YOUTHFUL IGNORANCE CAN KILL YOU!

YOUTHFUL IGNORANCE CAN KILL YOU! This is a true story. The names have been changed for obvious protection. Please, to any and all, pay close attention! This is real, and is affecting more and more of our society. God, save our children!

When I was younger my Mother and I didn't get along well at all. I often busied myself by playing both ends against the middle, just to get my way. Not only did I nearly cause my parents divorce through such antics, but I also caused my Mother's distrust in me, among other things. She didn't see my point of view, and I certainly didn't see hers! I was forever feeling as if no one understood where I was coming from, and was convinced that no one "could"! At age 13 I hated life! I know that sounds strong, but it is true. I felt as if no one cared, and I was determined to do my own thing to show my defiance. When Mother said "no", I did it anyway, and when she said yes, I outright refused! Of course this made problems worse, but it was far too convenient for me to blame her, after all, I felt she should "know" what I was going through. She was my Mother wasn't she? Forget that we didn't spend time together, or that I couldn't see her point of view any more than she saw mine. I was convinced that things were different in "her" time, so telling her my problems was a waist of time. I didn't understand where she was coming from, and after a certain point, I didn't care. All I saw, was that I was alone! I couldn't see her reasoning, so when she pushed my friends away, I didn't see the "care" behind it, I only saw hate. It was my hate, but I had to blame it on her. I couldn't blame it on myself! She was my Mother after all! I eventually started playing around with her prescribed head ache pills, and darvons, darvacettes e.t.c., and I would often make my self stay up late on a school night so that I could feel the buzz. My attitude began to deteriorate as my mood swings increased and of course, I blamed Mother! She didn't understand me, so in my youthful ignorance, I would give her more not to understand. I thought some how, that it was a way of getting back at her. Little did I know where I was headed! By the age of fifteen, I had attracted friends of the same type personality as mine. We weren't necessarily bad kids, we just weren't preppies, and had to make statements to that fact. Our clothing consisted of bell bottoms (which were in style then), t-shirts and army jackets, and we walked around school like tough guys! It was all an act though. I wasn't happy, and wasn't even sure what "happy" felt like, and I was sick of it. I was sick and tired of wanting someone to love me, and tried to kill myself on a number of occasions. One night in particular, I was at a friend's house. I was all messed up, feeling sorry for myself and saw the pistol in the livingroom cabinet. Janet, my friend, had gone back to check her sisters and brothers before breaking out the booze. Her parents were gone and it just seemed like the perfect time to do it. I opened the cabinet, picked up the gun, and checked to see if it was loaded. My heart began racing when I saw the bullets inside, and I felt the sweat on my forehead heating up with added prickles. I closed the gun, cocked it, and pointed it to my temple. I didn't even look to see if anyone was around. I took three slow measured breaths and pulled the trigger! Janet had quietly returned, and grabbed my wrist just before the shot. She pulled the gun upwards toward the ceiling, which left a nice hole! It was later explained as an accident from just "looking" at the gun, and was forgotten. My feelings however, weren't! I was still depressed, still felt mis-understood, unloved and uncared for. If only someone could see "me"! We began to bully the other kids in school that were less fortunate, or who were weaker than we. Linda, my other friend, stole valium from her Mother, and I stole darvon's from mine. Our parents never knew. When I came home from school high, Mother would ask "What's wrong with your eyes?" I told her that I forgot my glasses that day (which became a full time workable excuse), and that my headache was so bad that I rubbed my eyes red! We were always high in school and kept it from the faculty for a long time, but eventually got caught. Suspension was all that came out of it. Lying about the circumstances had by then, become second nature, and frankly, we didn't care! By the time I was 19, I was smoking pot, sometimes laced with opium or hash, and drinking heavily. It seemed like the "in" thing, everyone was doing it! We went to weekend parties out in the apple orchards where even our car stereo's couldn't be heard from the highway, and stayed out late causing our Mothers or husbands extreme worry. We didn't care. I had gotten so wrapped up in my need for drugs just to survive, that anyone else's problems, were just that, "their" problems! After being married two years, I still partied, and at that point I didn't even care that my marriage had fallen apart. I was so tired of trying to please anyone but me, I thanked God for the seperation. My cute little boys of one, and two years were a mess. If they so much as giggled I yelled at them, frequently throwing their toys across the room because I couldn't handle the stress of intrusion on my "space"! The house was always dirty and I didn't care about that either. Often, in the mornings while I slept in, the two year old would wonder into the kitchen, and grab hotdogs for him and his one year old brother to eat...just to get spanked for making a mess when I woke up! I didn't care that social services had taken my children from me and given them to their Father. I finally felt free, I could get high whenever I wanted... and I couldn't even "see" what I was doing to myself "or" my family! How sad. By the time I was 25, I was smoking expensive pot, opium, hash, snorting and smoking cocaine, taking LSD and mescaline, chewing up and swallowing psylisibin mushrooms and downing 5ths of whiskey. I don't believe, now that I look back, that I had a sober day in all those years! I didn't even know who I was anymore, let alone who I was with, and if I wasn't stoned out of this