A Death in the Family

When I initially got this Email I was not sure if I should make it public. But after I have now read it three times, I think it is imperritve that I make thie public.

A week ago I was informed that my uncle Eric had died suddenly. Furthermore, as per his request, there was no funeral or wake. This got me to wondering if he saw his death looming from some dismal disease, or if he just decided that he should have a comprehensive description of his wishes at the young age of 40. The truth was much, much worse.

Today I recieved an Email from that side of the family with a letter... a suicide note left from Eric for all to see. The letter is a detailed and heartwrenching monologue of despair, depression, drug addiction and eventually complete hoplessness. Eric was a man that I looked up to as a child for his musical talent and, indeed, he was my inspiration for becomeing a musician. He was kind, warmhearted, eternally youthful and extremely caring about his friends and family.

The story that you are about to read is one that is closer to my heart than Eric could have ever imagined. If I only had the opportunity to speak to him about this, I think I might have been able to help. I too was once hopeless addicted to crystal meth and felt my life closing in around me. If only I could have said to him "I understand" or "I've been there," if I could have just offered him the compassionate ear of a non-judgemental family member who had been through what he went through maybe he would still be here today.

If only I...

If only one life can be saved from the story below, Eric's death would not be in vein.


March 18th, 2006

Explaining what happened

Last week I saw a tv commercial with a new slogan regarding crystal meth. The slogan says:

Not Even Once

In my opinion, that is the slogan that gets the point across accurately. When you turn on the news you hear constantly that meth is one of the most dangerous drugs out there, some speculate that it may be worse than heroin. I can’t speak authoritatively but I can tell you that it is horrible stuff. I am certainly not going to try to excuse or explain away what happened, but only answer the question which is only appropriate. How could Eric be so stupid? Accidently.


I was stupid when I was 21, and it was expected that I would do stupid things. Someone offered me coke, and I figured, what the hell, why not. It didn’t do a thing for me. I could feel my heart beat slightly faster, but it didn’t give me any pleasurable feelings. I was stupid to risk it. A couple years later, someone else, same thing. It did nothing for me. In my early 30's in the similar situation, I just shook my head and said, “Oh you go ahead and do what you want but I’ve tried it a couple of times and it does nothing for me, don’t waste it on me.” I was pressured, I knew what the outcome would be, so once again did it, so I could say “See I told ya”, when the result simply wasn’t there. After they see it was a waste, they don’t pressure you again, so I just pacified them. Well, Memorial Day weekend of 2002, I had invited a friend over for the afternoon. We had just recently met and both had the gift gab. After a couple of drinks and talking he pulls stuff out and asks me if I have a razor blade. In times past I was in other people’s homes, but I thought it was a little rude for him to just decide to do this in my home, and it was written all over my face. He sort of stepped back and said, “Oh you don’t do this?” and I just shook my head and said, “no, I don’t” and finally I just shrugged and said, “Hey, ya know do whatever you want, but don’t waste it on me, it does nothing for me.”. So he did his stuff and we went back to talking and when he was ready to do it again, he gestured as if to offer again and I shrugged it off and finally he said, ‘oh just get over here” and I said, “ok, but it’s a waste on me.” Truthfully, a half hour later I said I didn’t think I felt anything, but I wasn’t a 100% sure. I felt different in a way, but it was subtle. A while later, some more, but still, I said stop wasting it. About a half hour after the second try, I said I feel awake, I’m in a good mood, but I’m certainly not high or feeling anything like that. He laughed at me, and commented that I was talking a lot, I laughed back and said, “oh yeah, wait till you meet my mother!” As time went on, I did start to notice that even for me, I was too talkative. I’d had experiences like that before without being high in any way. The distinction was I’d start to interrupt him and then quickly apologize and say, “No, you go ahead, but I just thought of two other things I have to tell you.” and by the time he finished what he was saying, with two side-trips of his own, I now had five things instead of two to tell him, and we joked about keeping a score card. At some point in mid-laugh I thought I saw light coming through the window shade, and thinking it was 10:30 or 11pm I looked at the clock it was almost 5am. I was stunned and said, ‘This is terrible cause I have to go to work at 7, I have to be up in an hour and I haven’t gone to bed yet.” I was making a joke of it but was worried, because I really was starting to unwind. Well, I got through the day, but went straight to bed after work.


