Southland Federated Farmer’s president and long-time dairy farmer Jason Herrick is making up for lost time.
Until four years ago, the newly elected president had a drinking problem that led to him hitting rock bottom, wanting to end his life and, most painfully for him, hurting his relationship with his children.
Drinking is a problem that, statistically, he shares with many rural New Zealanders.
A wastewater sampling study released earlier this year confirmed rural communities consume more alcohol per person than people in urban areas do. Some rural spots consume twice the annual average of the likes of South and West Auckland.
Alcoholics Anonymous runs over 500 in-person meetings – 100 of them in small towns or rural communities. This accounts only for those doing something about their addiction.
Herrick lives between the tiny townships of Mossburn and Lumsden in the deep south, an isolated part of New Zealand.
“One of the biggest regrets is the impact it had on my kids. I had no relationship with my kids, zero,” he said.
“I was always authoritarian, I was not a forgiving person, I was not a very nice person to be around most of the time and alcohol had a huge part to play in that.”
Herrick now has two grandchildren and one on the way. He can’t turn back the clock on the mistakes he made as a father, but is making sure he is a healthier and happier man at 46.
“I am working really hard to work on my relationship with my kids.”
On top of his job at Federated Farmers, he milks 1000 cows and has been open about his mental health struggles. Drinking was the biggest contributor to him wanting to end his life.
“Alcohol was a massive factor. I used it as a coping mechanism, right. When you have a tough day or if things aren’t going to plan, then you’d come home and have a few drinks to ease the reality.”
In a regular week he would go through at least one bottle of bourbon, drinking every evening. That’s on top of what he would consume at the local pub in the weekends.
“I would come home in an absolute mess.
“You can’t take back what you say, right. You might put some stupid stuff on social media, you might drink and drive, that’s probably one of the dumbest things you’d do. You would burn bridges and upset people.”
Police confirm research shows alcohol consumption is higher in rural New Zealand than in urban locations.
When alcohol contributes to one in five victimisations for the New Zealand Police, as well as alcohol harm costing the country about almost $8 billion each year, it is a nationwide problem.
“We continue to monitor alcohol harm in all our communities as we look for opportunities to reduce and prevent this from occurring, regardless of whether it is in a rural or urban areas,” a Police spokesperson said.
The Rural Support Trust confirmed that alcohol is often part of a wider reason for contacting it for help.
Minister for Mental Health Matt Doocey acknowledged alcohol often has a negative impact in parts of rural New Zealand.
“The government recognises addiction and substance-related harm are complex issues that require innovative and evidence-based solutions,” he said.
“We are continuing to expand access to both mental health and addiction supports in rural communities through investment in digital tools, helplines and the through the rollout of primary mental health and addiction services to general practices.”
However, government budget cuts mean job losses loom over the mental health services across the country, with the Ministry of Health cutting around 134 jobs.
Those affected by these cuts are likely to be rural folk such as Herrick, who said he was more or less saved back in 2018 through friends and mental health services.
“I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for a particular person on a particular day,” he said.
“I was the good old classic southern man, take the concrete pill and harden the hell up and get on with the job. I never dealt with the issues.”
In 2018 during a very harsh winter Herrick felt work and life were out of his control. He remembers not being able to sleep at night because he was worried about how his farm would be perceived by neighbours because of Southland’s tough farming conditions.
“Drinking just made things worse because you didn’t have control of what you were saying and what you were doing.”
As with any addiction, the next day was worse and so he would reach for another drink.
His partner Sandy was the spine of his family for much of that period.
“She has never been a huge drinker, in fact she stayed sober most of the time because I wasn’t. She had to make sure the family was safe, that she was safe and that I wasn’t going to make a huge jerk of myself.”
Having now farmed for 26 years and knocked alcohol on the head for four, Herrick has turned his life around.
“I very much protect myself in social situations when it comes to that sort of stuff. I have a lot more self-control now.
“I don’t miss it at all.”
The added bonus: Herrick is a shadow of his former self, walking around 71kg lighter.
“That was the huge turnaround for me in life, getting in control of my physical wellbeing and helping out my mental wellbeing.”
A rural Canterbury dairy farmer in her late forties, who asked not to be named, is now 20 years sober. Since giving up drinking at 27, she’s met her husband and had three children.
If she had continued drinking she wouldn’t be here, she said.
“When I picked up that drink, I could not control the roller-coaster I was on. I wanted to control it, I wanted to enjoy it, but I couldn’t do both.
“I’d have a great night out, I think … but I would black out every time. The next day I didn’t know what had happened, what I had said or who I was with.”
When her friends showed concern for her behaviour she made new ones, without taking a look at herself.
“I had gone to town wearing a wetsuit in Invercargill where I lived at the time. It was 6am and they were closing the bar. I was by myself, had no money and here I was arguing with the bartender because he wouldn’t sell me a bottle of tequila.
“I ended up vomiting, they sent me away in a taxi, and I was vomiting until lunchtime the next day. When I finally came to, I was suicidal.
“I do very clearly remember looking in the mirror as this 27-year-old who is supposed to be in the peak of her life. I just felt so disconnected and that my life was a write-off.”
She had to hit rock bottom before admitting that drinking was the centre of her pain.
“For me something went off. I thought before going down the suicide road, maybe I could get some help and maybe alcohol is the problem.”
It was sharing the shame and secrets at AA that got her confronting her issues and starting to heal.
“The shame and the fear, all of that fuelled the alcoholism. When you start sharing that, you put some light on it and it isn’t sitting there in the dark anymore.”
For every success story, however, there are the silent tragedies out there in rural New Zealand.
“In 20 years, I have watched a lot of mothers bury their alcoholic sons and daughters, I have watched children bury their alcoholic parents. It is horrendous and it is just more suffering till the end,” she said.
“I know one he’s in his seventies, he’s in the cottage on the corner of the farm, pickling himself. It is tragic.
“It doesn’t have to be like that.”
Having spent close to 21 years sober, she said the key to breaking addiction is regular AA meetings and getting off the farm once a week.
“That one meeting a week, it means I can continue to show up as someone’s wife and someone’s mum, sober.
“Find your thing that you go off the farm for every week, just something. It doesn’t matter if it’s bowls, pottery or whatever it is that you are interested in. Just something that gets you out the gate every week.”
She and her husband have seen the downturn in dairying and every week are looking to see if the books can be balanced.
“It’s no ginger ale and skittles at all. It is hard, it’s like ‘How are we paying these bills?’ Eight dollars of payout now is not the $8 of payout from four years ago.”
But she said being sober gives her a clearer mind to deal with the hardships and remind her why she is there in the first place.
“When you are a farmer, you are intrinsically passionate about the land, the people of the land, the produce, the way of living and the connection to the seasons, to the animals, and to the earth. There is something very deep in that and it is bigger than one season of a bad payout.”
“If it isn’t bigger than that, then you have probably left farming.”
Need help? AA is accessible to alcoholics in rural communities in New Zealand through:
In-person meetings
Online (Zoom) meetings
AA On Air (recorded) Meetings on its website
Access Radio
AA Online Shop
0800 Phoneline (0800 229 6757)
Email (help@aa.org.nz)
AA website (https://aa.org.nz/)
