The “War” Story

So yeah, about the crippling heroin addiction. I’d like to have one of those stories that starts out with I was an all star athlete, injured myself, got hooked on pain killers, and so the story goes. But that’s not me, that’s not my story. My story is – I was a bad kid, with a little bit of a messed up home life, who sought outside things to make me feel whole inside. I was 5 years old when my dad passed away, and I had my first drink at 12. The years in between my dad passing and having my first drink are a blur. One of my countless therapists over the last 20+ years of my life calls that a trauma response. My little brain couldn’t comprehend the grave loss I had just experienced, so it decided to shut down.

So let’s start at 12. I was at a party with my older cousin, everyone was drinking, and I wanted to be a part of. I took my first shot of cheap vodka, and I felt the warmth instantly hit my entire body – head to toe. At that moment, I knew this was what I wanted to do everyday, all day, presumably for the rest of my life.

I was attending a catholic grade school at the time which I loved but hated simultaneously. I had incredible friends who came from the most loving of families that treated me as one of their own. Only issue was, I viewed myself and my family as different than everyone else. Other moms drove Range Rovers and my mom drove a minivan. (This probably has something to do with my disgusting shopping problem, but we’ll get to that later) Side note about my mother, she did all she could when she could and what she did was more than enough.. I just couldn’t see the truth for what it was when I was a kid. The truth was, I was different, I didn’t feel different, I absolutely was. I did not have a dad, I did not live in a mansion, and I did not come from a silver spoon. With that being said my mom tried her absolute hardest to have us fit in. Love you momma.

Back to the story, so here I am, at a party, 12 years old in some little black dress I had no business being in, having my first drink. I proceeded to “black out” and fall down the stairs. I woke up the next day wondering when I could do it again, and how. This turned into dragging the local catholic school girls down as far as they would go with me. Stealing our parents cheap liquor they used to cook (sorry about the penne vodka that time mom) and drinking it wherever we could whenever we could. Fast forward to my summer going into high school and I was drinking alcoholically.. getting kicked out of graduation parties after being caught drinking and smoking pot there, and beginning to gravitate towards “new friends”.

From here, it’s the same story you hear.. Weed turned into Xanax, xanax turned into prescription pain killers, prescription pain killers turned into IV heroin and crack cocaine use daily. Throw in a few boyfriends, loss of strong life long friendships, and gaining of new friends that also did what I did and that makes up my short lived high school years. Probably a good time to mention that I’m a high school drop out.

I entered my first treatment center just shy of 18, I don’t really think there was some huge ordeal to get me in there. I basically came clean to my family that I was a heroin addict and I simply didn’t want to live this way anymore. It was no surprise to them, they just truly did not know what to do with me. I had totaled a few cars, gotten a DUI, and been arrested countless times at this point. I am sure they were relieved when I finally admitted something was wrong. But here is where it gets dicey.. I went to detox for 5 or 6 days. I got out, went home, and had no skills to live this new life I so badly wanted. So I picked up again, and again, and again.

Eventually my mom sent me off to Florida after another failed rehab attempt in New Jersey which came shortly a little stint in Monmouth County Jail. This probably seemed logical at the time considering I couldn’t get a minute sober outside of an institution at this point. (DISCLAIMER- Florida has incredible treatment providers, one I happen to proudly represent in my day to day work.. It just was not for me. I was not ready. I did not have any desire to get sober.) So, with that being said I flopped my happy ass around Florida for the next year and a half with over 15 admissions into numerous treatment centers. At this point, my family was done with me. My mom told me to have them call her when they find my body. A few months later, I found myself back in New Jersey. Like the good drug addict I am, I ran like the wind when I got home only to find myself overdosed for the 10^th or 11^th time in a year while entering what would be my final treatment center.

Everyone asks, “What happened?” “What changed?” “Why did you stop?” and honestly, I don’t have an answer for that now six years later anymore than I did when I completed that treatment program. I know I followed suggestions and shut my big mouth for the first time in my entire life. I know I did whatever I was told to do, kicking and screaming, but I did it. I know I dug into a 12 step fellowship and spilled my soul to another woman – good bad and indifferent. The only logical answer I can seem to come up with sitting here right now, is it was God. It was nothing short of a miracle, that I deserve minimal credit for outside of just listening to the voice inside of me that wanted to live more than it wanted to die.

That my friends, is my little war story for you. This is going on the internet, and I plan to have kids one day- so if you’re my kids friends mom years down the line reading this.. Don’t judge me please. I promise I’m nothing like the girl described above. This thing really works if you allow it to.

Talk soon. XO