My Path to Recovery

For as long as I can remember I felt as though there was some void inside me that needed to be filled. Even as a child I can recall thinking there was something missing. I equated the feeling to being hungry, or thirsty—it was a sort of sensation that felt like my brain was telling me I needed something, but I could never quite put my finger on what it was.

 At around 10 years old I discovered energy drinks, and for me it was fantastic—finally I knew what I needed! Some days I would drink 6-7 energy drinks, so much so that I would become ill and have terrible crashes that would linger for long periods of time. From the get-go, I was irregular. Me and my young friends would all gather and drink energy drinks, but I always drank the most by far, because I needed more and more to fill this void. 

At around 12 years old I found what I thought was my first true love, the thing I had been missing my whole life, alcohol. In my head, I thought everything was solved—this was it, the true answer to the void. In the beginning, I started with 4-5 beers each time I drank, and in less than a year, after most nights out, I had no idea how much I drank because most of the time I didn’t remember the back half of the night. One Saturday when I was about 14 years old I drank so much that I ended up passed out on a river bank. My parents, friends, and police looked for me all night and found me by the edge of the river, nearly in the water, at 1AM. This was the first time I realized I couldn’t stop drinking once I started. I was different from my friends. When they drank, after a while they said, “I’m too drunk man,” but I never experienced that feeling; I was never drunk enough. No matter how many beers I had whether it be 12 or 27, I always needed more. 

By the summer after my sophomore year of high school, I was drinking every day to extreme amounts, and it was starting to have impacts on my life. Me and my parents were fighting constantly, my friends were becoming weary of hanging out with me, my girlfriend left me due to my drinking, and I was on probation. Up to this point, I mostly only drank. I had used meth and cocaine here and there, but because my current friends at the time were against any hard drug use, I kept it hidden and didn’t do it very often. Then, right before my 16th birthday, I met a group of people with interests similar to mine. They too enjoyed drinking and using, and at that point my addiction began to take off. I again quickly realized I was the odd man out. Many of them could use meth or bars for a night of partying, then stop until the next party. I was not like them. I could not wait till the next party, for the day after using anything, I would get more. Whether there was a party, an exam, a track meet, it didn’t matter, I was going to get more, because substances were the answer to the void that had plagued me for so long. 

At 16 I went to my first rehab after a 2-week-long benzo and alcohol bender, which was basically one very long blackout. By now I realized I was in a trap. I was hurting everyone around me, bringing chaos into the lives of everyone I loved. My family was miserable, living every moment of their lives worrying I would die. I was stealing from family, friends, businesses, and most of the words I said were lies. I wanted to stop. However, at this point even though I knew how much damage my addiction was causing I was not willing to try anything and change everything. I still felt I couldn’t live a life of complete sobriety, for living with nothing to fill my void felt impossible. Within a month of being released from the rehab I was back to blackout drinking, and before long bars, opioids, and meth. 

At the age of 17, in the midst of a blackout, I busted down the glass door of a CVS with a fire extinguisher to get more alcohol, for it was past 2AM and there was nowhere for me to steal it from as I usually did. This drove me to my second rehab, in which I now wanted more than anything to be sober. By now my old friends I had known my whole life would not hang out with me, and even my new friends who partied were starting to distance themselves from me because I dragged everyone around me into chaos. I had a felony hanging over my head, and my family was even more miserable than before. I began to feel that if I couldn’t get sober I was better off dead. With all this said, you’d think I would clean myself up after leaving rehab this time, right? Well, I’m here to tell you that that’s not how addiction works, at least not for me. For despite the felony that hung before me, despite the misery of my family who I truly loved, despite the loss of my life long friends, and despite my own overwhelming misery that I knew was a direct result of my use, I was back to blackout drinking, benzos, and opioids within a few months of going home. 

 

I now realize that substances were the only treatment I had ever known to fill the void I felt and without some other treatment for that void it would be impossible for me to stop using substances. And, although upon leaving this second rehab it seemed that nothing had changed, one important thing did happen to me there which would eventually cascade into a method of treatment which would allow me to align my void with something beautiful. Before going to this rehab, I had sat in many AA and NA meetings, and while I wanted to get sober, and enjoyed having people to talk to about my struggles, anything that was said about a higher power, or the 12 steps, just went in one ear and out the other. I simply didn’t want to hear it. Then in the middle of my stay at the second rehab I decided to make a run for it during our outdoor time (it was an adolescent rehab, so we weren’t allowed to check ourselves out). I successfully escaped from this rehab, stole liquor from a Walmart, and walked for about 26 miles as I drank. Now, it hadn’t occurred to me to steal any food or water for my long journey, only liquor, so by the 26th mile, in the middle of nowhere, at around 2AM I started fainting. I had not seen a building for at least 8-10 miles, and there was no sign of anything coming up. I thought I could no longer go on and was going to die on some seemingly endless country road. I laid on that road for some time, then gathered the strength to get up, and when I did, I saw a light shimmering out from over the cornfields, and so I followed it. For at least a mile I trudged through a crop field until I reached the only 2 buildings in a 6-mile radius of me, which were a church with a large light on top, and an old farmhouse. I drank water from a puddle outside the church and then slept at the foot of the front door on a small walkway, and in the morning a farmer gave me apples, water, and let me use the phone. While this by no means got me sober, it opened my mind a little bit to the possibility of a higher power, and I began to be interested in what these people at 12-step meetings were saying about spirituality and the 12 steps.

