LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS

Do you know what it is like to look back on six years of your life and barely remember it? I never wanted to get off the drugs. I never wanted to live in sober world. I honestly thought no one on this planet was truly sober. I had been using consistently since I was fifteen. "The Pharmacy" was what they called my high school. Drug addicts disguised as doctors. My love affair with pills started when I was a sophomore in high school. I was always just so anxious you know? I was fifteen and was just dealing with so much, oh, if you only knew, you would understand why I so desperately wanted to not feel. The first time I took Xanax everything felt better, because that was when I stopped feeling anything. The teenage angst, the loud thoughts, the insecurities, the sense of impending doom - all of this suddenly vanished. If I only knew what I knew then, where that one pill would take me, how I would never stop doing them almost daily for the next 6 years - How the addiction to that one pill would grow, transform, morph... from almost every pill you can think of, to cocaine, ecstasy, meth, heroin... how I would lose friendships, relationships, jobs, cars, apartments, my self-worth.. would I still have done it? That question is very complex and complicated, because I am who I am today because of what I have walked through. In a perfect world, we would not have to deal with things of this nature. But this is not a perfect world. Addiction is not a thing to be played with nor is it a thing that should be hush hushed about. People are dying. I saw on the news a few weeks ago that drug addiction

caused death is now higher than the chance of dying in a car accident. I cannot change my story, but today I have three years sober, and am able to help others who struggle because I have walked that path and made it out. This is my story.

I can still remember the day I took my first drink as if it were yesterday. It was the summer before my freshman year of high school. I was always that weird kid, the one with the roller back pack that wore her PE clothes all day in middle school. I always yearned so desperately to fit in, to feel accepted, to feel loved. That hot summer day, I remember, as soon as the luke warm Jack Daniels hit me mouth and ran down my throat and into my belly, I felt as I had arrived. All my fears, insecurities, and false ideals about myself in my teenage angst mind had disappeared. Even if just for that day - I had felt as if I had arrived. I had felt as if I belonged.

Freshman year came and went and with the discovery of the relief alcohol gave me, I remember drinking often, but not often enough to have developed a problem yet. The last week summer before my sophomore year, it was as if something shifted. I don’t remember much, but I remember waking up in the hospital. My face hurt. I was later told by my family that I had gotten so drunk that I fell face first onto the pavement in a random bike trail. I was discovered alone by a jogger in the early morning. I was covered in vomit and ants. I had scabs on my face. Looking back, the most alarming thing of the situation was that I wasn’t concerned that this had happened, didn’t care that my “friends” I was with had left me there, but instead was enraged that I had been “found out” by my family. This was really a remarkable shift because this was the beginning of the end of any innocence in my adolescent years.

Relief. Quiet. Calmness. When my best friend at the time had “ran away” from home, I was under just so much teenage stress, that when a good friend of mine offered me a Xanax to

relieve me of my worries - I said yes. What day or what month I couldn’t tell you - but what I can tell you is how it made me feel. It made me feel better. It didn’t matter if you didn’t like me. It didn’t matter if I got a bad grade on that test. It didn’t matter if I got kicked off the tennis team. It didn’t matter that my dad was living on the streets doing heroin and it didn’t matter that my mom who was so deep in her own alcoholism at this time had lost custody of me and I was living with my grandparents. All that matter was that I had my “medicine.”

The next two and a half years of high school can be summed up in two words - a black out. I was going to raves and taking MDMA pills every weekend as a fifteen year old.

Prescription pills were so easy to get, all you had to do was go to the quad of my high school during break and stand next to the snack line. It was crazy. A lot of memorable things happened during this time, from being on the winter formal court to prom night to graduation and grad night. I remember barely any of it. The memories are foggy and if I see a picture I can vaguely remember, but I can’t remember how I felt. I took drugs to not feel. I got in trouble a few times, once I got too drunk at a city carnival and had to be driven home by the police. Another, a friend’s mom had thought I was providing her daughter with drugs. She came to my grandparent’s home and began telling them her accusations of me. This also included her outing to my family that I am a lesbian. I barely remember any of these things happening - but I do remember always being able to manipulate and persuade my family that I was not a bad kid.

