My Experience with Drugs & Alcohol

I can vividly remember the first time I got high. I was a teenager hanging out at my friend’s house. My friend was an avid pot smoker and had an intriguing strain of weed called “God’s Gift.” We were looking for a place to smoke, and since my Mom and Stepdad were gone for the weekend, we decided to go to my house. Once we got there, we climbed on the roof and started smoking some weed my friend had in a green container. We smoked out of a soda can since none of us had a pipe, and after I took my first hit, I began coughing like a maniac.

After I stopped coughing, I felt a change in my body. Everything slowed down and seemed ten times funnier. My friends and I decided to walk to the restaurant Islands. We stopped at a grocery store on the way, where one of my friends asked if I had any money. I put my hands in my pockets and pulled out everything I had, which amounted to a few coins, and my friend yelled out, “We’re rich,” and we started laughing hysterically, high out of our minds.

Once we got to Islands, a waitress seated us. She asked if we wanted anything to drink, and I ordered an iced tea. She clarified and asked if I wanted a fruity flavor, which made me crack up. Thankfully, I was able to compose myself and finish giving my order. We had a good time eating at the restaurant, and I spent the rest of the night in a relaxed state.

I really enjoyed my first time smoking weed and getting high.

After my first smoke session, I started smoking weed regularly. Especially once I switched to homeschooling in the 10th grade. It was pretty easy to buy weed and hide it from my family… At first. I hid my weed in a special compartment in the bathroom that went undetected for a long time. I’d smoke during the day when no one was home, or go to my friend’s house and get high. Once my family retired for the night around 9 or 10 PM, I’d walk down the street and smoke on the corner behind a giant RV trailer.

Eventually, I was introduced to alcohol and cigarettes one night at a friend’s house. I don’t remember what I drank, but I rotated between beer and hard liquor. I also had my first cigarette that night, a Marlboro Light. I enjoyed smoking as I drank, and I threw up by the end of the night. But I still had a great time.

After that incident, I started going out with my friends regularly to party. We usually got two 30-packs of beer and drank on the weekend. As I got older, I began drinking hard liquor, but I initially stuck to beer and only had the harder stuff when it was around. Most of the time, we’d get an older friend to buy alcohol for us, but if not, we knew places that would sell to underage kids.

If, for some reason, we weren’t able to buy alcohol, we’d do what’s called a beer run. A beer run works like this: two people enter the market, one looks out and makes sure the coast is clear, and the other grabs the alcohol and bolts out of the store. On one particular night, it was my turn to be the guy who stole the alcohol, so one of my friends stayed in the getaway car while my other friend and I went into the store to steal some beer and get the party started.

Once we got inside, my friend walked around the beer aisle to make sure there was no security. I went to the liquor aisle and waited for my friend to text me that it was safe to run out. When he texted me to go, I grabbed a 30-pack of beer and bolted outside full speed. As soon as I took one step outside, though, I was immediately tackled by two huge guys who were secret shoppers (security guards dressed like civilians).

They put me in handcuffs and escorted me to a holding room in the back of the store. Everyone who was shopping gave the secret shoppers a round of applause for capturing me, which was embarrassing. Once we got to the back room, the cops asked me for my parent’s phone number. I gave the cop my aunt’s phone number, hoping she could pick me up without telling my dad. That was a fantasy, and when they called my aunt, she gave them my dad’s number.

I had lied to my dad earlier about where I was going, so I knew I was in big trouble.

The cops contacted my father and asked him to pick me up. My dad told them he’d head over right away.

As I waited for my dad to arrive, all sorts of fears came over me. How hard would he hit me once we got home, and how long would I be grounded? There was no way I could explain to my dad why I was caught running out of the store with a case of beer. I was caught red-handed doing something illegal and had come to terms with the consequences, whatever they might be.

Eventually, I heard footsteps coming up the stairs as my dad entered the back room. As soon as he walked in, he looked at me with disgust. The officer explained to my dad what happened and wrote me a ticket for shoplifting. The police took off my handcuffs, but before I was released, they realized they had forgotten to search me. They asked me to empty my pockets and began patting me down.