I continued using, going to meetings, and debating whether I was going to get a sponsor and do the 12 steps or not for about another two years. I was now in college and had nearly been kicked out for two different drinking-related incidents. I had used sheer willpower to get about one month sober after that, still attending meetings but not doing steps or creating a relationship with a higher power. Finally, it happened. One night I was about to relapse and was trying desperately not to. I would go into the store to buy a beer, then walk out with a Gatorade, then go into another store to buy one and walk out with a Pop-Tart. I was battling the relapse with every ounce of strength I had. I said to myself, alright, I’m going to make one call to an old drinking buddy because if I’m gonna drink I don’t want to drink alone. If he answers, I drink; if he doesn’t, I don’t. I called what I thought was the friend’s number, and it turned out to be a man from my AA meetings, someone who I never would have purposely called. I knew why this was happening, and immediately I said I was not doing well and asked him to be my sponsor. The very next morning, he took me to a bench by the river, the same bench I had relapsed on when I first got to college, and this I saw as a message – this was my new beginning. I can’t say that at that moment my desire to drink was lifted, and I never drank or used again like many people do. It wasn’t, and I have drank since then. But what I can say is that since then I feel reborn, and I am able to live a life where things are no longer hopeless, but rather beautiful. 3 years ago, I felt completely and utterly hopeless. As if no matter what I did, things would not be okay. I felt trapped and it seemed there was no way out. Today I know with 100% certainty that as long as I live a certain way of life, no matter what happens, everything is going to be beautiful. Even the hardships are beautiful, because they serve as catalysts for my growth and propel me closer to connection and love. Today I have a treatment for my void which aligns it to something beautiful.

I have discovered that I am able to live a happy, purposeful life if I do a few crucial things. The most important is that I always continue to try to strengthen my relationship with a higher power of my understanding. I do this through the 12 steps of AA/NA, working to be of service to and spread love to all other beings (plants, animals, humans). This has been the answer to that void that’s plagued me my whole life. Not only is it the answer, I believe that it is the reason that void was there in the first place. For so long I didn’t know what that void wanted, I didn’t know how to satisfy it. I thought it was energy drinks, I thought it was alcohol, I thought it was women, I thought it was drugs. Each time I did these things, the void would feel satisfied temporarily only to return larger than ever. The void seemed like a wicked curse, a thirst that could never be quenched. Today my viewpoint of the void has changed. Today I view the void as a gift, a gift that directs me towards my true purpose in life. I am here to help spread love to all beings around me; that is my purpose. When I align my void towards such a purpose the true beauty of life begins to present itself and I begin feel and see the love and beauty that is everywhere.  The void was always meant to drive me to my purpose; I just never knew what my purpose was. Now that I have discovered this purpose my void has become aligned with its intended use, and its energy channeled into such purpose. As a result my drive and motivation for service and growth is immense and it is this service and growth that heightens my well-being and allows me to live a beautiful life today despite all the mental struggles I face.

I don’t mean to put on any fronts or facades. I by no means feel amazing and filled with love 24/7. I still get depressed, anxious, sad ect. and have lapsed on alcohol multiple times since figuring out what my purpose is. But I know now with complete certainty that I can live a happy and beautiful life. I know that if I live my life to be of service to others, and work to grow and connect with my higher power then everything is beautiful. And so, even when I fall things no longer feel hopeless. It no longer feels like there is no way out. I am 100% sure there is a way out and I’m 100% sure that if I do what I was put here to do then all will be beautiful.

I have never before felt such a way. I have never known for certain that if I live a certain way all will be well. I have never before seen the beauty of life as I do now. For these reasons I am making this website. I know how it feels to feel hopeless; it is truly a terrible feeling. My goal is not just to inspire hope but to inspire certainty that there is a way out of addiction for every single person here on earth.