It was two weeks or so later, on the telephone with him, that the we were talking when he asked me, “have you ever done coke?” I laughed at him and said, “Trying to be funny huh?” He seemed confused and asked, “What do you mean?” I said, “Yeah right, I JUST DID IT WITH YOU A COUPLE WEEKS AGO! Is your memory that short?” He said, “You thought that was coke? That wasn’t coke... that was crystal.” I inquired, so he went on trying to say it was similar but different, blah, blah, blah, but at that time, I had not ever heard of it. Not that I would have, because I generally gravitated towards more interesting people. Without vast experience, my perception of someone who was “high” meant they were similar to “drunk” in that they would laugh for no reason, and couldn’t even explain why. That wasn’t appealing to me in any way. Just the tone of disgust in mom and dad’s voices when they’d talk about someone involved in drugs or alcohol, rubbed off. Even after I turned 21 I often couldn’t bring myself to walk in a liquor store, I’d have a friend do it for me. Chris Brodeur used to laugh at me. By the time I turned 22 I had enough courage that I could walk into a liquor store as long as it was the one in Medfield where nobody knew me. Then I got daring in the following year, I could go in Millis, so long as it was at Roche Brother’s plaza, not at Bobby and Peter’s.


Unfortunately, having never heard of it, and not thinking that I should write it down and research it, a couple of hours after the phone call I couldn’t remember what the hell he called it.


Not even once

There is that slogan again. Why such a big deal? Because two weeks later when he is suggesting that we get together again, I said “SURE!” and did not even realize suspicious thought pattern at work in a flash. As soon as I get off the phone I’m thinking he’ll probably bring that stuff again, and it wasn’t so bad. It didn’t mess me up, It just kept me awake past 9PM which is unusual for me, but I thought clearly, I wasn’t “high”, I wasn’t “out of my mind” and had an enjoyable evening. This time, I had the following day off, so where is the harm in this. In looking back, I know how I felt, but didn’t see it as suspicious. Waiting for him to come over, was like driving home from the pizza place or KFC when you’re starving, smelling that delicious smell. You can’t wait to get home and eat. When he arrived, I’m thinking to myself, I wish he’d stop talking and get that stuff out of his pocket. The urge to say, “Hey we can talk later will you get that out?” was strong. I almost felt like I had already had some, I was upbeat, happy, and talkative. Seeing him get it ready seemed to take forever. Please keep in mind, I had not done it a second time yet. This was about to be the second time, yet look at the level of craving going on, and it wasn’t registering as danger in my head.


In October, having only done it twice, I didn’t consider it a negative, it was fun. On a Sunday morning I was having coffee, and online chatting with a couple of friends, and get into a conversation with some guy, shooting the breeze, and all of a sudden, however he worded it, I knew what he meant, that he had some of this stuff and wanted to “party” as they say. Well I invited him over and he jumped in the car and came over. When noon approached he excused himself that he just had to make a quick phone call to his co-worker to have her open the store because he was delayed. As soon as she answered, I was in shock, because I have never heard anyone, off the top of their head, spout off a string of lies that made sense, tied together, were indisputable. My mouth was hanging wide open. This should have been another warning to me, but instead, I’m actually relieved, thinking that this may mean he’ll be able to stay (with his crystal meth) for another hour or so. His conversation turned into a fight, because she was the only other one who could open the store, and she had apparently left him a voice mail at home hours ago, calling in sick. So now, at 11:55am, he has five minutes to get himself from Brighton to Nashua New Hampshire, to open a store in a Mall. He didn’t leave Brighton until 2:00pm but had a story all worked out. I was really thinking what a loser he was, to be so damn irresponsible when you’re the manager of anything. He’s trying to convince me that his record at work is so good he can get away with it this once. This was my third time in four months. I never thought that in four more months, I would be exhibiting the same behavior, working at a store where I had an incredible track record, but would see fit to take giant liberties.


Two weeks later he was back, and had plenty of time to spend because they had just fired him. He didn’t care, he’ll have ten offers tomorrow, and he did. He started a great job, that fired him within a month. It is always their fault, they are unreasonable. Working in retail, I can only think how hard it is to keep even lousy help, and how we go to any length NOT to fire people. It’s still not clicking with me. I had a roommate at the time Marco, who was a friend for years before becoming a roommate. He didn’t want to but in, but he was just worried that already I was getting carried away in the ‘fun’ of it all. Nah, don’t worry about me, I’m fine. His comment was, “Who the hell was that loser? I finally just shut my door cause I couldn’t stand listening to him talk.. You don’t normally hang out with people like that. What’s up with that?” I acknowledged that he was a little tough to take, but thought he was harmless.


