Getting clean from crack in 1990 changed my whole life. I smoked it for four years in the late '80’s and my life revolved around getting and smoking crack.
While addicted I was sometimes the victim of violence, I sold or traded most of my possessions for a pittance of crack, I hung out in the worst places with the worst people, two times I had to go to the hospital because once I smoked so much crack one night I fried the inside of my throat, I burned it bad and needed some prescription medicine to heal it and the other time I burned the entire inside of my lips from repeatedly hitting on a stone pipe which actually had nothing in it.
I had to report my car stolen three times to the police because I lent it to strangers for a day for a rock of crack and they didn’t give it back. I cheated, lied, manipulated friends and strangers and had it done to me. While addicted I had joined a mental health support group held in a clinic in a large room. Before walking in several times I would go in the adjoining restroom and smoke some crack and then stroll into the meeting high as a kite. I think the leaders suspected something but I couldn’t tell for sure. But I did stupid stuff like that all the time while addicted.
In other words, I was your typical crack addict.
But then in 1990 I was staying in a temporary crisis group home and I wandered downstairs one night and discovered an AA meeting being held in the dining room every Tuesday night. I was invited to join and I started going regularly. It was usually only about 6 or 7 people at the most and the leader was cool and so was everybody else and I felt comfortable there. That was the start of my sobriety.
And soon someone told me about two other meetings being held just right around the corner from this house and I started going regularly to all three. My stay ended at the house and I moved into a board & care home but I still attended those meetings and I started discovering other meetings and pretty soon I was walking or taking the bus to 5 or 6 meetings a week. And my life changed. Instead of sneaking around doing drugs and avoiding cops, now I became more employable and I got a job.
The third week I was in the board & care I enrolled myself in college. I could walk around without the paranoia of always covering my tracks to hide my drug use anymore from my family and my bosses and other people. I started hanging out with people who were not doing drugs.
Once I became clean, “I became part of the solution instead of part of the problem.” I started living a normal life, I went to movies or to the record store or to picnics and birthday parties. My family started trusting me again. In the board & care home I started hanging out with my sister and her husband and their friends who didn’t do drugs instead of ex-cons, pimps. hookers, street people, con artists, etc.
My life blossomed. Just so many good things started happening to me when I got clean. My health improved for one thing. No more two or three day crack binges where I didn’t feel like eating or I forgot to eat and I lost 25 lbs without noticing it. Now I ate healthy at the board & care home. I now spent my money on cassettes, or going out to eat. I made some acquaintances in the 12-step meetings and I recognized dozens of other regulars at the meetings.
AA, CA and NA have been good to me. They saved my life and showed me a good healthy, honest way to live. I just followed a few simple principles and I was much happier than I ever was in my active addiction. I haven’t craved drugs in 28 years, the obsession and compulsion to use was lifted from me in 1990 and has never returned, I don’t miss drugs or alcohol at all.
Just to end this I will say this; it is not impossible to get clean and sober. No matter how long you used, or what drug you used, or how often you used or how much you used; it doesn’t matter, you can still get clean. I’ve seen it a million times in 12-step meetings where the most hardcore addicts or alcoholics who had used drugs or drank for 10, 15, 20+ years, they were still able to get clean and sober and go from the gutter to becoming employable and living productive lives. It’s a fact.
So good luck to anyone who wants to change their life and live clean and sober, it’s there waiting for you. Maybe you got something from this. Good luck.
