My Story

My name is Richard Jensen, I was born on the twenty second day of July 1970. I was raised by my mom Marie Hurley (was Jensen at the time) with my brother (Kenny) and sister (Tina). I was raised in north Portland apartments called Tamerax. The Tamerax was in the Columbia villa. This was the ghetto of Portland, a predominately black neighborhood. We may have been the only white family in a five block radius. I was a very hyperactive kid with a very short attention span and no good fatherly role model for the first thirteen years of my life. There were a few men that passed through our home when I was young. Many of the men were abusive to my mother and many had drug or alcohol problems. My mom was very insecure and had other problems at the time which made for a bad pick of men. I knew mom loved us and did the best she could with what she was working with. I grew up angry and racist and learned to fight at a young age. By age twelve I had been sent home from school for fighting many times.

I played baseball for a couple years there and my mom began to keep score for the team. My mom and my coach at the time found interest in each other. Jerry Hurley was my coach's name and he was a great man. They fell in love and got married. We moved to Tigard which is in southwest Portland, oh man were those greener grasses. We all moved in together with two of Jerry's four kids and became a family. This was very trying for all of us. We all managed very well considering the large amount of us in a small place and also not a lot of money. Mom was a stay home mom and dad worked at the post office. Somehow we always made it and had the things we needed. They raised us kids with good morals and a great belief system to carry on with us.

I began to wrestle when we moved to Tigard. I found wrestling to be a great sport to help me funnel all my hyperactivity and the anger and resentment that I had. I didn't understand this stuff till later but wrestling was my out and it kept me out of trouble for many years. Without wrestling in high school I may not have finished. I had a great coach, mentor, and leader to guide me through my high school years. Thank God for H.D. Weddell, my high school wrestling coach. I was not a great wrestler through high school but I did have a good senior year. I had a lot of heart and I worked hard/ I always thought of the wrestling room as the safe haven or the sanctuary. Wrestling taught me many things: team work, discipline, focus, healthy competition, goal setting , commitment and much about healthy relationships. Wrestling taught me that there were no limits to hard work and that anything is possible.

I graduated from Tigard High School in June of 1989. Upon graduation there were a couple possibilities for college. I graduated with an eye on Clackamas Community College, the local college with a wrestling team. The summer after high school I tried drugs and alcohol and got addicted to methamphetamine the first time a tried it. I didn't realize it at the time that I was addicted. I went fishing in Alaska and found that the life style was a very rough one and the alcohol and drugs ran rampant. I continued to go fishing for the next five years. The drug addiction and life style sank in deep and fast. I would go out and make $10,000 to $30,000, come home and party till we shoved off again three month later without a dime in our pocket. Those five years were just a big party, much of it was fun but I was creating trouble for some time to come.

The first time I got busted was in the early 90's. It was in northern California and I got caught with a large quantity of methamphetamine. I went to jail and got probation. Shortly after that I got a DUII in Oregon and landed on probation in Oregon. Next I got caught with methamphetamine. Again in Oregon and they gave me a PCS2 (possession of controlled substance. I got out of jail and ran to Tacoma Washington thinking I would leave my troubles behind. Within a month of being there I found my way back to jail with new charges (assault 3) for a drunken fight. This was in was mid 90's and I was then on probation in three states. Stuck in the web of addiction and a criminal life style and I thought that was the only way I would ever live.

For the next ten years I was in and out of jail many times for probation violations and new charges here and there. I got to the point where it was normal behavior to go to jail. In fact it got very comfortable at times. Going to jail was just another day in the life style of a drug addict with criminal convict belief system.

The last four or five years of my addiction I was taught how to manufacture methamphetamine. I really thought I was someone now. I got busted shoplifting many times over the years. I had found my way back to jail in Oregon for fighting with a friend of mine at the time. I lost a good friend that day, but that's where my addiction took me. I was charged with another assault. The police raided my house a couple of time and I was charged with distribution and manufacturing methamphetamine and sent back to jail for a year this time. The jail sentences were getting longer and harder.

I had spent five years of my adult life in jail and the system had finally had enough of me going in and out of the jail system. They charged me with another manufacturing and sent me to Oregon State Penitentiary for thirteen months. For the first time I was truly relieved. The October 10, 2003 arrest may have saved my life. At the very end I was whittled down to 150 pounds I was very sickly and unhealthy. There were times when I couldn't get out of bed and my joints would seize up and muscles would hurt so badly I just wanted to die. At the end I was doing things I told myself all my life I would never do. I had no morals and no respectable belief system and I forgot everything I was raised under by my parents.

