About
A Second Chance at Life was originally founded August 20th, 2018 and re-originated on February 5th, 2024. Austin Willfred was poisoned by fentanyl on June 20th, 2023. Our founder, Jim Willfred was frozen by stigma, afraid to give the reason for Austin's death. He was afraid people would think negatively of Austin or that he had bad parents. Many people stay stuck in this stigma and develop serious depression. This only lasted five days and then changed to anger.
Austin was very vocal to his friends to stay away from this lethal drug. Jim searched online and found several organizations fighting the epidemic but after two months of asking found not one focusing this problem in St. Louis. At that time, Jim Willfred began putting together A Second Chance at Life.
Austin "AJ" Willfred
I have had the pleasure of knowing Austin for 8 years. During those years of our acquaintance, I’ve known him in many capacities. Austin is a brother, uncle and an outstanding son. In the 8 years that I have known Austin he has demonstrated courageous acts of selflessness, and strength.
Growing up, Austin had many hopes and dreams. He wanted to travel the world and see every beautiful aspect life had to offer. He was very family oriented. The holidays, especially Christmas, was his time to shine in making sure everyone had the same driven spirit as him. Music, movies, gifts and the company of his loved ones and friends the whole month of December is what we all would know to be and what he would refer to as “Lit”.
If you didn’t know him, you missed out on a very beautiful, kindhearted soul. If there was ever a time you needed a shoulder to cry on, a hug, a smile or even a little laughter you could’ve counted on him to always be there to crack a joke in the slightest sense to make you feel better.
His uniqueness and strength to help other people will never go unnoticed. Especially the times he encouraged friends and family to be and or stay sober. After losing his cousin Jake and many close friends to fentanyl in the past couple years, Austin swore to end the stigma and to never let the drug define those who devastatingly lost their lives from it.
Tragically, on June 20th, 2023, Austin was found unresponsive in his room. He was poisoned by fentanyl. His courageous selflessness and strength of light that shined through every room he walked into has now and will always be dimmed as he is no longer here to fulfill his purpose but we as friends and family come together as one to carry on his legacy for him.
As Austin would say, “One way or another the mark I leave on people will last forever” has proven just how much of an impact he had in this nonsensical world. & Because Someone we love is in heaven, we now have a little bit of heaven in our home. Austin will forever be loved, missed and never forgotten.
#AJSWORLD #Forever23
Written by: Chelsea Franklin
Meet the Team
Jim Willfred
Founder and President
I am a man with many life experiences that created an insatiable passion to help those afflicted with substance use disorders and to help other parents not to feel the pain of a loss of a child as I have. I struggled with substance use disorder for 20 years until I was able to break free in 2004. I earned the Individual Achievement Award by Governor Bond for the ability to utilize help from government agencies to rebuild my life. I was asked to stand before 500 government agency workers to let them know that what they do is very important work. I was asked by the HeadStart organization to go to Kansas City for a weekend conference and then come back to St. Louis and run a mentoring program to teach fathers how to be efficient fathers. In 2005 I joined the Carpenters Union in which I have spent 20 years as a Millwright. In 2006, after only 2 years free from substance use disorder, I purchased my first home. For the next 16 years I housed people with substance use disorder in my own home. In 2018 I started “A Second Chance at Life”. Apparently, this was not God’s timing and within one year I suffered several tragedies. First was financial devastation followed by the loss of 5 immediate family members. On June 20th, 2023, my son Austin was poisoned by fentanyl. Since that day, all of my life experiences combined with an immense passion, drove me to reinstate “A Second Chance at Life”. Out of necessity I completely revised the company’s vision. Now I work not only for sober living homes, but also for advocacy, legislative change, drug prevention education, and coalition building and collaboration. It’s too late to save my child. I am doing this in hope of saving other children.
Allison Sedlak
Secretary and IT Coordinator
Beginning at the age of 15 I was troubled by substance use disorder for about 14 years. I not only used for pleasure but to self-medicate from severe chronic pain conditions and trauma.
After several failed attempts, I was finally ready and truly accepted recovery. I had a powerful spiritual awakening and became of the mindset set that my next relapse would equal death; a mindset that has kept me in long term recovery to this day.
Both my son and my daughter were born in 2006 and are my greatest achievements to this day.
I decided to go back to college to complete my coursework and graduated Magna Cum Laude from The University of Missouri St. Louis with a BSBA in 2011 and a BSIS in 2012. Since then, I have been an Online Digital Freelancer, Digital Marketer and so much more.