Step Denver

We can't thank the Sheraton Denver Downtown Hotel enough for all they continue to do for our men! They stepped up once again this week - donating and installing new flooring in our Phase II rooms. The floors were starting show to their age, so we're excited for our residents to have an upgrade to the space they've earned.

After achieving all their Phase I goals, the men get to move out of the dorm into a private Phase II room. In Phase II, residents address financial, legal, family, social, and employment needs - and start building real momentum for their future.

They get to see, in real time, the strides they have made in rebuilding their lives and experience the fruits of their labor. One more thanks to the Sheraton Denver Downtown Hotel for making them feel at home.

We're so excited for you to read Step’s latest newsletter and impact report - click below to read some powerful stories and updates.

https://stepdenver.org/2026-donor-impact-report/

MODUS Real Estate is hosting their second annual charity golf tournament benefiting Step Denver on October 5th at the exclusive Hiwan Golf Club.

Don't forget to sign up or you'll miss out!

Click the link below:

https://events.golfstatus.com/event/the-step-classic-2026/

Step Denver's monthly sobriety celebration we call "Cakes & Coins" had a strong presence of gratitude. Some Step Denver Alumni came back for the event including Step Springs' COO, Andre. He had a powerful message for the men following the path he took 4 years ago - which is for all of you out there also. There is hope. Congratulations to all of our residents who keep putting their recovery first day after day - including the men who picked up chips ranging from one to three years.

A big thanks to Collin for sitting down with us to tell us his story:

“I relapsed on alcohol in a hotel room when I was in Florida. My dad lives in Colorado, so I bought a plane ticket here and continued to drink. I basically was just drinking myself to death in my dad's basement.

“He found me and he kicked me out. I was in pretty bad shape – he said he counted like 25 bottles of liquor in his basement.”

After a few short stays at shelters in Denver, Collin entered the program here at Step.

“I think when I got here, I hadn't eaten in like a week and a half. This place saved my life. I've put on probably 25 pounds since I've been here.

“The meetings, the brotherhood, just the guys here - I've met a lot of really solid dudes here that actually care about where they're going.

“I scored this really killer job after five days.

“I have three children that weren’t talking to me at the time. They’re all talking to me now. My relationship with my daughters is better now than it ever was. My dad finally started to talk to me again.”

Collin on what drives him to keep improving every day:

“I’m here for a reason. I have a five-year-old boy that needs a bone marrow transplant. If I start to think about drinking, I need to think about him and what he's going through. You know, I got problems, but he's really got problems.

“My goal now is to help other guys. I try to go early and stay late at meetings. Just to hang out and try to meet people and be of service. I cook every Sunday here for the guys. I’ve been doing that for almost two months now.

“I still have a lot to prove, but I'm going to just keep doing what I'm doing.

“This place has been a blessing to me.”

We want to give a quick shoutout to Kevon for recently getting a big raise and a promotion! We got to sit down with Kevon to hear his story:

“I started drinking at 19, and drank for six months straight after that. I lost my job, and ended up staying on someone’s couch for a while. That went on for 16 more years.

"My first attempt at stopping was when I was 29. That began the cycle of three months of not drinking, then relapse. Over and over and over again. Everything would be going well, and then I'd burn it down. It just got exhausting.

“This is the first program that I’ve ever been a part of. I feel unbelievably lucky.

“A big part of it is people who are here chose to be here. There’s a lot of things that you hear someone say that I think will truly register with you as an addict or an alcoholic. It goes beyond just, ‘Oh, I don’t drink anymore.' It’s fixing why I drank in the first place.

“In the last year, it's been a big jump in progress for me, as opposed to just kind of running into the same old wall. Just being able to break through to the other side, and a promotion was on the other side of that.

“I got a job about a month into the program as a junior technician for the baggage handling systems at the Denver Airport. A senior tech position opened up, and I decided to throw my hat in the ring. I was one of the very few people in America that’s trained on this specific system by the manufacturer, so I had pretty good positioning.

"It was nice having Mark (Step’s Career Counselor) there for advice. It was probably the best interview I’ve ever done – the answers were just all there.”

“I had been drinking for 16 years and never had this kind of progress, ever.”

We recently had the privilege of sitting down with Step resident and staff member Austin! He shared how his addiction started, the role Step played in getting him back on track, and his thoughts on becoming Step’s Weekend Facility Coordinator a few months ago:

“I started using and drinking when I was around 13. I was a skateboarder, so I was very rebellious to society. I liked the punk outlook to it and just liked to have fun – or what I thought was fun. Eventually, I started having psychosis from the drugs, which really drove me deeper into addiction.