When I was arrested October 10, 2003 I had had about enough. I was worn out. Exhausted from looking over my shoulder; so tired of hiding and the paranoia was getting to me. Insanity was full force by the end of my addiction. Sitting in prison I got the news that my mother was diagnosed at late stages of cancer. I was unavailable, incarcerated and confined away from my mother for her last days. I remember talking on the phone with her while she was doing chemo therapy. Actually, I would talk, she would listen. Someone would hold the phone to her ear while I talked. I told her all of the things I was going to do differently. I told her that I was done with a life of crime. I was going to find a way to stay clean, off drugs and alcohol. She had heard this many times before. Little did she know it would ring true this time.

My mom (Marie) passed away three weeks into chemotherapy. I was devastated. Sitting in prison feeling like I had been dragged behind a truck for many years, bruised beaten and worn thin. Now I just got news my mother died. Unable to be present at the funeral, I hurt deep. I felt as though I had been a failure all my adult life. I was very much afraid I couldn't make it out there without drugs and alcohol. I know that if I had not been confined in prison when I got the news of mothers passing I may have gone off the hook and not found my way back. Being confined and away from the drugs may have saved my life. I was not prepared to handle this news. Truly believe that God had a bigger plan for me. I spent the next year avoiding trouble and influence in prison, and planned to find help for my drug addiction upon my release from prison.

I was released from the Oregon State Prison the day after Thanksgiving 2004, cold turkey and fresh air. I was scared to death and wasn't sure were to go or who to talk to about getting the help I needed at the time. I was paroled to the Salvation Army and I knew I couldn't stay clean on my own without help. I was released from prison with really long fire engine red curly hair that had so long meant part of my identity, real thick skin like a shield, and a belief system of criminal convict mentality. I had the clothes on my back and the shoes on my feet and I was fighting the combination of three addictions. One was the addiction to criminality, the second to the process of manufacturing amphetamines, and third using methamphetamines.

For a couple of weeks I pounded the pavement of downtown Portland looking for a treatment program that would take me in with no money or insurance. I spent much time eating in soup lines in downtown Portland. I was introduced to David Fitzgerald, a mentor in the mentor program, by Jimmy Hubs, a friend of mine I ran into downtown. I hadn't seen Jimmy for a couple of years and he was clean today. David gave me hope and he offered me a chance to be in the mentor program. I signed up for treatment at Portland Alternative Health Center (P.A.H.C) and the mentor program took me in and I was housed in 8 N.W. 8th (Central City Concerns clean and sober housing).

I truly thought that it would be like all the other treatment programs I had tried to go through. Yes, there were six or seven different court mandated programs I had tried over the years. I had never graduated from a program before. So I was put into a group that was specific for the kind of treatment councilor I may need (so they said). They were right. Between my mentor David and my councilor Bobby I couldn't miss a beat. They were two ex convicts that had been in recovery for many years and now they were in charge of a treatment program. They knew how to work with someone like myself that had been living a life of crime and living in and out of jail. There was a trust that I gave them that I may not have given others at this time. I had to check in every day, got to all appointments and learned to go to twelve step meetings. Most of all, I recognized that I had a problem and had to learn to address this addiction and not be a fraud of this new life style.

In a six month period I graduated my first treatment program and I was beginning to learn how many stayed clean, one day at a time. I had a chance to address my criminal way of thinking through groups in treatment and criminality groups. I was introduced to many that had a longer list of crimes and had been doing drugs much longer. They were clean and they gave me permission to stay clean. In other words, just seeing that they were doing it told me if I listen and follow directions. I might stay clean also and find that way of life that I want so badly. I went to a meeting every day for the first six months. Upon graduation from the program I moved into clean and sober housing called Oxford House.

Shortly after I moved into Oxford I saw my two daughters for the first time in years. I honestly abandoned my children for years for the drugs. Thank God they had wonderful mothers to raise them. I always said I dig a great job to pick women to have my two daughters with. Brittany is 16 years old now and Kailyn is 8 years old. They are the greatest trophies in my trophy case; we will talk more on what that means later. I am building a wonderful lasting relationship with my daughters for the first time and it's meaningful and lasting, I am thankful for this relationship that for the first time is based on trust.

I was introduced to the Recovery Association Project by a mentor named Randy Sorvisto. He went inside and I stood out on the front porch of the place. This beautiful woman comes out on the porch and she introduces herself to me as Brenna Bedsaul. She said, " I am your sister." We had just met for the first time, I was floored. Brenna said she been looking for me, loved me and missed me. We held each other for some time crying in each other's arms. We built this beautiful relationship for the next couple of years and she has found her way into recovery also. She now has a couple of years clean too. Brenna and I have the same father; I had never met my biological father until after I met her. I had so much anger and resentment towards my biological father for not participating in my life over the years. Getting to know Brenna has softened me and helped with the healing process enough for me to meet with him. I am not building a relationship with him, but I have been able to meet him and find out that many of my traits were from him and I never knew that. I have many mechanically inclined skills and I love building cars and am very self motivated. Those were all traits of his too.

