- Drugs
It’s not like I woke up one morning and said to myself, “Today I am going to become an addict.” But indeed it seemed that overnight I was shoulder deep in addiction, an eating disorder and mental health issues.
Growing up, I was always daddy’s little girl. Around the age of four, my father left and didn’t return until a few years later. I could never completely blame what happened on him leaving, but it certainly had a part in it. From the age of 10, I can remember doing things I knew were wrong. By the age of 13, I was involved in drugs, drinking and law-breaking. I had been in and out of the principal’s office for failure to attend school and was taken to my first treatment center later that year.
This first trip to treatment had no lasting effects on me. I was soon back to doing what I did best, which was causing problems everywhere I went. I gradually started getting into pills and ecstasy. My family had caught on that I was lying about being sober, and by the time I was 14 years old I was attending my second treatment center! I ran away from the center to go get high, leaving them no clue about what had happened 0to me. I thought I had yet again outsmarted the system. Several days later, the cops found me getting high on heroin for the first time. They carted me away to the station to be picked up by my family.
My parents agreed to send me off to a school in upstate NY for gifted and talented horseback riders. They figured it would save me from myself and make me happy. After a few months of being there, I was raped, physically abused and mentally tormented by the owners. I ran away from the facility and was taken into a local’s home before returning to my family. I never mentioned what happened until I was 18 years old.
When I returned, my addiction was growing stronger, and my actions were more out of control. I ended up getting pregnant by my high school boyfriend. We were both active IV drug users at the time and were very dangerous for one another. I terminated the pregnancy. After that day, it seemed that I was growing even more out of control than before. I was trying to take away all the pain from everything that had happened.
I entered a treatment center but I refused to attend the groups and claimed I was cured from the disease from addiction. I remained clean for a few weeks until my best friend, Brody, committed suicide. I went into a downward spiral and attempted suicide myself.
A few weeks after returning home from the last treatment center, my father and I were arrested for physically fighting. I promised my father I would never be arrested again after that. Two weeks later, I was arrested again after leaving a party with a group of kids. They had robbed three homes at gunpoint before picking me up. I was arrested for failure to ID. Fortunately, the cops let me go without any charges for the crimes committed by the kids I was with. Months later, I watched a good friend overdose on heroin. She had stopped breathing, so I was forced to call the cops and start CPR on her as I waited for the police to arrive.
A few months after that, I was flown to another treatment center in Lubbock, TX. Once there, I came out about what happened in NY and about my addiction to heroin, pills, tranquilizers and meth. I completed four weeks of treatment and was advised to go to a longer treatment program to deal with my PTSD, ongoing drug addiction and eating disorder. I then flew to Memphis, TN where I attended and graduated from my last treatment facility in August of 2012. I have been sober ever since.
I currently reside in South Florida where I attended sober living. Today(6/21), I am four days short of having one year sober! It’s a huge accomplishment! I hope to celebrate many more years of sobriety! My sobriety has brought me sanity, happiness and a new way of living that I would NEVER have been able to obtain while I was using. I have hopes of staying sober while accomplishing many dreams of mine such as going to college, getting married, having children and getting back to my hobbies like horseback riding. Getting clean has allowed me to live my life again!
Haeley’s sobriety date: 6/25/12