Lori Drescher

Lori is a Recovery Coach practitioner; she is a NYCB Certified Addiction Recovery Coach (CARC), a Family Recovery Coach, a Recovery Coach Trainer, and a parent in long term recovery from the effects of loving and living with an adult child who suffered from Opioid Use Disorder (OUD).  Lori lost her son Jonathan to fentanyl poisoning in 2021.

Lori founded Recovery Coach University in 2016 as a result of her personal experience of watching her son suffer from the stigma, persecution and discriminatory practices in treating one with Substance Use Disorder. The practices were so different from other health care conditions and help was very difficult to find. Help for families was practically nonexistent. RCU was one of the first Training Organizations in NYS to focus exclusively on training people and family members with “lived experience” and a desire to help others become educated and skilled in effective and compassionate care based on sound coaching principles and client-centered skills.

She is a designated ‘Best Practice Trainer’ by FOR-NY; NYCB PWI authorized Trainer; ASAP-NYCB approved Trainer, and Trainer Registry Governance Committee Member. She is an approved OASAS professional development Trainer and approved by CCAR to train all CCAR Programs (RCPF). One of Lori’s proudest accomplishments is her membership in the Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers (MINT), achieved in 2020.

Lori has coached families and individuals since early 2014, speaks publicly regularly, and advocates across NYS and nationally for improved access to prevention, treatment, harm reduction and community recovery supports. Her mission is to eradicate the stigma and shame of addiction in families, to empower families to achieve their own recovery, to advocate for vitally needed community recovery supports and to help educate the public on harm reduction. She passionately advocates for progressive strategies for addressing and ending the opioid epidemic including by declaring a Public Health Emergency in NYS. Her professional career includes 25 years of executive and management coaching, training, and experiential learning design.

Lori Drescher, Founder, Recovery Coach University (RCU); CARC, RCP, RCPF, Member-MINT (Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers)

RCU has a way of teaching that hits both the heart and the mind, and I’m really grateful I got to be a part of it. This training is going to be a huge asset in how I show up for the people I serve.”— RCU Participant, November, 2025