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This is a we program

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This is a we program

My story starts off like I believe many do; with some sort of unresolved trauma or pain. In my case, I was molested as a child at the age of six.
My childhood was great I had both parents who loved me without question. I was not underprivileged and I was always provided for. Of course other things happened to me as a child and a teen I had no control over, divorce, death, and my father moving away to another state.
Now let??s fast forward to the first time I used. I was fifteen; I had just shot myself in the hand with a pellet gun by accident and was taken to the hospital to have the pellet removed. I was given Percocet for the pain. The first time I took it I fell in love. The feeling was like nothing I had ever experienced in my life. This would be marked as the beginning of my addiction.
Within six months I was stealing medication from my mother, medication she needed for legitimate pain but I didn??t care for the self seeking, self centered behavior had begun. Within a year I was using prescription painkillers every day. Dope sickness would creep in to my bones, arms, and legs when I wasn??t using. I had become dependent and needed opiates no matter how they were procured. My actions thereafter became less than questionable; theft, anger, manipulation, and violence just as long as the ends justified the means.
At the age of seventeen I discovered Methamphetamines. Over the next two years my life spun out of control. I dropped out of school, could not hold a job, and, terrorized my family to the point that they were scared of me.
My first experience with rehab took place when I was twenty. The program was thirty days and not sufficient enough to do much good, although, it did curb my Methamphetamine habit. I stayed clean for close to five months before I began to use Opiates again. From the ages of twenty to twenty-five I managed to keep work for a year here and there but was eventually fired from every job and it was a direct result of my drug addiction.
A few days after my twenty-fifth birthday I was arrested and looking at 4-16 years prison; this was not a good place for me to be in but I was happy I had been caught and the madness was over. My first night in jail I hit my knees and prayed, I prayed my heart out to anyone who would listen. The difference between this prayer and the many before it was that I meant every word of it. I needed saved, I needed redirection, and I vowed to help others. This would be the night I met my higher power.
I was given a reprieve on the 4-16 years of prison for a extended rehabilitation stay at the Salvation Army. I stayed confined in jail for three months before being released into the program. I was introduced to the beauty and simplicity of the 12-step programs. The Salvation Army program would grant me a second chance on life and familiarize me with many other positive habits that had been lost along the way. I literally had to learn to live all over again.
Sobriety is not an easy road. If it were everyone would be doing it. I still have my ups and downs but now I have tools to fix those problems as they arise. One of the most valuable things I have learned throughout my journey is that we all have a choice. It??s beautiful isn??t it? Even the word itself is pretty ingrained to the psyche. If I constantly keep in mind that I must do the next right thing, make the next right choice, I can do this. I have slipped a few times but I??m still fighting the good fight and today, today I am sober.
To say yes to an instant is to say yes to all eternity.



Partners for Hope raise critical funds on behalf Partnership to End Addiction – the nation’s leading organization dedicated to addiction prevention, treatment and recovery. Every dollar raised on behalf of the Partnership* will help ensure free, personalized family support resources, including our national helpline, peer-to-peer parent coaching, customized online tools and community education programs, can reach those who need them most. Please consider donating to this fundraiser and sharing this page.

*Donations made to Partnership to End Addiction are tax deductible to the extent allowed by law. All contributions are fully tax-deductible, as no goods or services are provided in consideration in whole, or in part, of any contribution to this nonprofit organization.  EIN: 52-1736502

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Comments

1. Untue
Decoder - Breaking down teen culture, substance abuse, and parenting » Blog Archive » Celebrating with Alcohol: A Reward for a Job Well Done? I was suggested this web site by my cousin. I'm not sure whether this post is written by him as nobody else know such detailed about my difficulty. You're amazing! Thanks! your article about Decoder - Breaking down teen culture, substance abuse, and parenting » Blog Archive » Celebrating with Alcohol: A Reward for a Job Well Done?Best Regards Justin
2. Gjawua
Decoder - Breaking down teen culture, substance abuse, and parenting » Blog Archive » Celebrating with Alcohol: A Reward for a Job Well Done? I was recommended this web site by my cousin. I'm not sure whether this post is written by him as nobody else know such detailed about my difficulty. You're amazing! Thanks! your article about Decoder - Breaking down teen culture, substance abuse, and parenting » Blog Archive » Celebrating with Alcohol: A Reward for a Job Well Done?Best Regards Cassetta
3. Charisse
Dear Maxwood, I think that your idea to reward yourself by striving to achieve something better is a good one. I adopted this method for my beginning college years. However, I think that this idea also has to be interspersed with a kind of work-free reward as well. Otherwise, young adults run the risk of burning themselves out in the constant struggle to do the next hardest thing.
4. Maxwood
Rewardedness can be a subtle, circular-reasoning way of assuring ourselves that we are good-- after all, if I hadn't earned it, I wouldn't have this, right? The perfect reward, in this perspective, would be the next, bigger challenge-- the mandate to do something even more meritorious. Give the kid a bigger, more taxing, more prestigious mission or "job" to take on and maybe everyone can forget the "obligatory" celebration gesture.
5. Allan Howard
Be real! You can trust your kids, if thay can trust you. No secrets, no lies. If you feel you have to keep secrets. You have some work to do. Get some help.
6. Kimberly Victorino
Stress, as you have mentioned in your article is one of the large contributor of a person to take on alcohol or any sorts of drugs, like crystal meth. Parents, friends, and relatives should guide these people and let them know that what they do is wrong. I've come across a website http://recoverynowtv.com/crystal-meth-recovery that may assist the parents, to help their kids be achieve crystal meth recovery, or any other drugs.
7. Re Wired
Hi Charisse, First, kudos to you for being able to "know your limit" as you stated and to have such high awareness of how our society/family/culture has affected our perception of how alcohol provides "rewards". What I most liked about your blog was how you drove home the concept of how we have to integrate healthy options and outcomes as well in to our and the lives of our children. I want to share with you and your readers a wonderful organization called The Search Institute http://www.search-institute.org/developmental-assets who has been studying What Kids Need to develop a healthy sense of self to not drink or do drugs in self harming ways. Our organization is a prevention and treatment non-profit for substance abuse/use and I invite you and others to check out our blog as well at http://www.arpnc.org/blog/