To my surprise, I had a pack of cigarettes in the jacket I was wearing. Ironically, it wasn’t even my coat or cigarettes. Earlier that day, my friend let me borrow his jacket because it was raining, but that didn’t matter. I had just been caught stealing alcohol, and now I had a pack of smokes on me. The officer immediately wrote me another ticket for being underage and possessing tobacco.

We walked to his truck when they finally released me. Knowing my dad, I figured he was going to either yell or hit me once we got inside. Thankfully, he only yelled. After what felt like forever, he finally stopped, got out of the truck, and disappeared into the darkness.

I got out of his truck and called my friends to pick me up since I didn’t want to go home and deal with my dad’s wrath. As soon as they picked me up, we talked about the failed attempt and how shitty it was that I got caught, even though I was the only one who had to deal with the consequences.

We decided to make the most of the night and went out partying. We stopped at a nearby 7‑Eleven to buy another pack of cigarettes to replace the ones the police took, then partied for the rest of the night. I stayed at my friend’s house that weekend because I was too scared to go home.

I decided to go back to my house on Sunday.

The next day, I woke up and hung out with my friends. Later that night, we went to another party. This time, we were outside waiting for it to start, and some guys dressed in regular clothes walked up to us and said, “Undercover cop, get against the wall!” They did a search on me and found a pack of cigarettes, and I was given another ticket for underage tobacco possession. Thankfully, they didn’t call my dad or arrest me, but I still got another ticket I’d eventually have to deal with.

I got into trouble after I developed a social life and started partying on the weekends. My family told me not to go out, but I went anyway.

To fund my vices, I worked as an assistant janitor for my stepdad and as a data entry clerk at my uncle’s doctor’s office. Since I was young and didn’t have bills, I had a lot of money at my disposal. Whenever work slowed down and I needed cash, I asked my family for help. If they were generous and gave me money, I took advantage of them.

For example, my aunt would give me her card to withdraw $20 at an ATM, and I’d take out $40. I’d ask my Grandma, who received Social Security once a month, to let me borrow money I knew I’d never pay back. There were also times I stole my dad’s stuff and sold it for drug money. It feels terrible sitting here writing that, but those were the types of things I’d do to fund my lifestyle.

It wasn’t long before I was introduced to pills. The first one I tried was ecstasy.

Ecstasy is a pill that comes in various colors and designs and makes you feel extremely happy. It puts your mind in a state of bliss where everything feels more enjoyable. Music sounds better, conversations seem deeper, and you appreciate everything around you. You experience a hard crash the next day, but for those few hours, there’s no comparable feeling.

The first time I used ecstasy, I was hanging out with a friend who had a couple of yellow ecstasy pills with a Lamborghini logo on them. I swallowed one, not sure what to expect. About 30 minutes later, my friend and I got into an argument. While I was yelling at him, I suddenly felt my anger disappear. I stopped arguing and felt a surge of joy. I apologized for getting mad and told him he meant a lot to me.

I felt the ecstasy starting to kick in, and boy, did it feel good.

My friend had to leave, so I called another friend who lived nearby, and he invited me over to hang out. He didn’t live far, so I walked over to his house. It was a sunny day, and I felt like a million bucks as I walked with the warm sun shining on my skin.

When I got to my friend’s house, I let everyone know I had taken ecstasy for the first time. They asked how I felt, and I told them, ‘amazing.’ They made sure I was comfortable and were extra accommodating. They pulled out some weed to smoke, and we blazed outside for a bit. I asked my friends if they had cigarettes, and one of them slowly pulled out a pack of Marlboro 27s from his jeans, which were my favorite cigarettes at the time.

I had a huge grin on my face when my friend handed me a cigarette, and it felt euphoric to have a smoke while I was high off ecstasy and marijuana. As soon as I finished it, I asked for another one and started chain-smoking.

After hanging out for a bit, we got in my friend’s car and drove around. As soon as we got in the car, the radio started playing, and Toxicity by System of a Down came on, taking my high to a whole other level. My friends were hungry, so we drove through Carl’s Jr., and one of my friends suggested I get an orange juice, which he said was the best drink to have on ecstasy. I took his advice and ordered one, which tasted like heaven as it went down my throat.

