American Drug Addict: a memoir

by Brett Douglas

  A man I met in jail came by the shop one afternoon. He remembered me discussing my plans to start a computer business upon my release and was amazed at what I had accomplished. I knew he had had multiple surgeries on his back due to an oil rig accident and took pain medicine regularly. After some small talk, I said, “Give me a Lortab.”

  “Brett, after what you just told me, I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

  “I only want one.”

  “What about your sobriety?”

  “I know what I’m doing. Just give me one.”

  So, he did. That one Lortab was the beginning of the worst five years of my life.

  The Dark Corridor

  The Line Begins to Blur

  by

  Nine Inch Nails

  There are things that I said I would never do

  There are fears that I can not believe have come true

  For my soul is too sick and too little and too late

  And my self I have grown too weary to hate

  The more I stay in here

  The more it's not so clear

  The more I stay in here

  The more I disappear

  As far as I have gone

  I knew what side I'm on

  But now I'm not so sure

  The line begins to blur

  Is there somebody on top of me

  I don't know I don't know

  Isn't anybody stopping me

  I don't know I don't know

  How long can I hold my breath

  I don't know I don't know

  Just how far down can I go

  I don't know I don't know

  As I lie here and stare

  The fabric starts to tear

  It's far beyond repair

  And I don't even care

  As far as I have gone

  I knew what side I'm on

  But now I'm not so sure

  The line begins to blur

  The following is a list of actions I have never taken and events I have never experienced.

  - I have never failed to pay my bills

  - I have never used public assistance

  - I have never been unemployed for an extended period

  - I have never lost a home due to foreclosure

  - I have never stolen from my wife

  - I have never stolen from my mom

  - I have never stolen from my son

  - I have never stolen from my daughter

  - I have never stolen from my customers

  - I have never lost a business

  - I have never falsely accused someone of a crime

  - I have never been physically assaulted

  - I have never totaled a car

  - I have never had my home burglarized

  - I have never perpetrated a hit and run

  - I have never committed statutory rape

  - I have never attempted suicide

  - I have never watched someone die

  - I have never had someone try to murder me

  - I have never committed cold-blooded murder

  All these things I have never done or experienced.

  Yet.

  The longest of journeys begins with a single step. Much in the same way, the worst of debacles begins with a single drug. For a person in recovery, after that line has been crossed, all other boundaries can easily be traversed. Each subsequent line becomes dimmer until they’re invisible. As I’ve stated earlier, a seemingly insignificant decision can sometimes turn out to be a life-changing event. Never has that statement been more accurate than the moment I swallowed that Lortab. I can hardly calculate what that one pill cost me.

  For an addict, the most insidious part of drug use is whatever the user wants, whether it be energy, elevated mood, or relief from stress or boredom, the drug delivers in the best way. That single Lortab did exactly what I wanted it to. The guilt and shame I’d been feeling were immediately washed away. I could focus more clearly on my work and enjoyed doing it. I’ll only take one Lortab a day.

  Of course, my plan didn’t work out the way I wanted. Within a couple of months, I was taking ten pills a day. I slowly started spending more time acquiring the drug and less on my work. I started cutting back on expenses at the shop to help pay for my habit. Despite this self-inflicted burden, I managed to hold it together.

  Much to my surprise, Paula kept a conciliatory attitude concerning my infidelity. I realized ending my marriage was a mistake, and we reconciled. I agreed never to speak to Barbie again, a promise I did not keep.

  One evening, I came home to find Paula holding a cell phone bill in her hand. “Whose phone number is this?” she demanded, looking rather upset.

  “I don’t know,” I lied.

  “Yeah, well, who the fuck have you been texting at one in the morning?”

  “Probably someone in AA.”

  “Well, I’ll just call the number and find out.” Paula started dialing the number on her phone.

  “Wait,” I gasped. Paula looked at me, knowing what I was about to say.

  “That’s Barbie’s number,” I whispered.

  “You motherfucker!” Paula yelled as she punched me twice in the face with a closed fist. I shoved her away from me, causing her to trip and hit her back on the arm of the couch before she fell to the floor. She howled in pain.

  I panicked and ran to her side. “I’m sorry. Are you okay?”

  Paula responded by punching me in the head again. I knew I had to get out of the house. I ran into the bedroom to grab some clothes and a carry bag. She followed me and delivered two more punches, which I deflected. I pushed her to the floor again.

  “Stay the fuck away from me, bitch!” I yelled.

  Paula jumped up and lunged at me again. I responded by throwing my car keys at her, hitting her in the hand. She recoiled in pain.

  “I’m calling the police! You’re going to jail, asshole!” Paula bellowed as she ran into the living room. As I turned the corner after her, she was dialing a number on her cell phone. I snatched it from her hand and threw it against the wall, reducing it to pieces.

