The Life of An Addict

Saturday marked for me 7 months that I have been clean and sober from meth and shooting up. For the first time in my constant battle for sobriety, this time sobering up had been the easiest. I completely left the state in which I had full access to the needle exchange and whatever drug you want on every corner (and could get a lot of it for free). I got to go home to my family, something I didn’t think would happen in the end.

I should be dead.

What few seem to understand is that the last 3 years took a lot out of me physically, mentally, and emotionally. I started snorting and smoking meth as a means to get out of my depression that everything I loved was 1000 miles away from me. It was the only thing that brought me out of laying in my dark bedroom, sulking. Then it progressed to using it to get me through working as a server because I was very amicable and my work production got me from never having served before to being a server trainer in a month

Eventually, the docile, understanding me started to fade away. My husband and I would get into fights over it and once I realized that, I knew I couldn’t continue our marriage and the meth. I left, only to be arrested that night, 2 days clean, because of a pipe in my belongings when I grabbed my stuff and left. My ride got pulled over and we honestly didn’t know when we consented to the search.

I stayed sober for a month and a half between jail time and a boyfriend’s family creating a sober atmosphere for us. That soon came crashing when he relapsed and I fell along side him. I left there too.

After 2 days of being homeless, trying to work at the casino, and being dragged around Louisville to help hustle people for money for food and cigarettes, I realized one of my newer friends was in a halfway house in Louisville and had been doing pretty well for herself. She helped me get in, and I sold my fate to the devil that day. All it took was one guy and everyone to grow comfortable with me. No one was sober in that house, and worst of all, I witnessed for my first time as I held the phone for a flashlight in a dark room for that guy, the power and thrill of a needle. But I hated needles, at least until I saw that and my adrenaline spiked.

One day, him and I got some crystal, and he used it all to make a shot before realizing that I had never used a needle before. He made me swear I would never touch one again after that one time because “people get addicted to the needle rather than the drug.” The only rush wasn’t the drug but the stories of how a shot of ice would give you what they call Dragon’s Breath (a cold breath that you could barely manage) and the most insane high you can imagine. Secretly, I wanted to know what that was like.

When he was gone, I had grabbed a needle he had stashed and asked my friend if she would give me a shot so I could feel that high, know what it was like and why everyone was so adamant to use needles. She missed my vein over and over until, finally, I took it from her and asked her to coach me through it. Still, no intense feeling.

Eventually, he found out and got pissed. It was bad enough I let my friend poke me over and over, but I had promised him I wouldn’t do it. He watched me take my own shot and the concern grew.

I stopped for a couple months from that point, as our relationship grew rocky and he found out that when he split up with me for a week, I had sexual relations with a guy from work. I soon learned what hell could be. It started out with a slap across the face and being choked to near unconsciousness from this 180 lb., muscular guy, to it slightly mellowing and us leaving the halfway house to move into one of their boarding houses.

We both started shooting up again, but this time, that very first time there, we had enough ice to make a shot that knocked the wind out of me with a cold chill, made my heartbeat skyrocket, and give me such a strong high, I’d never felt anything like it. In that instance, I got hooked. The more we used, the worse things got. I dropped down from 130 lbs to 100 lbs soaking wet, I had bruises from the continual, worsening beating he gave me when his paranoia kicked in, and there were track marks all down the bends of my arms. I couldn’t keep a job, neither could he. We barely ever had food unless I asked our old program director/landlord for help. We supplied our drug habits by being the middle man to the whole house.

The shots got stronger, the beatings got worse as they went from choking and slapping to ripping hair out, punching me, kicking me, slamming me into my surroundings, and death threats. I took more drugs to drown it out. Eventually. I started taking small shots of heroin to ease the pain of the bruises and broken ribs I had because ibuprofen wasn’t cutting it and the hospital wouldn’t give anyone on drugs pain meds. I didn’t want this anymore. He would run of with a girl for days, leaving me drug less, food less, and scared to interact with anyone in the house in case he thought I was fucking them. After he was gone for 6 days, him and her came back with a mass quantity of heroin for us all. I hated heroin. It made him more violent, it made me want to throw up, but at this stage, I didn’t want to keep going. I was tired of the high, tired of the hurt. She handed me a shot split between the 3 of us first, her mistake. He would never let me do any unless he tested it first to see how strong it was, then dumbed my shots down.

But this time, he was too busy getting his shot ready. 40ccs of amber liquid, thick like hot syrup. Before either of them could realize it, I took the whole shot, knowing the amount of heroin in it was beyond anything I’ve ever done. Once their shots were ready, they looked at me, and realized I jumped in head first. All I remember was telling them it’s ok, I’m fine. As I stood up, black. Everything was gone. There were no senses, I actually did it. I was finally free.