I had the time of my life, and spent the rest of the day chilling with my friends.

After that, I started using ecstasy more frequently, and eventually went on a binge where I took ten pills in a single day. It sounds ridiculous, but I’ll explain what happened. One afternoon, my friend came over and told me he stole a bottle of ecstasy pills from his older brother, who was a drug dealer. We went to the mall and spent the entire day walking around popping pills. Since it was Christmas season, the mall was covered in bright lights, and classic songs like “The Nutcracker” played over the loudspeakers.

Every hour or so, we popped another pill to keep our high going. Whenever we felt dehydrated, we bought water from the food court. It was like we were at a rave, and we had a blast strolling around.

By nighttime, we were drained and crashed at my house. The next day, my friend headed home, and shortly after, my family confronted me with a small bag of pills. I guess while he was sleeping, the drugs had fallen out of his pants, and my family found them on the living room floor.

I told them the drugs weren’t mine, but it was a tough story to sell. They gave the bag to my mom, who took it to a police station. After testing the pills, the police told her they were ecstasy and Xanax. My family wasn’t happy with me, and it was a bad look. On top of that, I still felt drained from all the ecstasy I had taken at the mall a few days earlier.

I reached out to my sister and asked her to take me to the hospital because I felt like something was wrong with me. I told her to keep it confidential, and she promised she would. The doctors examined me and said I’d be fine. They told me to stay hydrated and sent us on our way.

After my sister dropped me off at home, she immediately told my family what happened. I felt betrayed that she told my parents after I confided in her, but looking back now, I understand why she was concerned. Unfortunately, it put a huge strain on us, and we didn’t speak for nearly a decade. We still aren’t too close, but I’m no longer mad at her, and we talk more than we used to.

Despite this incident, I continued using drugs and became a full-time cigarette smoker. I started off smoking occasionally, but got hooked and began buying my own packs. There was a tobacco shop near my house that sold cigarettes to one of my friends, so I walked there hoping they would sell to me too.

The first time I went to the store, I walked up to the counter nonchalantly and confidently asked for a pack of cigarettes as if I were well over 18. I must have been in over my head because the first thing the guy behind the counter said was, “ID, please.” I couldn’t provide it, so I walked home empty-handed and disappointed.

A week or so later, I was craving cigarettes, so I marched back to the store hoping for a different result. The same guy from my first attempt was there. I asked for a pack and, once again, got denied. I mentioned that one of my friends bought cigarettes there and that I wanted a pack too. He looked at me for a moment, thought it over, then told me to go across the street to Taco Bell and get him some food. If I came back, he said he’d sell me a pack.

I was happy to oblige and pick him up some tacos, and just like that, I had a connection for cigarettes.

My favorite cigarettes were Marlboro 27s and Reds. I also smoked Wine Black & Milds. Looking back, out of everything I used, drugs, liquor, all of it, cigarettes were my favorite. There was something relaxing about having a pack to smoke throughout the day or a long Black & Mild to puff on. Even though I knew it was terrible for me, I loved smoking.

The main difference between drugs and cigarettes is that it’s much easier to hide a drug habit. When I was high, I could sit quietly in the car with my headphones on, tell my family I wasn’t feeling well, and avoid blowing my cover. When you smoke cigarettes, though, you can’t hide it because it leaves you with a strong smell that’s hard to get rid of.

One time, my mom picked me up to take me to court for a ticket I got. Before she arrived, I went outside for a quick smoke. The second I got in the car, she called me out for smelling like cigarettes. I denied it, but obviously smelled like I had just walked off a tobacco farm.

By this point in my life, I was regularly drinking, smoking cigarettes and weed, and experimenting with harder drugs.

One night, my friends and I were outside my house around midnight after partying. While hanging out, I saw one of my friends pull out a pouch filled with white powder. My friend started rolling up a dollar bill to prepare a line of cocaine. I was both drunk and high and asked my friend to let me try some when he was done.

I felt nervous when it was my turn to do a line, but I went through with it, curious to try the infamous drug. After snorting the coke, I didn’t notice anything at first, but was told to wait patiently for it to kick in. About ten minutes later, a powerful high rushed through my body. I lit a cigarette and took drags, blowing smoke into the night air. It was an incredible feeling, and I enjoyed every second of it. It definitely lived up to the hype.