Marco changed the subject and told me “Good news, I just found a really cheap flight for my vacation and I leave on Friday!” “Congratulations I said” and the next thought in my head was how nice it would be to have a weekend of privacy and get some crystal and have a great time the whole weekend. If one day is good, two is better. I called my new friend back and asked him if he could possibly purchase some of that for me for next weekend and he said sure no problem. He came by on a Wednesday and picked up the money, and dropped it off Thursday night. It was tough to concentrate on my work knowing what was at home waiting for me. I was at my desk thing about it, picturing it, feeling it. Serious warning sign? No. It’s just fun.


This is a very good time to explain more about the drug. It’s a good time because this is where the flashing danger signs, become signs of inherent danger. Crystal meth does not make you
high. Crystal meth causes your body to release natural neurotransmitters, dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine. To steal a paragraph about these body chemicals from a web page:

Certain aminos cause you to have better feeling of well being. Serotonin is a chemical that helps maintain a "happy feeling," and seems to help keep our moods under control by helping with sleep, calming anxiety, and relieving depression. The brain also makes Dopamine, which makes people more talkative and excitable. It affects brain processes that control movement, emotional response, and ability to experience pleasure and pain. All of these chemicals are natural chemicals that affect our bodily processes.

Think of these natural body chemicals as being in very short supply. They aren’t something that your body simply churns out, The production is such a slow process that your body tries to recycle them as best it can (Called recollecting) but metabolize and filter out a good percentage. Imagine a big natural sponge all weighted down with water and as you are carrying it, you bump your hand and squeeze the sponge a little harder, it drips a little. That is how your body release these chemicals. In tiny bits. When you use crystal meth, it’s like giving the sponge a good squeeze. One day of usage, you could wipe out and discard what will take two weeks to restore. So if you do it once every couple of weeks, your body has ample time to fully recover from the assault. For the first four your body is filtering out the drug and recollecting the natural body chemicals, bringing you to “the bottom” but then the body begins the process of producing neurotransmitters which could take another 10 days.

So Marco is leaves for vacation, and here I am. It’s only been six days since I last did the drug, and I have my own supply, and a whole weekend to spare. The problem is, I haven’t recovered fully from the last time, so I have to do more of it, to achieve the same feeling. This is what tolerance is. Not that I have a resistance to the drug, but my body is running at 95%, and to get to feeling good, more is required. As for that natural sponge comparison, I have to really grab with both hands and wring it out. Needless to say, with a double assault on the body, the four day drift down starting Monday, was prominent on Thursday, when I could barely stay awake.

A couple weeks later after some asking around, I had made contact with a dealer, so I didn’t have to rely on anyone as a go between. The Thursday yawns were replaced with a little bit just to get me to the weekend, but I didn’t want it to interfere with my work. Around the time of crossing into the new year, 2003, I finally put a blemish on my six year record of perfect attendance at work. I had to call in sick day on a Friday, because I got carried away with my Thursday pick-me-up, and had been up all night and was exhausted. One day in six years, they could hardly complain.

Realizing that use of this drug made me ruin a perfect record, I rationalized it in my mind. I’m hard working, I’m organized, I don’t drink and show up to work drunk, in fact I drink very little. I don’t drive an expensive car, I don’t maintain an expensive house, I don’t even take expensive trips, I prefer road trips. I’ve got a very good job that pays me well, plus a side business, which at this time, had literally exploded, forcing me to ask Marco to move out to use the second room for storage. I had never been a lazy or irresponsible, so what was the harm, in this little treat that cost $100 a week. My natural sense of responsibility would prevent me from letting this get out of hand. I felt superior in a way, to people who would give in to such things and allow their lives to be taken over.