  I ran back into the bedroom, desperately gathering my belongings. Paula didn’t follow me. A minute later, I heard the unmistakable sound of something being destroyed. As I dashed back into the living room, I saw the front door open, and Paula standing on the sidewalk leading to the front porch, smashing the desktop computer I had recently built against the concrete. By the time I reached her, it was in the same condition as her cell phone. Paula stormed inside and slammed the door shut.

  Realizing I had no car keys, I ran to the front door, expecting it to be unlocked. Paula, however, had deadbolted the door. I hit it at a full run, smashing the door out of its frame and sending wood splinters flying across the living room. I quickly ran into the bedroom and grabbed my car keys, leaving my other belongings. She intercepted me in the living room with a carving knife in her hand and chased me out the front door. I frantically jumped in my car and sped away.

  As I drove to the shop, I called an employee and asked if he could open the store the next morning. I fully expected to be arrested later that evening. But the police never showed up.

  As stated earlier, every personality is the sum of all past experiences and relationships. Had the roles been reversed, I would have walked away, since I grew up in a home where my parents never fought. At least not in front of me. But Paula frequently spoke of her tumultuous childhood, growing up in a home where domestic violence was a regular occurrence, usually caused by her father’s infidelity. Her response was not surprising.

  Although I never saw Barbie again, my betrayal was never forgotten. It was a cloud that darkened my marriage until the end.

  Eventually, my physical tolerance of Lortabs made the habit too expensive. I started shooting Roxy’s again. I also discovered a new drug, Dilaudid, which is much more potent than most other pills. I typically would shoot 90mg of Roxicodone at once. But injecting 8mg of Dilaudid was much more intense
. The rush felt like being kicked in the stomach. Before I injected the pill, I found something to hold on to so I wouldn’t collapse. My ‘One Lortab a Day’ plan definitely didn’t work out.

  As had occurred in the past, Paula abandoned sobriety and started shooting dope with me. Although the progression was slow, we started spending more money on pills and less on essentials such as utilities, food, and the mortgage.

  I met a drug dealer named Money, although I doubt his parents gave him that name. He sold crack from a hotel room and was surrounded by an ever-changing assortment of women who all had drug habits. I regularly had sex with them while smoking crack. Thus, I spent a lot of time in his room. He was a calm, quiet man who had no problem selling me dope on credit.

  The happiness of sobriety was gone. Drugs had blotted out any recollection of my previous life, replacing it with a synthetic joy which only occurred when I was high. Life had become a never-ending struggle to stay as stoned as possible, a futile effort to avoid seeing myself. I had fleeting moments of clarity, which I stamped out like a cigarette butt. My life started to quickly unravel, although at the time, it seemed like an eternity.

  For the first time since I opened Hard Drive Computers, I didn’t have money to pay the rent. This failure was not due to lack of business. I had reached a point where I just didn’t care about anything except the next high. Paula and I stopped paying the mortgage. I initiated several restructuring plans but was only putting off the inevitable. We started paying the minimum on our utilities just to keep them on, sometimes going an evening without power or water. Our weekly expenditure for drugs was around $2,000. We went from living to surviving.

  We can mark the first one off the list.

  I have never failed to pay my bills

  Although moments of clarity became less frequent over time, when they did occur, they crushed me with great voracity. The most intense moment happened in the middle of night. I suddenly opened my eyes out of a dead sleep, and the disintegration of my life came into vivid focus. I started crying. This wailing was a deep, guttural sadness, causing me to cry out in the most despondent manner possible. The grief hit me in waves, the next being more ferocious than the last. I fell out of bed and onto the floor, curling up in a fetal position in the corner, howling in agony. Paula woke up and tried to console me, acting as if she didn’t know the cause. But she knew. I cried for an hour until I fell asleep from exhaustion. I woke up the next morning, still curled up in the corner. Whenever this emotional eruption would unexpectedly occur, I tried my best to medicate it away.

  To free up more money for drugs, Paula and I applied for and received a food card. Public assistance may not be cause for disrepute by some members of the current generation, but for me personally, I felt great shame over it. But that didn’t stop me.

  Let’s mark the second one off the list.

  I have never used public assistance

  For the first time since I opened the computer store, Paula started spending time at the shop. As benevolent as that may sound, our time working together was not productive. We waited for a customer to spend money, then purchased dope with it. I had somehow managed to keep the store open for a year and a half without paying the rent. Inevitably, the day came when I could no longer keep the plates spinning. I was forced to close Hard Drive Computers.

  As I drove home that day, I felt physically ill, as if a family member had just died. Overcome with grief, I pulled the car to the side of the road and had another crying fit. I repeatedly punched the steering wheel while screaming through my tears, “Why did this happen?”