Cocaine is a highly addictive drug. The high feels so good that once it wears off, you immediately want more. It’s the kind of drug that makes people act desperately to get their hands on it.

I remember one night, I went across the street to my neighbor’s house, and when I got home, I realized the cocaine in my pocket was gone. I immediately went back outside and spent almost an hour crawling around with my phone flashlight, desperately searching for the tiny bag. I never ended up finding it, but when I think about this incident, I can’t believe how ridiculous I must have looked trying to locate some cocaine on the ground. When you’re a drug user, sometimes you can’t see how crazy you’re acting.

Not long after being introduced to cocaine, I started using promethazine. Most people just mix the syrup with soda, but my friends and I were such fiends that we poured it on everything. We dripped it over cigarettes before lighting them, poured it onto blunts and bowls of marijuana, and took turns chugging it straight from the bottle. It was never our primary drug of choice, but we enjoyed it whenever we got our hands on a hard-to-find bottle.

After spending time experimenting with other drugs, I realized smoking weed no longer satisfied me. The high it gave me wasn’t strong enough anymore. I started losing respect for weed and preferred using harder drugs when I went out.

As underground rapper, Necro said in his song, ‘I Need Drugs.’

“As a young teen, I started with marijuana

Then graduated to coke cuz I needed something stronger.”

Out of all the drugs I used, the worst one had to be a little white pill called Xanax. It’s a prescription drug usually given to people with anxiety, but when abused, it completely alters your behavior. Xanax puts you in a heavily sedated state that lowers your inhibitions and impairs your judgment. If you take too many or mix it with alcohol, you can black out completely and wake up with no memory of what happened the night before.

I started taking Xanax after transitioning from homeschooling back to regular school. One of my friends was selling bars, and I’d meet up with him before school to buy a couple. Two bars were usually enough to keep me high from morning until the final bell.

One time, I was high off Xanax with my friends, and went to 7-Eleven to buy some cigarettes and alcohol. When we walked in, my friend told me I jumped on the counter and asked the clerk if he enjoyed his job, and other random questions. The clerk must have been like, “What the hell’s wrong with this guy?” When you take these pills, though, you can’t control yourself because you’re way too loose, confident, and high.

I started getting comfortable using drugs at school and even snorted cocaine in the bathroom stalls between my classes. I’d sit on the toilet, take out my folder, do a line or two, and leave. I never got caught, but an adult approached me once and asked why my eyes were so big. I got nervous, and my heart sank. He walked into a nearby office, and I quickly left the area.

The same adult saw me another time and walked up to scan my eyes again, but this time I wasn’t high, and my eyes looked normal, so he couldn’t say anything. I didn’t realize it at the time, but looking back, these were warning signs that my drug use was becoming noticeable to my family and people outside my household.

Eventually, I reached a point where I was high every day and lost all sense of time. I didn’t know what day or month it was because I was stuck in a nonstop cycle of using drugs and partying. I completely stopped listening to my family and only cared about going out and getting high.

One day, I got home after a night of partying, and my dad told me to pack my bags and get ready to go to my mom’s house. He said my behavior was unacceptable and that I couldn’t stay with him anymore. Once he dropped me off, I knocked on her door. She opened it, called my dad, and told him I couldn’t live with her either and that he should come pick me up right away.

I had turned into such a troubled teen that nobody wanted to deal with me anymore.

I wanted to quit using drugs and get my life on track, but I was never able to stop using for more than a week or two. My friends and I always proclaimed we’d quit, but knew it would only last for so long. When you’re partying in environments that contain drugs and liquor, it’s hard to abstain from them, especially when everyone else is indulging in them and having a good time.

Eventually, I got into so much trouble that I knew I had to sober up. I decided to quit everything cold turkey. It was hard, but I knew it was time to finally address my problem. I had let everyone down, and it was time to get clean.

Since my body was used to consuming drugs and alcohol, it reacted poorly to me quitting. I felt terrible all day and had trouble falling asleep at night. When I did fall asleep, I had strange dreams. Sometimes, I’d lie down and feel like I couldn’t breathe. My heart was beating so fast I thought I was going to have a heart attack. It also felt like I was having seizures because my arm would randomly shake from side to side.

