Choosing Sobriety
As a teenager and young adult, I experimented with drugs, but I was always afraid to try heroin. Why did I do drugs, to begin with? Why does anyone? I could say peer pressure or I could say I was dealing with the pain I always felt. When I first moved to California in 2011 I eventually gave in and tried heroin. I was going through so much at the time that I did what I always did to numb the pain. I only freebase heroin in the form of black tar which is a way you can smoke it.
I remembered how good it felt, but I also remember how I lost everything in the process. I got clean for a little bit and got my stuff together. That was also around the time I began a relationship with Jesus. I spent a couple of years doing good before I started smoking weed and drinking again. At least I wasn’t doing heroin, right? My thinking was off but I had good intentions. We moved to Tennessee for a new start and everything seemed fine for a little while until it wasn’t fine anymore. My life fell apart and when my life fell apart, I turned to heroin. This time I was snorting it in the form of powder.
I couldn’t always get it at this point so I just took pills or snorted them. This led to a full-blown addiction to opiates, which led to me once again losing everything and becoming homeless. Even as a homeless drug addict, I still prayed to God, I still loved Jesus, but I was still holding a sign to get dope. I was self-medicating my ongoing pain. I finally gave in at this point and shot up heroin. I gave in to what I always said I would never do. In a way, I was just giving up on life. I remember I would shoot up so much every day, sometimes up to five times a day, I would have to shoot up cocaine just to have the energy to go out and make more money to get more heroin. I think about that time in my life and it makes me what to cry. I was lost so I tried to get clean again, and I did. I remember being so sick it was the worst feeling, I don’t wish that feeling on anyone.
I spent 4 months sober before I went back to the streets again to get high. My sober life put pressure on me and I didn’t know how else to deal with it. I spent the next 6 months running the streets. I was doing heroin, but I chose only to snort it because in my mind at least I wasn’t shooting up. For a few weeks during that time, I was with some people who shot up heroin and I decided to join them. I ended up sharing a needle with this girl and before she gave it to me she told me that she had HepC, but my hunger for the feeling of heroin running through my veins was stronger in these moments than living with a lifelong disease. So I shot up with the used needle she gave me. Not only did I shoot heroin into my veins, but I shot in HepC. The sad thing is I didn’t even think twice about it.
I ended up overdosing that day in 2018, I almost died. When paramedics got to me they said my respirations were 4 and I was blue. They stuck me with Narcan in my arm twice and nothing happened. One paramedic decided to put an IV in my arm and insert the Narcan into the IV, once they did that I woke up. I remember I was violently shaking because I went into instant withdraws. He told me on the way to the hospital that if I didn’t wake up from the 3rd dose of Narcan that they wouldn’t have been able to do much else for me. Do you know what I did? I left the hospital and got high. Two days later I overdosed again. I still continued to use heroin every day, just so I wouldn’t have to feel sick. I tried to get my stuff together, but that ended in a tragedy that also sent me to jail. The jail was my last chance and I understood that the minute I arrived.
Today I choose to be clean for so many reasons. I choose to be clean because I value my relationship with Jesus above everything. I choose to be clean because I want a better life for my family. I choose to be clean because I want to be an example to others and hopefully inspire them to do the same. I choose to be clean because I know I won’t get another chance and I want to make this last chance count because it’s my memory for all the ones I’ve lost along the way. Being sober is a choice and it’s one I fight for every day, but it’s one that I will continue to make because I am who God made me to be.