“At one point I got sober on my own, but ended up relapsing and lost everything – burnt all my bridges. I had three attempts on my life. That’s what led me to Step – pure desperation.

“I learned accountability here. I learned a lot about myself and my defects.

“This program put a fire under me. I never used to make my bed; I never had a savings account – I’m learning a lot of discipline."

On the support network that Austin has built since coming here:

“Most of my contacts now are ‘Step’ this or ‘Step’ that – if I ever need someone to talk to, I just type in Step on my phone and I’ve got a huge list.

“Today, I can call my mom and she’ll answer, because she knows that I’m not looking for a handout. We’re mending our relationship for sure.”

On the role that working for Step has played in his life:

“I'm super proud to be on this road - to be at Step Denver. I'm grateful and proud to be of service, working with the team that helped me so much and rewired my mind - just transformed the way I think.”

Austin’s final thoughts on the program:

“It does take a lot of hard work - it’s a tough program - but if you can go through the whole program, when you leave you shouldn't have a tough time with actual life.

“I heard one person say that in addiction we sacrificed everything for one thing, and now all we have to do is sacrifice that one thing for everything.”

A huge shoutout to everyone who joined us for Cakes and Coins last night - three guys celebrated one year of sobriety, with one man picking up two years!

We recently got to sit down with Step resident Ed to hear his story:

“I've been drinking since I was 15. It got to the point where I was drinking a bottle or two a day.

“I went to my first 12-step program, and I remember hearing a guy talk about his life and how he had lost everything - and how much better his life had become since he’d gotten sober. In that moment I decided that I'd become an alcoholic, and that I wanted to live.

“As fate would have it, I got here and this is the program that worked for me. It's almost like there was divine intervention guiding me along the way to end up here. I needed guidance and regimen, and Step definitely provided that.

As Ed started looking for jobs, he quickly realized that he would have to branch out from his past career of engineering.

“My RSM (Recovery Support Manager) said, ‘engineering was causing you a lot of stress. That may be what lead to the habits that you had created.’

“I remember thinking, ‘Oh man, this is what I do. This is what I know.’

“I probably put in a hundred applications to other jobs. As fate would have it, one day I felt totally defeated and I decided I was just going to take the day off from looking for a job.

“As I was waiting in line for samples at Costco, they had a little napkin holder right there and it said, ‘Need a job?’

“I got an interview, and was hired on the spot. I started getting really good at it.

“After six months, I had an opportunity from a friend to get back into engineering.

“It just so happened that the same exact day I found out I didn't get that engineering job, I got promoted. I've learned to trust now that when these little circumstances like that happen, a lot of times I don't really believe they're coincidence anymore.

“I'm a senior supervisor at Costco now. I'm the second in command under only the manager, with a team of 56 people.”

Ed also shared some other areas of his life that have improved since coming to Step.

“I've been writing a book for seven years. I finally finished it and published it. In six months of sobriety, I finished what I couldn't finish in seven years of drunken stupor.

“My connection to God has grown astronomically to something that I never even knew could exist. I feel that connection all the time now, almost every day.

“I have never, in my adult life, felt this way. But I had never been sober long enough to build any kind of connection.

“I'm happier - like, truly happier. I would say that in the past, I might have been happy maybe 5% of the time. Now, I'm happy 95% of the time.

“One of the most dangerously deceiving parts of addiction is that it narrows your life so much that it's almost impossible at times to see a way out. And when that happens, it's really easy to lose hope. But if you're still alive, then there IS still hope.

“Some of life's greatest journeys begin with just taking one single step.”

"Without drugs and alcohol, I actually feel like I have a life that's worth living."

Step resident, Travis, who recently got a promotion and moved into a Step Sober Home, shared with us how proud he is of what he's been able to accomplish since coming to Step:

"Now that I'm not spending the little money that I had left over from when I was getting paid on drugs and alcohol, I can actually have some stability - that reduces a lot of stress and anxiety.

"When I lived here in Denver initially, I spent four and a half years interviewing for a supervisor position and never got it. So to have that happening, just in three, four months, you know, tells me that I'm experiencing dramatic change.

"Now that I'm sober, I'm finding that things that I struggled with to accomplish are coming more easy to me, and that gives me a lot of confidence because that will carry me to where I really want to be."

Travis also shared some advice for those entering the program:

"If you're going to choose to come to this program, commit to it with the fullness of your being in your mind. Don't take a half measure.

"This is your life that is at stake here. Your freedom - your happiness."