One thing that helped alleviate my pain was hot showers. Having hot water poured over my skin was surprisingly relieving. There were times I took three or four showers a day. My family would ask why I was taking so many showers, and it probably looked weird, but it made a man who felt insane feel sane.

I was able to stay clean for a whole year, but like most addicts, I relapsed. My family left town for the weekend, and I had some old friends come over. Within 48 hours, I relapsed on cigarettes, alcohol, cocaine, and weed. I re-entered the same type of environment I was in before, and due to my lack of self-control, I went back to the same substances I swore I was done with.

After my relapse, I didn’t use cocaine again, but I continued drinking and smoking.

One of the most embarrassing moments in my life came when my cousin and I went to a marijuana dispensary. I felt embarrassed walking in because I was wearing the same clothes I had worn on my last visit. I also hadn’t showered in days and wasn’t taking care of myself. I felt like a complete and total bum.

When we got to the dispensary, I heard a noise coming from the ground. I looked down, and my shoelaces were untied, flapping against the ground. Here I was, a grown man who hadn’t showered or shaved in days, wearing the same outfit as the last time, and not just one but both of my shoelaces were untied.

I decided to cut down on my drinking, so I took a break. One night, though, I went over to a neighbor’s house and got offered some liquor. I thought to myself that since I hadn’t had a drink in a few months, I’d probably be able to control myself. So I convinced myself it’d be okay to have a drink.

I started drinking again, and for the first few times, I was able to drink until I was buzzed and then stop like a responsible person. It didn’t last long, and I went back to my old ways of drinking until I blacked out. I took another extended break and tried drinking again, and the same thing happened. I controlled myself initially, but then went back to overdrinking.

It became clear I was an alcoholic.

When I turned 21, my family wanted to take me out to drink, but right before my birthday, I decided to quit drinking forever. Ironically, I quit drinking before I was legally able to start, but that’s how it worked out for me.

My last night of drug use was when I was 20 years old. I was hanging out with a friend when he suddenly handed me a glass pipe. It didn’t look like the usual pipe I smoked out of, and I remember thinking it looked strange. I figured there was probably some kind of THC oil in it, so I took a hit. A few moments later, I felt the strongest high throughout my body. I looked at my friend and said, “Yo, what kind of weed is this? I ain’t never been this high before.” He laughed and replied, “Naw, this ain’t weed, bro. It’s crystal meth.”

I thought for a moment about how I’d been clean from hard drugs for years, and now I relapsed on a drug that was far worse than anything I used before. I felt terrible for a moment, but succumbed to smoking meth with my friend all night. I have to say, out of every drug I’ve used, Crystal Meth gave me the greatest high.

I left my friend’s house around 5:30 AM and walked home. As I approached my house, I saw my uncle in the kitchen making breakfast. He opened the door, looked at me, and said in disgust, “You’re on drugs.” I walked into the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. My pupils were so dilated they looked like they were about to pop out of their sockets. I went to bed, feeling disappointed in myself.

I used drugs a few times after this, but before I turned 21, I decided to permanently quit taking drugs and haven’t relapsed since. I’m 30 now, so I’ve been clean for over a decade from drugs and alcohol. I’m fully aware now that I have an addictive personality and can’t afford to relapse again.

Quitting drugs was easy for me, but quitting drinking has been a challenge because alcohol is such a big part of our society. Everywhere you go, people drink, and not everyone understands your decision to stay sober. Most people respect it when I tell them I don’t drink, but if they keep pressing me about it, I just tell them I’m an alcoholic. That usually shuts the conversation down instantly. It would be like a guy asking a girl on a date and her telling him she’s a lesbian.

There’s not much you can say after that.

I don’t party as much these days and prefer not to be in places where there are drugs and alcohol. Not because I can’t control myself, but because I don’t want to surround myself with things that once helped destroy me. A thief shouldn’t hang around a bank, a person with a porn addiction shouldn’t be on Pornhub, and an alcoholic shouldn’t be sitting at a bar. It doesn’t make sense to put yourself in environments that could trigger a relapse.