I started talking about going back to school and wrestling. Many of my friends thought I was kidding or they just laughed. For so many years I wondered how things may have turned out if I had wrestled directly after high school. I dreamed of being on a college wrestling team and going to school as I was loaded over the years. Sometimes I would just wish that I was wrestling and not stuck in the web of addiction wasting my life away. I had stayed clean awhile and as the fog lifted I got to thinking I may be able to compete again. Maybe just a lost dream, but then maybe not. So I went to Clackamas Community College and talked with the athletic director Jim Jackson about trying out for the college wrestling team. I said to Jim I was thirty six and hadn't wrestled for the last 17 years and I wanted to try out for the wrestling team. Jim said "Richard, many have tried and odds are that you may not make it, we forget how much hard work and dedication it takes to make it. Not just that the body may not hold up at your age, it takes a lot of your time. You can give it a run but the odds could be one and a hundred that you make it, so don't set your sights too high." I left his office and realized with those odds there was a chance. Because the odds of staying clean a couple years were even worse. I just thought thank God there is a chance. So from that day on I began to focus on training. Started to set the pegs in place so that there was a good balance in my life because I knew it would take everything I had to make it through a practice let alone a season.

The school year began and I treated practice like my recovery I decided to just look at one day at a time. I wasn't going to let anyone break me. I was going to work hard and never quit until I reach my goal. At first the goal was just to get through the first two weeks of iron man. Explain I was 220 pounds The first day of practice was tough, seventeen years out of shape, and fifteen years of drug addiction. Many thought I was a coach and wondered what I was doing out there. Many bets were taken that I wasn't going to make it through a week. I remember that for the first couple of months I could hardly walk the mornings after practice, and we practiced hard every day. The practices were designed to weed out those that didn't have what it took to stay. A month into it and I am still there, feeling good. 15 pounds lighter and finding that an ice bath every night helps my recovery time. Then came time for certifications. Coach Stonemetz told me that only the guys that are going to be on the team need certify. I looked at him and said "I better certify then because I want to keep that option open for possibility's". He just looked at me smiled and said "OK then get in there and weigh yourself." That was the first time in many years I felt like I was making a commitment and becoming part of something I had wanted and dreamed about over the years.

First year, season one; I call it the season I was getting the body to work again. I finished many runs and races in the back of the line. It never bothered me because the goals at this time wasn't to win, it was just to finish the race. I may have only won three matches my first year but I showed up for every practice and I got better every day. I worked as much and as hard as my body would let me. Ice baths every night, black eyes, bruises, blood and sweat. I had back pains every night and the neck that needed healing. I blew my right knee out and just wrestled through. I spent many nights up late not sleeping because of the pain. I set out to fulfill a lifelong dream and there wasn't anything or anyone going to stop me.

It wasn't the pains and the practices and the nights of no sleep that were the hardest to fight through and keep going. It was getting the news that my step father had passed away. I was at a wrestling tournament and getting ready to go out on the mat. I got the call from my brother. He had died very suddenly and it blew me away. I left the tournament and went straight to dad's house to be with my family. I was just beginning to find a place where I was OK with my mother's passing and not so mad at God and here was dad, my baseball coach from years ago. The only father I had known that raised me. He was the father that had supported me through years of tough times. I just saw him three days before. He made it to a wrestling match with his camera on his neck looking like a proud father, He took a whole bunch of picture and met the team; man that day was so good. It meant so much for me to have him see me in my prime doing what I love. For the last four years my dad and I had built a new relationship based on much trust. He got to get to know me on a new level, clean and sober, I am so thankful for being able to give him that for his last days.

I wrestled with Jim Hilliki most of the season. We traded off as starters for Clackamas Community College at 197 pounds We wrestled close matches and worked hard together; we supported each other and pushed each other to get better. Whichever one of us would start the other would be as supportive as he could. We were a team and we worked well together. The season was coming to an end and it was time for Jim and I to wrestle off to find out who was going to represent Clackamas Community College at the regional wrestling tournament. I call it the national qualifier because it's the tournament that determines if you go to the biggest tournament of the year, the national tournament in Rochester Minnesota . Oh man I had dreamed of making it to the national tournament before. Jim beat me two out of three matches the day of the wrestle off. Yes, I was crushed but he was the better man that day and I was proud to be able to just be there at that moment at that time at that place. I made it through a tough season of one of the toughest sports. I made a decision to push harder and workout through the summer and wrestle in all tournaments I could and get ready for my second year. At this point I had realized I had overcome many berries this first season. I believed that I could be good enough to make it all the way to Minnesota next year.