  I knew the answer to that question. I just didn’t want to look at the truth. Once I arrived home, I announced the closing of the business to my family. No one even looked at me. I mistook their reaction for apathy, when in fact, they were surprised the business lasted as long as it did.

  One more down.

  I have never lost a business

  When I left the store for the last time, I took all the pending repairs with me. Several of the computers I personally delivered to the customer’s homes. The rest I sold for drugs.

  Six months later, I received a phone call. “This is Stan. I’m a detective with the Santa Rosa County Sherriff’s Department. Our office has received numerous complaints about your store.”

  “Complaints?”

  “Yes, I’ve had several people contact our office about you stealing their computers.”

  “All of my customers sign a service sheet that clearly states any machines left in the store over sixty days will be forfeited.”

  “Well, these people say every time they came by your store it was closed.”

  The customer’s complaints were accurate. I didn’t bother going to the shop unless I needed money. To make matters worse, I made a rather feeble attempt to return some of the work.

  “I have the paperwork the customers signed. Would you like to see it?”

  “Well, sir, a warrant for your arrest has been issued. If you come in this county, you’ll be arrested.”

  I hung up. Just another fear to add to my expanding list. In fact, fear permeated my every move. I stopped answering the phone. When someone knocked on the front door, I hid in the closet. But the police never showed up. I forgot about the warrant.

  Let’s cross that one off.

  I have never stolen from my customers

  Once I closed Hard Drive Computers, I remained unemployed for the next three years.

  And another one is marked off.

  I have never been unemployed for an extended period

  I had no job and a horrendous drug addiction. To make matters worse, Rick Scott became the Governor of Florida. The preceding statement is not a political one. The reason pharmaceuticals, such as Roxicodone and Dilaudid, were so easy to acquire was because of what was known as the “pill mills.” Central Florida had a number of doctors who would prescribe copious amounts of pain medication to anyone who walked into their office with an MRI, which was nothing more than a typed letter anyone could fill out. Drug dealers would drive addicts to Central Florida by the van load and pay for each doctor visit. In return, the dealer would receive most the pills, giving the addicts a small portion. When Rick Scott became Governor, he closed most of the “pill mills.” That effort sounds like the correct course of action. But, as we all know, nature abhors a vacuum. The absence of pharmaceutical pain medicine was filled by heroin.

  The problem with heroin is potency. Whenever I injected Dilaudid, I knew what to expect because the strength was always the same. In contrast, the only way to determine the potency of heroin was by injecting some and waiting for the effect, a potentially lethal test.

  Throughout my three-decade history of drug use, I had never encountered heroin in Pensacola. Almost overnight, everyone was selling it. Within a month, three people I knew died. But that didn’t stop me. Death was a reasonable risk.

  Heroin and crack became part of my daily routine. I visited Money’s hotel room three to four times a day. On one of these visits, I was approached by a young girl who was frailly thin. “Today’s my eighteenth birthday. I’ll fuck you for some crack.”

  The women in Money’s room were not usually this forward, but I took her up on her offer. The declaration of her age didn’t seem odd.

  The next day, I went back to Money’s room for more dope. A young lady named Alexa said, “Did you see that real skinny girl here last night?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s my sister.”

  “Oh really?” I choked, not sure where she was going with this.

  “I wouldn’t touch her if I were you. She’s fourteen.”

  Money started laughing, indicating he already knew. Once Alexa left the room, I blasted him for not warning me. He just looked at me with an evil grin. My actions the previous night bothered me if for no other reason than the legal ramification I was exposed to. The smile on his face was my first glimpse at the type of person I was dealing with. At least, the first one I paid at
tention to.

  There goes another one.

  I have never committed statutory rape

  Drugs were now my single, dominating thought. Nothing else mattered. I knew in my heart the routine Paula and I were locked in would end badly. All I could do was put off the inevitable catastrophe as long as possible and stay emotionally numb until the end. I was willing to do anything to achieve this.

  Since I had already sold all my valuable possessions, I started stealing jewelry from Paula’s case. My rationalization was she never wore these pieces, and I gave them to her anyway. The jewelry was quite valuable. Every dime I got from the sale was used to purchase crack and heroin. As long as no one discovered the theft, I could live with myself.

  The list continues to get shorter.

  I have never stolen from my wife

  Eventually, Paula noticed the missing jewelry. Naturally, she accused me of stealing it. And just as naturally, I denied the theft, suggesting the crime was committed by Cade, one of Devin’s closest friends. I knew Cade had recently gotten into some legal trouble, lending credibility to the false suggestion. When Devin learned of the theft, he physically attacked Cade and refused to speak to him any longer. I watched my son seethe in anger over his mother’s loss, knowing I had ruined his longest and dearest friendship. Although Paula verbally accepted my explanation, she had her doubts.

  Let’s mark off another one.

  I have never falsely accused someone of a crime