|
|
|
Unbelievable!
Keep spreading the word. There are many people out there who need to hear you. |
|
|
|
JaydeRaven
|
| Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 18:15 |
|
|
|
| Kudos. Some think it takes strength to never sink that low, but I think the real strength is shown in those who do sink to the bottom and then pull themselves back up. |
|
|
|
angelaterry
|
| Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2008 11:11 |
|
|
|
| ur badass man!u r an inspiration.... |
|
|
|
itsmiked
|
| Posted: Sun Nov 25, 2007 13:38 |
|
|
|
Dude Mike That's wickedly awesome!
Good stuff I say, good stuff! |
|
|
|
Tgirl
|
| Posted: Tue Nov 20, 2007 02:26 |
|
|
|
Hi MykeC
Great blog. We all have our demons in life. Sometimes they win and sometimes they lose. Wish you nothing but the best Hon. Enjoy your Thanksgiving and keep the faith in yourself. Hugs.
Love
Auntie Jeannie |
|
|
|
MykeC
|
| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 17:02 |
|
|
|
| i've been clean an' sober from sept. 8, 2005 an still goin' strong!! |
|
|
|
mitchdean01
|
| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 16:10 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
| |
 |
|
 |
|
| |