As I read that last paragraph, it feels like someone I once knew. It sounds like a person who was proud, and I was, justifiably so. Yet I read it, and I can’t believe that I’m talking about myself. It would be another 24 months before I would learn, at a Crystal Meth Anonymous meeting at Fenway Community health center, that my rationalization was text book. The room was filled with about 35 guys who had good jobs, homes of their own, success, rigidly responsible in every aspect of their paths, and they felt that they could reward themselves with this treat, and not let it get out of hand. Story after story of losing their home and being on a friends couch, one losing his company with 25 employees, plus his house. They all had varying degrees of success, but were all equally successful in losing whatever it was they had. One guy stood up sobbing, his name was Barry, and he was saying he was just miserable, he had a duffle bag with him and he didn’t know where he was going after this meeting. His life was now in his duffle bag, he was in day four and all he could do was cry, and he had no money or place to stay or go.

I don’t want to jump ahead too far, so backing up to January of 2003, that is when my usage took on a pattern, and by the summer it wasn’t a pattern it was routine, and I considered it a bad habit, until late in the summer I became fearful that habit had become addiction. I must comment how fitting are the recent commercials I have seen on TV, with the 10 year old boys and girls standing up, and saying, Hi, My name is Ann, in ten years I will grow up and be a drug addict, and wind up in a 12 step program. Hi, My name is Billy, in ten years my liver will fail because I’m an alcoholic. How many times did I lecture myself that with all Mom and Dad did, this is not what they brought me into this world for, and they would be so.... I always have to stop myself because they wouldn’t be ashamed, they’d move heaven and earth just to help me fix it. I feel enough shame myself. It’s not something that parents hope for with their children, and it is certainly not something that I ever hoped for myself. It’s that stupid 21 year old who tried coke, it did nothing, so to pacify people would demonstrate it had not effect. Who was to know I’d be handed something different and not know.

When trying to break the patterns made me realize something had gone wrong, I did a lot of reading, and in the word on the page, saw that my rationalizations, and the route I had taken was textbook. Why did I wait for a year and a half to read this. One website aimed at prevention, I can’t forget, because it said when you do meth, you end up two places. In jail, or dead. I thought they were going overboard, and I actually wrote them a note. At that time, which was September 2003, I found that Fenway Community Health Center offered counseling and had a weekly support group meeting, and I book marked the page. My friend and former roommate Marco had moved to Chicago, but I confided in him finally, that my flirtation that he had witnessed the year before had become, I was fearful, and addiction, as I was having difficulty in breaking the pattern. Finally, I picked a day and quit. I got by on the first day ok. The second and third I couldn’t get out of bed nor stay awake, and the fourth, was misery, though I was prepared for it, ready for it, as I had read the details online. Coming out of a long period, the forth day is when you reach bottom, and you feel the full effects of the damage you’ve done. You have enough neurotransmitters in your body to stay alive, but no more than that. These neurotransmitters that make you feel as they say, “A sense of well being and content, happy, and emotionally warm”, when absent, leave you feeling desperate, crushed, in tears of guilt, and sadness, and with the total inability to reason away these feelings, you simply have to know ahead of time and try to take them with a grain of salt. Since a person who uses the drug “on weekends” most often does so on a Friday night, in reference to the four day decline, they refer to it as suicide Tuesday. Those who don’t understand what the drug does to them chemically, often take day four at face value, and get so wrapped up in their guilt and sadness, that they take their lives. On my day four in Sep 2003, I cried for eight hours off and on sometimes at length. The guilt, guilt about talking back to mom 20 years ago and petty things I had done throughout my life, nothing that any normal person would think about. I had just rented a video of Handel’s Messiah, and though out of season, I was watching it in surround sound, filmed in a beautiful cathedral in Amsterdam, and the boys choir all singing their hearts out like little angels, and all I could think was, “that used to be me”, and now look at me, a sobbing drug addict in bed for withdrawal, and that only made it worse. How proud am I now. I finally called Fenway Community Health Center to find out about a meeting. I needed to drag myself out of the house and get there cause I didn’t want to be alone. The person explained that they have the meetings scheduled for once a week, but actually, the group didn’t have anyone attending as of yet, but I could come in and talk to a counselor. The wave of crystal meth was just coming to Boston at that time. It was at the time “new” for the east coast. They were trying to prepare for the wave that would come in with certainty at some point.