All summer I stayed on my diet and made sure that my life stayed balanced. I saved enough money to take the next season off of work so I could just train. Yes, I had a great summer and I wrestled in three or four tournaments. I ran a couple of miles every couple of days. Most of all I kept my eye on the prize. The prize was not only to succeed in life and stay clean but the prize was to make it to the national tournament in Rochester Minnesota and become not only the oldest guy to compete there also become an All American. I have to admit I sacrificed a whole lot to fulfill this dream. But the payoff was getting huge in my eyes and in my heart.

The 2007-2008 season began and it was time for two weeks of iron man. I came into the season at 187 pounds and in real good condition. I figured if I came into the season in shape and on the weight I would have more time to work on a double leg takedown which I needed to succeed this year. There is no doubt that I had the conditioning and the heart (which is the most important piece). I was so excited for the season to start. The first tournament of the year was in Forest Grove. Much of my family, friends and support showed. The intensity was out the roof with excitement. I won my first two matches by far, I believe one was a Tech fall and the other was a major decision. I lost the next two, went two for two for the day. What a great day for me and a wonderful start of the season. It took me a week to heal after that brutal tournament.

I had the most amazing season 2007-2008. The lives I was able to touch and the people that were drawn in, not only by my story but also by the success of this year for me. I won a whole bunch of matches. Only winning three last year and about 15 this year made for an exciting and intense year. I knew that this was my last year to reach the goal and find the highlight of what I been working for and thinking about for years. Here it is am truly making my dreams a reality and that's why it's called Lost Dreams Awaken. Here I am alive and awake living a dream.

I had beaten everyone in my region except a North Idaho kid who beat me pretty good, a competitive opponent and team. I was really exited to roll into the Regional tournament as a second seed behind North Idaho's Ricki Vasquez. Yes, it was one of the most exciting days of my life. The National Qualifier! Here I am in my home town hosting the tournament at Clackamas Community College. I'm seeded number two. I was real nervous and I had only gotten an hour or two sleep the night of the tournament. I had thought about this day for a year and here I was.

The stands were full and it seemed as though they were all there to watch me compete and support me. I know that's not all true but many were there for that reason alone. I was feeling good coming into the tournament. There must have been 30 friends and family in the stands. Every match I wrestled at least fifteen spectators would line up on the mat and the kids were holding signs of encouragement and love, yelling and screaming. The place was a real mad house not to mention all the cameras and news crew following me to get an interview. ESPN sports center was there to get some footage for my story they want to publish on national television. All my support wanted to talk and hug me and wish me good luck. It was hard to not be distracted, but I did the best I could. My focus stayed on the task at hand: to win and place the top three so I could find my way to Rochester Minnesota for the national tournament. This day was so powerful and exciting for me and all the fans and the whole team.

The magic that took place is indescribable. Those that were there know what I am talking about. I won a couple matches that day and wrestled in the final match for first and second. I placed second as predicted. What an amazing feeling I had when I won the match that guaranteed my qualification to the national tournament. I had dreamed of that moment since the day I made a decision to go after the prize. I had worked hard, reached some goals and made it a reality in my life.
There we were in Rochester Minnesota at the national tournament, two weeks after regional's. ESPN on my tail, the local news crew is there, and the local newspaper. Not to forget all the pressures of life goals and the I-just-can't-believe-I'm-here. I want to say the tournament was about like any other we had wrestled in, there was just a little more at stake. So I stayed focused and went after it with all my heart.

I wrestled my first match at the national tournament and won by fall at the end of the first round. What an exciting feeling that went through me. If nothing else I worked hard for two years, found my way to the national tournament and won my first match out of the gate. I lost my second match by a fall to a really tough kid that I had lost two once before this year. The third match was against Yakima Valley Martin, who I had beat a couple times this year. That loss put me out of the tournament, but not out of life. He was the one on top that day with a victory of 7-6. At the end of the match I sat in the middle of the mat and just took in the moment. Right there, at that second, I was there with the big man himself and my mom hugging me from heaven.

Wrestling has helped me in so many areas of my life. I have touched lives and lives have touched mine. Bridges have been built between people, friends, family and people I don't even know through this experience. I had no idea what was going to take place this last two years. I do know that anything is truly possible through hard work, focus, passion, and the support of loved ones and family. Set your goals so that there is some work to attain them, and just remember it starts by putting one foot in front of the other, one step, one day, sometimes one moment at a time.
Now it is time to raise the bar a little more. My goals are to one day run an automotive repair shop called Affordable Car Doctor. The more immediate goal is to get off the ground a nonprofit organization that focuses on educating and giving hope through power of story. I want to go to schools, organizations, and institutions and share my story of Lost Dream Awaken and motivate more people in the direction of reaching higher goals and truly fulfilling their lifelong goals.