I’m not even sure what to write about. There has been so much going on in my life over the last few years I’m not sure where to start. I guess a good place would be my alcoholism , substance abuse and cocaine addiction, since they have influenced so much of my behavior in the past.

I liked getting drunk the first time I drank. I liked speed, weed, cocaine, quaaludes, acid, morphine,  smack, (smack not so much) mushrooms and pretty much every other drug I tried the first time I tried them, and I started VERY young.  All except for PCP. I really didn’t like the way that crap made me feel.

Weed, whites, cocaine and rum became my almost constant running mates. I was known for my ability to consume monstrous quantities of all of them simultaneously and still function. I made sure I was always around people who shared my interests, and could always find me my supplies. After a while, and pretty much inevitably, I started to deal. I was never very successful at this since I had a huge appetite for my own product line, but It kept me in drugs and cash for quite a while.

This life was fast paced and I LIKED IT. I liked my friends, I liked the bars, I liked the parties, I liked the money and I LOVED THE DRUGS AND THE BOOZE. I liked the attention and the notoriety it got me. It got me the reputation of being a bad ass that you didn’t want to fuck with and I REALLY liked that. I was hanging with the hard asses and I fit right in.

I managed to keep this shit up for a surprisingly long time, around thirty years, before everything started to go south. People around me were getting busted and/or dying, I was drinking and using so much that my health was going to shit.  My finances were so screwed up I lost 2 apartments and my Mom’s house that she left to me and my sister. I did make sure my sister got her share of the money from the house though. That was about the only fucking thing I did right.

After a couple of half-assed suicide attempts, I ended up in the hospital (a couple of times, thanks V.A.) and took two trips through their rehab program before I finally got my shit together on November 17th, 2010. Since I’ve sobered up, which I couldn’t have done without the love of my life, my sweetheart Wendi, I’ve managed to get and keep a real job, and I’m starting to straighten out my screwed up finances. (and man are they fucked up!)

All of these improvements have come about slowly, none of them have happened overnight.  But then again, I had over thirty years to fuck them up, so what do I expect, right?

I guess what I am trying to say is that no matter how bad my life had become, and no matter how bleak my situation looked, I knew that I had let it happen, and only I could make it better. I accepted the help that was offered to me, I stuck with it, and my life has improved immensely.

Don’t let addiction win. There is help available. You have to find it and use it. It’s not going to come looking for you. Make your life livable again. Regain your self respect. Do it for yourself.