Then, I called Marco and he stayed on the phone with me from Chicago, being supportive and understanding, and he got me through it. Day five I was able to at least go to the store and do a few errands, and invite a friend to dinner. Day six I did a little work early, took the car to the car wash, since it had been over a year, I was on my way to the post office when I saw what a gorgeous day it was, and started to cry realizing that I couldn’t recall a single day from the summer that was now over. It was such a great day that I didn’t want to be inside. I hadn’t called my friend Ray in six months, and called to see if he wanted to go out to lunch. We went to lunch and shopping afterwards, and it was the first time I could recall since it all began where I had done normal things that didn’t revolve around getting high or that weren’t cut short by the need to go home and get high. The following day, I began to try to sort through all that had been left undone for so long.

Keep in mind, that it hadn’t taken long, that my body under such routine assault, needed the drug just to feel normal. It was no longer done to get that high friendly talkative feeling, where everything is wonderful, it now took the drug just to be able to bring me up to blah. The worst side effects of the drug is what it does to your mind over time. Without it, your brain is simply not working. You can sit in front of the TV for hours, and not be able to recall a single thing that you saw or heard. Not because your mind is on other things, because it has gone flat. When you get high again, you’re too agitated to be good at doing anything, and you get focused on ridiculous projects and tasks for reasons I still don’t understand. As I mentioned early on, you lose all sense of time. Maybe you need to leave in one hour for an appointment and should be getting ready, but instead you are sick of all the crumbs in the toaster, and you’re busy with a toothbrush cleaning it for 45 minutes. You then rush around in the last 15 minutes (or so you think) to get ready, but keep getting sidetracked and are a half hour late leaving. Once in a while, it’s compounded by actually hitting a traffic jam.
You lose your ability to do anything well, or thoroughly, or on time, and you lose your ability to care, not because you don’t care, but because you lose your ability to see the level of importance, in the things you’re letting go. There was a lot that I had therefore let go, much work to be done. This lasted for only three weeks, which ended when I had done enough catching up that I could consider it a minor accomplishment. The level of accomplishment was such that a normal person would take an afternoon off and go with a friend to lunch and a movie, or something like that. Instead, I figured I could treat myself to a little reward.

That little reward lasted for sixteen months. During which time Mom had died, and I remember being late for both wakes and the funeral, being late to Paul’s house, being so high that I don’t really remember too much except Ruth’s, um, eulogy. I took comfort later when I heard whispers about it being self-serving, insulting and vastly inappropriate, because initially I thought that it was because I was high. The fact that I was high wouldn’t be noticeable, it probably seemed that I was taking it well, instead of falling apart. Nearing the end of the sixteen months, in December 2004 I was realizing just how far I had let this go, because it wasn’t $100 every other week or every week, is was now $1000 a week and I there was never a break in the high. I wouldn’t sleep for three days, and then sleep for a few hours, only to be up for another three. One of my big goals in December, was to attend Charlie’s Christmas party and Phil’s Christmas dinner, sober. The year before I had showed up high as a kite, but it’s not something that would show. I just probably came across as alert, energetic, and happy. Still, on the inside, I considered it wrong to show up in such condition, however unnoticeable it was, just as I felt it was, in retrospect, to do the same at mom’s funeral. Without being high, I wasn’t as efficient in getting things done, and I was hours late to Charlie’s. Though little jokes were made about me being late, I laughed too, and smiled not at the jokes, but smiled with the pride that I had arrived sober and that made me feel great about being there with everyone. So make all the jokes you want, nothing can bother me today. It was all great until I got in the car to drive home to an empty condo. Me and the furniture, and no drugs. In order to be sober for the party, I knew I couldn’t have any in the house. I thought, what are the chances of getting a drug dealer to make a delivery on Christmas Eve, and when I got home a phone call quickly solved that, and just before Midnight he arrived. When you spend $1000 a week with someone, you get VIP treatment. I got so high that night, that next thing I knew, it was morning, and that’s when I remembered that I was due at Phil’s house in half an hour, and I was in no condition, nor had showered and dressed. I had to cancel saying I didn’t feel well.

This is where being a good family comes back to bite us. There are some families that scream and swear at each other, constantly lie and cheat or steal, but we were raised in such a way that I feel guilty over the times that I pretended to be ill, or make up reasons for being late, because even petty dishonesty, is not something foreign to all of us.