They really had no idea how deep in my addiction I already was.

Upon graduation, my grandparents moved out of the one bedroom apartment we all lived in together and with good intentions gave the apartment to me to live in rent free. There I was, an 18 year old druggie kid with only delusional expectations of myself with way too much freedom.

This was recipe for disaster, and disaster it was. My apartment had became a party house. My struggles with self-worth equaled to meaningless friendships. This resulted in three years of way too much alcohol and every drug you can imagine being consumed here. Almost any chance at a real connection I deluded and threw away for my one true love - being loaded. I kept trying to escape the demons that lived in my head. In the book “Beautiful Boy” by David Sheff, his now recovering addict son Nic describes the feeling perfectly when talking to his dad about not wanting to go back to college while being in the depths of his addiction. He says “I just need some time. I have lots of work to do on myself. I’ve been having a hard time - feeling pretty depressed.” (Sheff 98) When you are in a drug fueled run that has already lasted years, it is difficult to see life without it, and although numb, when not high it can feel very low. Who knows how long this would have went on if it wasn’t for the one thing that changed everything. Meth.

The first time I tried meth I was 18. A friend I have known since middle school was battling his own demons. It was as simple as “should we go get some lunch or should we go score?” We chose to get high and the next three days we stayed up zonked out of our minds. When the high faded away, the come down was so terrible I was completely turned off from speed for the next three years. One day in January 2015, I was in Vegas and was offered an alternative for cocaine at a far cheaper price - meth. This time, I didn’t stop after three days. I didn’t get scared away from the body aching come down. The rush, the confidence, the make- believe happiness was how meth felt. Xanax and Speed, the perfect cocktail I thought. “The German chemist who first synthesized amphetamine, the forebear of methamphetamine, wrote in 1887 ‘I have discovered a miraculous drug. It inspires the imagination and gives the user

energy.’” (Sheff 109) Within 9 months, the drug had completely consumed me. By September, I was arrested for the first time, and then my grandparents evicted me from the apartment. The second I got out of jail, I didn’t think it would be a good time to stop, all I thought of was where am I going to get high now.

For much of the next three months, I lived wherever I could. Motels that I made sure had a lock to the bathroom door, random people’s houses, and my car. I would sometimes go to my mom’s or grandparent’s houses, only to sleep for a few days and then back to the streets I would go. I chose to be homeless - because I felt free. No one could tell me how much or how little I could use. I was in control of my own drug fueled fantasy. There are dark sides of the beautiful cities that we live in here in Orange County. Dark sides - where people become almost alien like and completely paranoid. People, myself included, do things for drugs that are so incredibly belittling and shameful. By the end of my run I was showering in gyms and lugging around old dirty clothes in big black trash bags. I was lucky to even have any clothes - because most items got stolen. You had to literally never sleep to keep your possessions, and often cases yourself, safe. By December I felt very soulless. I had forgotten what a hug felt like. I remember not being able to recognize my reflection in mirrors. I was ashamed of who I had become, but was so numb from the drugs that I felt little aspiration to do anything different. “Meth users may not sleep or eat for days. The combination of the drug fatigue has been shown to contribute to paranoia and aggression.” (Sheff 116) I always wanted to figure out the perfect cocktail of drugs so that I would not feel anything, yet still feel okay. I have yet to find that, and hopefully will never have to. On December 16 I smoked speed for the last time. I had been up for days. That night, I fell asleep while I was driving and hit a pole in the center divider of a road. I was jolted awake as

soon as I got onto the curb. I was able to drive my car to the side of the road, where I proceeded to smash and destroy my meth pipe. Glass everywhere, airbags deployed; Car totaled. I was done but I didn’t even know it yet.