world, I was confused and bawling like a baby from serious depression. A number of times I tried to commit suicide because life was just so unfair to me and I felt that I couldn't go on! The pistol certainly wasn't my last attempt! When I woke up, not quite over-dosing enough, I would re-think my situation until my next depression would hit. Before long, I was having troubles sleeping at night, so I started taking sleeping pills. After that, the sleeping pills caused me to oversleep, so i took speed. Sleeping pills at night, speed in the morning, and all my normal drug use during the day. I really thought this was normal! I kept this up for so long, that I began dropping weight drastically. Oh, I lost it slowly at first, and was quite happy with my new look, only to view myself in the mirror and still acuse myself of being "fat"! Before I knew it, at 5 feet and 2 inches, I was weighing in at 75 pounds. When I layed down, my hip bones seemed to tower over my skeletal looking belly and my breasts were mere skin without substance. Each time I looked in the mirror, all I saw was fat, and speed seemed to be the trick I needed. My cheeks were hollow and the circles under my eyes were telling everyone what was going on but me. I just saw "old age"! I certainly didn't believe I had a problem! It was them, not me. I nearly ended up in a hospital, but a friend of mine that didn't do drugs began coming over for a while, stood over me, and made me eat. I never stopped doing drugs, but I did cut down on the speed. After three months my appetite began to return and from there it took my metabalism 2 years to get up to a bounding 95 pounds! When my non-druggie friend realized I was still using, he disappeared. He said he wouldn't help someone that refused to help herself, and I was again on my own. It never occurred to me that my "using" friends didn't care about me, only the drugs I had to share. It certainly didn't come to mind that I was doing the same. We thought we were so close, so tight that nothing could ever break up our friendship! After I was older however, I looked back and saw quite clearly, that the only time my friends ever wanted to get together was to get high. We never had any ambition for shopping at the mall, comparing clothes, or doing the "make-up" thing which was normal for most women. The only guys we talked about were the one's that were more screwed up than we were!


At one point I ended up with one of those "screwed-up-high-on-drugs-don't-give-a-damn-about-anything-else" guys! I found myself in a relationship based on control... his! I had to do what I was told or get the crap knocked out of me, and if I wanted any junk, I had to give it up in the bedroom. It was a bad situation, but I found myself always defending him in front of others as if he were a good person... as if he were my knight or something. The second our company went home however, the facade disappeared and again, I was his slave for whatever his purpose. He controlled me literally. If I didn't obey, not only did I get beat badly, I didn't get any stuff, and that was a bigger fear to me than having my eyes blackened! Through the help of "friends", I finally got the guts and ran from that man. I got out on my own, and got a job that paid enough to keep up with my bills. I started dealing LSD and pot in order to get my own stuff free, and that worked out for some time it seemed. I always had a rough time at work and often screwed things up because I couldn't think straight, and often found myself getting fired, and job hopping. My contact was busted a year after our relationship had started and I was scared! I stopped buying anything and couldn't get a grip! I needed my stuff!! I eventually found a man that would give me all the coke and pot I wanted for sex. All I had to do was be there for him and he would take care of me. I thought he loved me because of this. I had dreams of marriage and kids, bar-b-ques and swim parties. I had visions of the middle class living! Boy was I was ignorant! Things aren't always as they "seem"! After 6 months of being with him, I showed up at my scheduled time, only to find I was pimped off to a stranger. I was held down and he forced sex on me. I screamed for him to get off. I screamed for him to stop, to let me go, but it only got me a black eye, a number of cuts on my face from his fist, and bruises in places best not to mention! Others came in to help hold me down and I was their target for the night. I wasn't released until the next day, and I had physical discomforts for quite some time after! By the time I was 28, I had done almost every drug there is (or was), and had started pawning everything for my drug money. If I had nothing to pawn, there was always sex for drugs and many willing to oblige... oblige they did! I had gotten used to that to the point that it didn't bother me anymore. I didn't even care if some man wanted to rape me, as long as I was "fixed" up. When my paycheck came in, I would get my stuff out of the pawn shop, always having to leave behind at least one item from being short of money. Two weeks later I was taking my stuff back into the pawn shop again. It was a never ending cycle! I eventually lost my T.V., stereo, keyboard, clarinet and anything else of value was pawned, except for my clothes. I'm certain now, that if I had owned a house, property and livestock that I would have pawned and lost them too, and wouldn't have thought twice about it. Christmas of my 29th year was near and I dreaded it. Thanksgiving was bad enough, Christmas scared me! I was alone and couldn't find someone nice enough to stick around! My family were all thousands of miles away and my so-called friends suddenly wanted nothing to do with me any more. They called me a druggie as if they were clean, and wouldn't even be seen talking to me. They treated me as if I were some street bum that was grossly dirty and disgusting, and maybe I was, I don't remember. That Christmas Eve, I sat in my room with a 5th of dark Bacardi Rum, and a large quantity of cocaine and pot. I combined it all with LSD and the speed I had and fully intended to overdose. I didn't want to wake up that next morning! That night I had