It’s also not fun for me. I can’t enjoy myself when I’m the only one sober and everyone else is under the influence. Some people can party like that, but I can’t. Nowadays, I like to stay at home and relax. I turn up by lying in bed in my underwear and reading a good book. If I really want to get “lit,” I’ll light a candle or two and get the party cracking.

It might not sound like the most exciting way to spend Saturday night, but it works for me.

When I look back at my substance abuse, I can see it caused me nothing but problems. Not only did I spend thousands of dollars on drugs, alcohol, and tickets, but I also hurt my family and embarrassed myself countless times. To fund my addiction, I’d stop at nothing. I eventually turned into a compulsive liar who would do or say anything to get high.

These substances turn you into the worst version of yourself. I remember a Biggie Smalls lyric where he said

“All my life I been considered as the worst, Lyin’ to my mother, even stealin’ out her purse.”

It reminds me of all the times I lied to my Grandma to get money for drugs and alcohol.

Drugs are dangerous because they put you in an altered state you can’t reach on your own. Most people know drugs are bad, but still use them so they can temporarily escape the hardships of life. I loved getting high, but hated when I came back to reality and my problems were still there with their arms crossed, waiting for me.

One thing that helped me during my recovery was going to the gym and exercising. It wasn’t easy at first, though. After all those years of smoking, I couldn’t run for a few minutes without running out of breath. I’m in great shape now, but it took a while before I could run for a meaningful amount of time.

My favorite thing to do at the gym was lift weights. Pushing and pulling heavy weights helped purge the negative emotions out of me. It also helped me put on muscle, which boosted my self-confidence. I started getting more attention from women, too 🙂

Nowadays, I do my best to encourage addicts to get clean. Nothing good ever comes from substance abuse. Whenever you hear about drugs or alcohol in the news, it’s usually because of an arrest, an overdose, or someone getting killed by a drunk driver.

This generation is facing an epidemic of people dying from pills laced with Fentanyl. Just know buying pills these days is like playing Russian roulette. You have no idea where the pill came from or what could be in it. Your drug dealer also doesn’t know what’s in it, and you should never trust anyone handing you a pill. Even if someone promises you it’s safe to take, don’t believe them.

Stay far away from pills.

Now that I’ve been clean for years, I can tell you with confidence it’s better to live a sober life – To start,

1. You’re always in control of your actions.
2. You have more money since you’re not buying a product that disappears after one use and has to be repurchased.
3. You’re not hurting your body and destroying your brain cells.

One thing I will say, though, is that life doesn’t magically get easier once you get clean. When you’re feeling down, you no longer have substances to numb your emotions or temporarily make you feel better. That’s why it’s important to replace drug and alcohol use with healthier habits, so you don’t relapse or fall into depression. Personally, I go to the gym, read, make music, and find other productive ways to channel my energy.

In the end, I’m grateful for my experiences and, more than anything, thankful I was able to change my life and get clean. I just hope people struggling with addiction recognize the problem and stop before it’s too late. Usually, someone starts using drugs and progressively gets worse until they hit rock bottom or face serious consequences that force them to quit. Those moments can cause years of damage and take a long time to recover from, which is why I recommend getting clean on your own terms instead of the universe’s.

Every now and then, I’m tempted to drink, but I quickly remind myself of all the hardships it has caused me. After being sober for years, it would also be ridiculous to start using again, especially since I struggled so hard to get clean. I might be able to control myself at first, but eventually I’d fall back into my old habits, and the addict in me would spiral out of control again.

I challenge everyone to ask themselves if they have a problem with substance abuse. If you’re someone who can drink and control yourself, then, by all means, drink up and have a good time. Consider yourself lucky that your DNA allows you to control yourself and drink responsibly. For everyone else, ask yourself if you’re being responsible with your consumption.

If you can’t go out and have fun without drinking or using drugs, you probably have a problem. If you need to have a drink when you get off work to relax, you probably have a problem. If everyone has stopped drinking and you’re the only one pouring another drink in your cup… You probably have a problem.

Do you have a problem?

That’s a question only you can answer.

Just make sure when you answer it, you’re being honest.