A taxi picked me up and something in me told me to go to a friend from high school’s house. Her parents were not particularly found of me. They knew whenever their daughter came home wasted she was coming from my apartment. None the less, my friend let me stay that night. I slept hard. When I woke up her parents gave me the talk. I half listened as they suggested sober livings. They kept talking. They spoke to friends that had known of people in similar situations. They heard of this place called Ashland Home. Ashland is a 12-step house located in Laguna Hills. They told me about it, almost pleading with me to get help. Something happened - I listened. My hustle was dead and I was so tired, I thought whatever why not. So I started calling. Three days later, on December 21, 2015 a bed opened up and this family drove me to Ashland. Ironically as we drove there we passed by the streets both my grandparents and mom live on. I had no idea then, but today I know that family brought me to the place that saved my life, and I will forever be grateful.

Full of fear I waited in the garage as my intake was being done. I agreed to stay for thirty days. Ashland is a special place for a lot of reasons, but one thing that makes it unique is that it does not take insurance yet it is completely free. The entire house is ran on donations and volunteers. As soon as my intake was done, I remember going into this beautiful home and just being completely in shock. I went onto the patio and felt something bigger than me bring this sense of ease and comfort into my heart. The next thirty days I was met with so much love and acceptance, the two things I yearned for my entire life. The void that I always believed needed

drugs and alcohol was filled with real life emotion and feeling. I finally felt for the first time in years. I would sit outside as the rain fell and feel the cold. Actually feel it. I couldn’t believe it, but I finally felt as if I was home. I have not drank any alcoholic or done any drugs since that very first day at Ashland. It has now been over three years. One thousand, one hundred, and seventy two days - clean and sober. I am now free.

The journey hasn’t been easy. I was 21 years old when I got sober. My entire life I had yearned to turn twenty one, to be able to drink legally and openly. Instead, I did the one thing I never thought I’d do, I got sober. I have struggled with feeling my age and feeling left out, but have learned that I can do pretty much anything, and enjoy it even more. I also remember everything! Which is a plus. When I had about two months sober I moved in with my grandparents. The same grandparents that evicted me out of my apartment. We now have a loving and healthy relationship. My mom, who is my absolute best friend, quit drinking a little over a year ago and is my absolute best friend. My dad has been off heroin for quite some time. Whether it be genetics or the fact alcoholism is a disease or a combination of both, it is a family disease and effects everyone - using or not. Staying silent and living in the shadows of your addiction could turn out to be deadly. I have spent a lot of time volunteering at Ashland and I get a reminder of just how destroying active alcoholism can be every time I meet a person who is new to sobriety. But, I get to help them. “Life will take on new meaning. To watch people recover, to see them help others, to watch loneliness vanish, to see a fellowship grow about you, to have a host of friends - this is an experience you will not want to miss.” (Alcoholics Anonymous 89) That is the most powerful thing of having a voice about addiction, when we are heard and we speak up, we help. My experience no matter how rocky has made me who I am.

My darkest days have become my brightest asset, because through all those struggles I have created my story, and with that story I am able to relate to others who are struggling, and I am able to hopefully help them see that there is a different life out there. That they don’t have to numb themselves, and they don’t have to be afraid to feel. Today, I am able to recognize myself myself in the mirror, I know what a hug feels like, I have real and honest connections with people that I love, and I don't have to go to sleep worried all my stuff will be stolen when I wake up. I get to go to school today at Saddleback College full time and be apart of the honor society Phi Theta Kappa. I have kept the same job for over two years. From drug fueled warehouses to classrooms, we do recover. Don’t be afraid or ashamed to tell your story, you never know who you might help. I am very fortunate to have been able to live to share this, many people do not because many people die before they are able to see the light after the darkness. Speak up, this is an epidemic, and people need to hear the truth about addiction. It can happen to anyone, addiction knows no boundaries. When we are not silent, we are able to tell others that there is hope if you seek it. The secret is out, addiction is everywhere. It’s time to help.

Work Cited

Sheff, David. Beautiful Boy: a Fathers Journey through His Sons Meth Addiction. Simon & Schuster, 2009.

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS. Alcoholics Anonymous Services Inc, 2001.