a very bad "trip" and had to be subdued by strangers that called themselves "my friends," and only wanted to help. I was out of control, and at one point decided that flight was a fancy when I was ripped out of the open window by a large male. I fought him with my fists, but he only hugged and squeezed me tight enough to cause my helplessness. Though most of this part I don't remember, I "do" remember him standing in the ice cold shower with me, not letting go until I calmed down. The bugs I felt crawling all over me, and in my mouth wouldn't go away. Everything and everyone kept melting before my eyes, very graphically! You just can't imagine what a melting human face looks like in all your worst nightmares! At that point I broke down and bawled harder than I had ever cried in my life. I was scared to death, I was hallucinating, I was sick... and I knew it! He just held me. That last depression didn't go away like the others. I wanted to die. I wanted to end it all, but something in the back of my mind kept nagging at me. I knew there was something better out there somewhere. After all, others were happy! That nagged at me for some time, until I finally turned myself in for treatment, and I couldn't have given myself a better gift! The program was hard! I found myself crying every night. I often woke from nightmares that were so bizarre and graphic that I thought I was losing my mind! I would wake up vomiting from the scene's I had witnessed in my sleep, just to witness other vulgarities while I was awake! I wanted to run, get out of there and find some drugs to make it go away! I knew, however, that it wouldn't help. The hallucinations, and the nightmares from them would still haunt me. I did stick with it though, and by the time I was released three months later I felt more alive than I had ever felt in my early youth! I had a grasp on something. I wasn't sure what yet, but I felt a tinge of reality, and that small bit felt good! Now it is years later, I am 37, I have my boys back and I'm married to a gentle man. I have been clean since 1989, and though my memories from my addiction of 15 years have many weak spots, I have a nice life. It is not the life I dreamed about as a young child, but it is "my" life, and I can handle rejections fairly well. I can think straight, I can learn, and I can deduce. I can wake up to an alarm clock, I can cook, and I can comprehend the word "love" for the first time in my entire life! I wrote this true story to hopefully alert parents and youth alike. Don't do drugs people! The world is not always as it seems, and although it may feel very real, it is very rare, if at all that we are unloved and alone. Your peers may tell you how "great" the buzz is, but they won't tell you about the bad parts! For one thing, they haven't yet experienced the bad parts, and therefore disbelieve in that possibility. Secondly, the one's who "do" know about the bad parts of drug abuse are "not" going to tell you about them, because you will back away and they will remain feeling alone! Thirdly, you have no idea how these drugs are processed! Drugs are poison to "begin" with, or they wouldn't make you hallucinate. People die daily because of other poisons mixed in with these drugs, sometimes as a sick joke, sometimes to give that "hallucinating" feeling with something cheap and toxic, while keeping their prices down. It isn't worth it! Somewhere, there is someone who "does" care about you! Don't do drugs, they will wreck your life and could very possibly kill you!! I certainly did not start out "wanting" to be a drug addict when I grew up. It happens very innocently at first by "experimenting" and you always feel as if you are in control! When you realize you are addicted, it is too late! Drugs do not discriminate, and it can happen to you! ************************************************************************************************ NATIONAL DOMESTIC VIOLENCE HOTLINE 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) * 1-800-787-3224 (TTY) Linea Nacional sobre la Violencia Domestica -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you know of a hotline, but don't know its number, call the national directory assistance at 1-800-555-1212. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alcoholism & Drug Treatment 1-800-477-3447 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Drug Abuse Hotline 1-800-992-9239 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- National Clearinghouse for Alcohol & Drug Info 1-800-729-6686 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- National Council on Alcohol & Drug Dependence 1-800-622-2255 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cocaine Hotline 1-800-262-2463 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gambling 1-800-GAMBLER ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NJ Drug Hotline 1-800-225-0196 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Addiction Resource Society Inc. 1-800-626-9355 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 800 Alcohol 1-800-252-6465 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ala-call 1-800-322-5525 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Narcotics Anonymous 1-800-992-0401 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prevention Hotline 1-800-THE-KIDS (set up to help families who are under stress or in crisis) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DYFS Citizens Action Line 1-800-331-DYFS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Division of Youth & Family Services 1-800-792-8610 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Other Hotlines ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shelter (youth-Harbor House) (908)929-0660 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Suicide Hotline 1-800-245-9090 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sexual Abuse & Rape Hotline (908)370-4010 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Runaway Switchboard 1-800-621-4000 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Family Planning Center (908)364-9696 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (c)1998 Paige R. 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