Message to Parents from Edmond Teen

My name is Andrea and I am an addict. I say those words every day and it reminds me exactly who I am and what I’ve become. Dealing with being an addict has it challenges, but to overcome them day by day show strength and determination. Those are key ingredients for me to live my life in success. Ever since I was a little girl, I’ve always stood outside or looked through the window to watch thunderstorms or to look at the sky. I love weather and the mysteries it brings. It wasn’t hard for me to realize what I wanted to be when I grow up. Meteorology is my passion, and it is my future that I look forward to every day. My goals and dreams in life mean so much to me that to even think of not being able to accomplish them makes me cry. I’ve always been a good student in school, always making good grades and following the rules. I never got in trouble and I was a great kid with great morals and a good head on my shoulders. I was disciplined and respectful, and I did what I was told on every occasion. All of these things changed when I made a decision that has altered the rest of my life. When I was thirteen years old, I met a new friend and became very close with her. Her mother was a very bad influence on the both of us. She didn’t care what we did, who we were friend with, or how late we were out each night. I would stay the night with her almost every weekend and get drunk with her at parties. Her mother bought us alcohol and let us have parties at her house. Boys were always allowed to stay the night. Going hand in hand with the alcohol was the marijuana. I used to smoke and drink on a daily basis with the help of my friends always doing it with me. From that point on, I smoked marijuana regularly until I was 16. I was a junior in high school now and I was still making good grades. I changed a lot of friends I was hanging out with and changed many of the activities I took part in. I tried cocaine for the first time and I was easily hooked on it. A month of doing cocaine and smoking marijuana was all the time it took before another drug was introduced to me. Ecstasy became a regular thing in my weekly activities. This sort of thing went on for another few months before I met my match. I got high on meth and I completely loved it. It was from then on my drug of choice. I did meth every day for two months, along with marijuana and alcohol. It all seemed so fun and different. I started to not like the feeling of being off drugs, so I was constantly under the influence of one thing or another. I smoked meth so much that I was unable to maintain a high on it. My tolerance level was too high for me to feel the drug anymore. This led me to using the needle for the first time. I shot up meth and it felt like the best thing in the world. It was all I thought about and centered my life around. During my experimenting with new drugs, many things changed in my life. My grades in school declined rapidly, and so did my attendance. I never went to school anymore, and if I had gone I made sure I was always high. I never did any of my home work and rarely did any work in class. Everyone at school new I was a “druggie” and I didn’t mind the title one bit. I was proud to let everyone know what I was high on that day and I advertised myself as a dealer so that I could make money to buy more drugs. I quickly became a popular weed dealer in school. I always had drugs on me at school, either to do them in some hidden place or to sell them to my classmates. I never listened to my parents when they told me what time I had to be home at night, or when I was asked to do chores or to clean. I snuck out of my house more times than I can count. Some nights I wouldn’t even bother to come home; I would stay out all night and come home the next day. I would leave when I wasn’t supposed to and steal money from my parents whenever I had the chance. The drugs always made my judgment of what was wrong change into the right thing to do.

