Meth Takes One More..........

17 years ago, I met a sweet, innocent 18 year old fresh off the farm from Arkansas. She was from a town of about 100 people. She was raised with a strong work ethic, and a strong faith. Her family was church of Christ and they were pillars of their church. She was a really good kid. When she walked into Mesquite Charlie's, which was the restaurant I was currently the server manager and trainer for, she was like a shiny toy I wanted to make mine.

I was 25, had been out of prison for a couple of years, and was an alcoholic/addict involved in the manufacturing and distribution of methamphetamine. I was a functioning addict, if you want to call how I was living my life functioning. I worked 80 hour weeks a week. I worked open to close doubles 6 days a week and trained new servers as they came into work. I would wake up Tuesday morning with a shot of meth, go to work and not sleep again until Monday morning. I slept a day a week.

That was the person I was when she met me. She did not see that. After all, I was a chameleon from years of practice. I had learned how to read people from a very young age, and I took her inventory as soon as I met her. She was a little shy but extroverted and had pretty low self-esteem. All I had to do was show her positive attention and tell her she was pretty and she was as good as mine.

Everyone at work was told that she was mine, so she was treated with a "hands off" approach from the people we worked with. They listened to me, because I was the person who supplied most of them with speed and weed. She made it through the training class and was my star pupil.At Mesquite Charlie's, we were given call names. Mine was Desperado, and her call name after she passed the training class was Santa Fe.We went on our first date the day she graduated the training class.

Needless to say, our lifestyles were polar opposites. She was small town and I was big town at the time. She was a small fish in a small pond and I was a big fish in a bigger pond. Everywhere I took her, people knew  me. Every party we went to, people sucked up to me. That tends to happen when you make a lot of money and always have a pocket full of dope with access to all the other drugs people could possibly want.

I made drugs and the addict's lifestyle look very attractive, and she bit. It started slowly, with a couple of wine coolers. From there she moved up to marijuana, and then ecstasy. She enjoyed everything she ever tried. After being told how horrible and evil drugs were her whole life, she was finding them to be quite pleasurable. The hook was in.

She was a really good server, but wanted to be able to work the hours I did so she could make more money. It was impossible to work the way I did without meth, so about a month after working at Mesquite's she tried meth for the first time. As soon as she took her first line, I knew she was like me. I saw her eyes go glaze over and that smile of pure joy play across her face. She was hooked from that first bump.

For the next couple of years, we remained a couple. She went from snorting to smoking it while she was with me. Although I was shooting it at the time, I  never let her know it. I did not want her to ever get introduced to the needle. Back then, that was one of my last vestiges of humanity. If you had never shot up, I would not be the person to do it for you. I also put out the word that if anyone gave her a shot of dope, they would never get dope from me or any of the guys slinging dope for me.

We had our problems, that much is certain. I broke up with her twice before the final time. She met another dope cook, who happened to give her that first shot of dope during our first breakup. I still would not let her shoot up around me. I knew what shooting meth had done to me, and I didn't want it to happen to her. The damage was already done. Shooting dope changed her.

She got violent after her first shot of dope. I can still remember the first time she got violent with me. I pride myself on never having hit a girl, and she punched me. I was spun out, and I laughed at her. She punched me again, and I laughed again. She reached up and yanked my ear ring out. I looked at my shoulder, saw the blood flowing down it, and froze. I knew that if I moved I might hit her, so I just locked up.

That infuriated her, and she started screaming and punching me. One of our friends was walking by and heard the commotion. He had my sister who lived down the hallway unlock the door, thinking I was hurting Santa Fe. They walked in to find me covered in blood from my ear and my  nose with her still screaming and punching me.

There were other times, I would be sitting on the floor playing games and she would be on the bed coloring. I would be so zoned into the game I would not hear her talk to me, and she would kick me in the back of the head.She would fly off of the handle and start yelling about the littlest things, always starting fights with me. She started hanging out with the dope cooks I had nothing to do with because of their moral standards. These were the 30 year old guys who would give a 14 year old her first shot just so they could get their hooks in.

That was the person meth turned her into. I watched her change in front of my eyes. She went from one of the sweetest people I had ever met to a girl that was angry and trusted almost no one.

