Santa Fe

Santa Fe is presented chiefly as the place where Nic Sheff completed three months in treatment before choosing to leave and continue his life outside a program. The stay marks a transition: his counselors recommend further structured support, but Nic declines it, forcing his father, David Sheff, to confront the limits of parental direction and imagine a relationship grounded in boundaries rather than control.

Treatment and the Next Recommendation

Nic completes three months at a program in Santa Fe. His counselors recommend that he continue his recovery work at another program in northern Arizona, where he could also get a job and volunteer. The proposed next step extends treatment beyond Santa Fe, but Nic does not accept it. The book gives no further details about the program’s methods or the Santa Fe setting; its importance lies in this decision point between continued institutional care and Nic’s effort to live independently.

Leaving Santa Fe

Nic tells his father that he knows leaving will cause worry, but that he needs to get on with his life. David initially tells him he cannot go, then recognizes that the decision belongs to Nic. Nic catches a bus east to visit a friend he met at the program. He and his father do not speak for a while, but later resume contact and check in fairly regularly. Nic subsequently meets an art student, shares a home with her, works at a café, and returns to writing his book, now with more to say about the difficulty of staying sober.

A Different Relationship

Santa Fe also figures in the relationship Nic imagines with his father. David recalls that Nic envisioned a bond less shaped by codependence and enabling, and more by independence, acceptance, compassion, and healthy boundaries. The change is not presented as a cure or a guarantee of recovery: Nic’s sobriety remains difficult, and his father cannot decide what happens next. Instead, Santa Fe becomes a marker of a changed parental role. David begins to accept that he can love and support Nic without taking responsibility for controlling or completing his recovery.