One night I was with my friend in his car sitting in a parking lot. We were smoking marijuana and we had just opened two beers. The police were called on us and I knew I was busted. I was handcuffed and put in the back of a police car while the car I was in was being searched. After they were finished, I was arrested and had to wait for my parents to pick me up from the police station. On the way home my parents told me I was charge with possession of marijuana, minor in possession of alcohol, and possession of paraphernalia of a meth pipe. At this point I had no idea that there was a meth pipe in the vehicle I was in. I told my parents I wasn’t guilty and they believed me. They made me plead not guilty to all the charges. After I was arrested I still did drugs, still shot up, still smoked weed, still drank, and honestly, I didn’t care about anything but getting high. My life was in a downward spiral and it was all happening in front of me. On February 28, 2004 I was at school in class when I found out one of my close friends had passed away due to Cystic Fibrosis. I was so distraught by the news that I ran out of the classroom and headed to the bathroom. I shot up for the last time, and cried the whole time I was doing it. After I did that, I ran to my teachers room and took her out into the hall and I dripped to my knees and asked her to help me with my drug problem.  I surrendered and broke down. I had hit the bottom of the spiral. I had had enough and I wanted to quit everything. Coming to this decision was the best thing I have ever done in my life. Later that night I went to a narcotics Anonymous meeting for the first time. I was torn into a thousand pieces as I sat there listening to people recovering from drugs. I know it was possible and I wanted to be like them. Everyday after that night I went to a meeting and I took in as much information as possible. I started living a clean and happy life. One month later signified I had 30 days clean. That night I went home and told my mother about my drug use and that I was clean and off drugs and I wanted to change my life around. I started going to school everyday and tried to make up as much work as possible, even though it was too late to salvage good grades or attendance for the rest of the year. I was picking up the pieces of my life and it felt great. Now it was time to go to court and straighten everything there. I went in front of the judge and everyone else in the courtroom and I told them the truth. I said that I had lied to my parents about the night I was arrested. I confessed to being guilty on two counts, but the third count I was still innocent on. The judge respected my honesty and believed me, so he dropped the other charge. I felt so good inside, so free, and so happy. I knew I had done the right thing and I was proud of myself. My parents even told me they were proud of me, which I rarely ever hear from them. Being guilty meant being in major trouble, which meant major consequences. Probation seemed harsh and demanding, but I knew it was in my best interest because it was going to keep me out of trouble. Living a clean life feels so wonderful there aren’t any words to describe it. I am a addict, and I will always be a addict. The disease of addiction is something I am going to have to live with the rest of my life. There are many challenges that I must face every day. Temptation is a big issue, which I have learned to control to the best of my ability. Strength is the real key to getting over the questionable moments.  Stress plays a big roll in my life and my recovery. Usually what many addicts tend to do is run to drugs if they have a problem because that is what they always did when they were using.  

Now, when I am stressed out I don’t have drugs to turn to. I turn to my higher power that I choose to call God, and I pray. I pray to have the courage and strength to be able to make the right decisions in my life. I pray for help, guidance, and friendship because he is always there to hear me. Another thing I couldn’t have come this far without is my sponsor. She is truly the wind beneath my wings. She has helped me realize and taught me so much since I got into recovery. She has helped me with my 12 steps and she continues to help me with the step I am on right now when I first came into recovery I knew that I had to turn my life and my will over to God. I know that I can’t live my life on my will because nothing works out the way I want it to. I have to realize that I am powerless over my addiction and I have to let God handle my life.

Addiction hurts the people around us. We seem to cause harm towards the people we care about most, but most of all we harm ourselves. I know that I put my parents, friends and teachers through a lot of misery and pain, but I put myself through much more. When I got clean, I realized how far drugs pushed me away from my dreams in life. To be a meteorologist, you have to go to college ant then get a great job. To get into college, you have to finish high school. Through my junior year in high school I was to accumulate 6 credits. In the end I came out with no credits at all. To make up for lost credits, I knew I was going to have to go to an alternative school. This was a good thing because I needed to get away form my school anyway, due to the people there that I associated with when I was using drugs. I had to end my friendships with some of my very close friends because they were still using. Today I have great friends that haven’t touched drugs a day in their life! They support me and my recovery and even come to NA meetings with me. NA is where I get a lot of support. Addicts can best understand and help other addicts, which is why I feel so comfortable around the people in NA. I know that they are just like me, and they deal with the same things I go through. Not only have I created friendships with these people, but they are my family. We care about each other so much and love is shown open and freely. Though my bad times and good time, I have learned so much, and I still have much to learn. To accomplish my goals and dreams means that I have to be drug free. I have the will, the strength, and the determination to make anything possible. My name is Andrea and I am an addict, and I am clean one more day.