I did nothing about it. I could have cared less, honestly. I egged it on. The night that she ripped out my ear ring Santa Fe went down to Brian's apartment with Brian and my sister. They talked to her for several hours to calm her down. I slept with our next door neighbor, who Santa Fe was friends with.

The last time I broke up with her, I wanted it to stick. I slept with the person Santa Fe cared most about in the world, her sister. Santa Fe then promptly hooked up with one of the kids who I had slinging my dope, and just like that she was out of my life. When I broke up, I liked clean breaks. Generally I would make sure that I did something that guaranteed they would be out of my life for good. I still saw her boyfriend on occasion, as well as her sister, but she was gone and soon forgotten.

That was, until this Saturday.I was contacted by one of my friends from back in the day with some news. Santa Fe was dead. She had died due to complications from an infection from IV drug use. She had gotten that infection from  her husband, who was the kid who used to sling dope for me years back. He also is deceased from the same infection. I guess that they had gotten married, and it had been chaotically every after. That is what drugs will do to your life.

They left behind 4 children, from the ages of 2-10 years old. What is sad is that the children may actually be better off without them, if they were unable to find their way out of addiction. At least the kids have good grandparents to live with that will allow them to stay together, from what I hear.

What I am reminded of  now is how our choices have long lasting effects. That, and there are two ways to live our lives once we get sober: abstinence and recovery. I chose recovery, and I will explain what that means.

As I reminisce on Santa Fe's life, I am reminded that if not for me she would not have been introduced to meth and the dealer's lifestyle. I have talked to multiple people, and they all tell me the same thing, "It's not your fault." That is then followed by several other statements, "If not you it would have been someone else" or "She made her bed" or "It was the disease, not you that caused you to make the choices you did back then." I abhor all of those statements, so I will address each of them in turn.

1. If not you it would have been someone else - That might be true, but the fact is that she did get her start from me. It wasn't someone else, it was me. She got her first taste of the lifestyle from me She get her first taste of drugs from me. She met her husband through me. I turned her out, and the drugs turned her into someone she never was.  
2. She made her bed - Her choices were all hers, and I can agree with that. My choices, however, were also mine. I chose to introduce her to the drug that would ultimately be her downfall. If she is responsible for her choices I should be held responsible for mine. 
3. It was the disease, not you that caused you to make the choices you did back then - I can't blame it on the disease. I know a lot of addicts that did not make the same horrific choices that I did back then. I ruined people's lives, and I knew what I was doing. I knew that once I got my hooks on someone they were seldom the same, and I chose to do it anyway.

Ultimately, I have found that holding myself accountable for my choices and actions is the reason I stay sober. I have what I consider to be great recovery for a completely different reason. I have made my life a living amends because I hold myself accountable for the collateral damage my past choices and actions have incurred. Because of that, my recovery is fierce. I refuse to go back out and use again because I don't want to hurt myself, the people who care about me, other people and the people that care about them. 

One of the best things about recovery is that you get your feelings back. One of the worst things about recovery is.......you get your feelings back. I am glad that I feel, and no one is going to take that away from me. Although everyone ultimately makes their own choices, I also made all of mine. Because of the damage those choices made both in my life and the lives of so many others, I care about outcomes now. I have a heart. 

I have a heart for the addict who still struggles, the person who has just started using but is not an addict yet, the individual who has yet to use but will as well as the former addict who faces stigma every day. I know the choices we make today come back to haunt us. I made a decision 17 years ago and today 4 children don't have a mother or father because of the damage that decision caused. 

Will I beat myself up about it forever. No, but I did for a day. Then I remembered that the louder my message of hope, the more people will avoid the dangers of drug use. When they say, "Not even once" they are not kidding. Drugs take no prisoners. In my addiction, I did not make friends; I took hostages. I will never live my life that way again. 

I know firsthand the dangers of addiction. I have been in and out of jails and prison, died more times than I can count on one hand just to be brought back. I also know secondhand the dangers of addiction. I have lost more friends than I can count on my fingers and toes either to addiction or the violence that comes from the addict's lifestyle. Because of that, my voice guiding people towards a different lifestyle is loud. I am tired of losing people I cared about to this disease millions of us share. 

If you have started using, there is still hope. I am living proof! There truly is a BETTER LIFE IN RECOVERY. Join me and BLiR as we share the dangers of drug use and the victories of recovery. We are TRANSFORMING LIVES THROUGH RECOVERY!!