Then a voice said it’s not your time, too many people are praying for you and I came to in a freezing shower, being slapped over and over, hearing him beg me to come back. The moment I saw him, I hated him for not letting me go peacefully. Instead, I was rushed into a hell of puking and motion sickness for 24 hours straight. I couldn’t keep for down, couldn’t even sit there and drink water without it all coming back up. I had enough. I couldn’t take it. The next day, he grabbed my hair but one of our roommates stepped in to separate us, and I ran, barefoot, a mile away to my program director’s house. He let me sleep on his couch during the come down and withdrawals and let me back in the program. When he offered it to my boyfriend, he refused and things went south.

A month sober, and I relapsed again, only for a short time. Sitting in that halfway house, hiding my stash of drugs and needles, hoping no one saw the track marks…. I left the house and snuck back to my boyfriend, but in no time I was spun out worse than before and this time, I barely made it.

He lost his cool on some heroin that day, bounced my head into a street sign, punched me over and over, and in the last moment, hand on my throat, he said it was my time to die. I was nothing but a junkie whore to him. I stabbed him in the back over and over until he let go, mortified. He was bleeding out profusely and I called 911 as soon as possible, panicking and trying to be there while he was gushing blood. We made up a lie to keep me out of trouble, but the cops eventually got it out of me and with documentation of his violence against me, they let me free on self defense. At the hospital, I was told my ribs were broken in 5 spots, my ear had been split open, there were 3 bite marks that broke the skin, and numerous bruises from head to toe. He went to jail once they stabilized him.

I was clean and recovering again, building back myself. All it took to shatter that was him to come back from jail one month later. My abused mindset came back. I believed he loved me and was sorry. We tried to run off, but got pulled over and both of us arrested, him for violating an EPO and me for a warrant for violating probation.

I sat in jail for 5 months while he got right out. All our belongings were taken, he was all I had in those walls, and all the promises meant something still. I was naive.

Getting right out, he wasn’t there. He said his ride dipped on him and he got me an uber to his friends house, who used needles and meth. Instant relapse, not an hour out. I was honest with him, he was mad, but things would be better, right? I managed to move in with one of my friends from jail since I had nowhere and the whole time, he was distant. He left me for a girl I later found out he was with since my second month on jail. I was mortified and hurt and when the guy I was staying with offered me the biggest shot of my life, I took it. 30ccs of water, draw back 75ccs for a shot. This was bigger than I ever had. There never was such a difference after the shot was made up. He said it was .5g of ice. It was cold syrup this time. In my vein, I got through half the shot before the dragon’s breath kicked me in the chest and I had to take the needle out. My hearing went out, everything went fisheye lenses, my limbs went numb, and the thing said to happen to every woman, my pussy went hot. The guy we lived with found a kick out of the fact I’d never done that much and soon, after that face melting shot, I was hooked worse than ever. He supplied me with a a gram a day for just me while he was at work and when he came home, he bought me cigarettes, food, and we would stay up all night doing mind numbing shot after shot. The hallucinations began, at one point I almost went into cardiac arrest, I picked too much at my whole body, and I was suddenly scared. They stole my phone, threatened me in the other room and made me believe I was just hearing things, except for 2 days, I stashed everything and sobered up. They beat the shit out of my best friend for banging on the door like a cop until his blood was everywhere. I couldn’t take it. I packed whatever i had and sat in the cold at Circle K, trying to find a way back to my ex husband’s dad’s house. A kind couple, after 3 hours, paid 40 bucks for an uber there. I was going to be safe. The drug use kept going, but at least i didn’t feel like i would be killed.

A jail relationship saved me

I got stuck a long ways away from home one day just trying to get out of the house and I had no way home. What was I doing? There I was in front of Target with a backpack full of needles, used and not, no money, no drugs, nothing. I remember a guy I talked to in jail gave me his address and only lived in the next town over. I sti had no way there until a kind family came up to me crying and offered me money to take a bus to where I needed to go. That day, I finally got sober. He took me in, kept me away from the drugs, the needles, all the way up until I had a friend from my hometown buy me a bus ticket back. Since then, I now have 7 month under my belt. I haven’t craved it.

Last night, I ran into a video of someone taking a huge shot and I lost myself. I’m sickened by how badly I craved it. I dont want to relive any of that. I want to keep my life. Addiction and recovery aren’t easy. It takes a part of you that you will never get back. Learn from my mistakes, please…