January 9th I 2005, I drew the line in the sand, and once again quit. I was so used to feeling sad, desperate, and lousy that day four didn’t have any significance whatsoever. I’m sure I felt just as bad as in Sep 2003, but I was just so used to feeling that way, I didn’t take notice. I only know that I had a great amount of trouble functioning. After two weeks I still just wanted to stay in bed, but trying to do things, anything that would take my mind off getting high. Facing the mess in my office of backlogged work, orders, bills, brought about too much anxiety, so I would have to do it in small bits. I finally developed a technique to work around it, when the anxiety would overwhelm me, I would lay down on the livingroom floor. Not in the bed because then I’d turn on the TV and stare blankly for hours, but the floor would get up once I calmed down. Then I could go back and do another 15 minutes work until I would again become overwhelmed. So many things had such a top priority, I had dozens of things that I felt had to come first. My mind was swimming.

Soon I was going to the meetings twice a week at Fenway Community Health Center. The wave of destruction had brought in enough people to start the group, unlike two years earlier. At first, I wasn’t too keen on the idea of spending every Wednesday night and Saturday morning with a room full of drug addicts. At the first meeting I realized instead, I was in a room full of professionals, entrepreneur, hard working blue collar workers, the whole gamut. I was in a room full of general goal-oriented hardworking people who felt that they could allow themself one tiny indulgence and they were certainly had the strength of character to be sure it didn’t get out of hand. Some now live at Pine Street, one was staying at the YMCA, I told the story of Barry who didn’t know where he was headed next, and other’s talking about being on a friend’s couch, other’s who were thrown out by their friends, maybe a third with stories like that. The majority of the stories though, were from those who had been in that situation, but was now a year sober, had been six months at his new job, and finally was able to get an apartment. Experience, strength, and hope. That’s what the meetings are for. To hear the reminders. To remember it is not a little treat or indulgence. Experience, strength and hope, that’s what people’s stories are supposed to reflect if they are going to be the guest speaker. It was about my forth or fifth meeting, when they had an announcement, about a member who hadn’t been attending the meetings lately. He just wanted to call everyone’s attention to the bulletin board out in the hallway, that if they hadn’t seen it yet, there was a handwritten note with his name, that said, Died, February xx, 2005. He went on to explain, that he has been in contact with his friends, and his family was so angry they were refusing to claim his body at the morgue, so there would be no wake or funeral. His friends however, were trying to organize a memorial service. From all the stories that I’ve heard, there comes a point for everyone there, that despite their deepest core values, they start lying and stealing from friends, family, start selling drugs, or turning to other crimes, so support their habit. This is a route that I refuse to take. It’s bad enough that I have run through all the money I’ve made, refinanced and went through that too, and racked up all kinds of bills, and skipped the minor detail of income taxes, but I can at least say, I didn’t steal a dime of anyone’s money to do it, it was all my own. But this guy apparently had put his family through the mill and still couldn’t make it. I refuse to do that. I was ashamed to even be high in front of any of you, felt guilty to be late or to have to cancel, to drag any of you down or put you through the mill of doing everything to help, is unthinkable to me.

The meetings helped. It was a constant reminder of danger, or helping in reconditioning my mind to perceive and understand as danger, something that I perceived as fun. There was one particular guy who was most often the chairman of the meeting, though not the guest speaker. He had been three years or so without any drugs or alcohol. Before the guest speaker speaks, they begin each meeting with prayer or meditation, and then poll the room if anyone has a “burning desire” to speak. He raised his hand, and said that he got high 2 nights ago. I was shocked, three years drug-free, and now 2 nights. He went on to explain, that he had his coat on and had his key in hand about to lock the door, when the phone started ringing. It was someone he hadn’t spoken to in years, who wanted to get together and party. According to him, his mouth said yes before his brain could even take time to think, so he skipped the meeting and got high instead. I should have listened more closely and mulled it over. Much of recovery is learning what triggers you to get high. When you finish a lot of work and you feel a sense of accomplishment, the next thing you want is a reward. When you spend a day doing errands and are busy, it is then time to unwind and get high. When those triggers are acknowledged, you can take steps to avoid them, or plan ahead and recondition yourself. One of my big distractions was cooking. I took a new interest in that. Instead of getting high, today I’m going to make a great dinner and invite two friends over. It also helped to fill the large spans of boredom, which was the #1 enemy in staying sober. If you’re high, a day goes by quickly, or a week, or a whole summer, or a whole year. Towards the end of 90 days, I was just just then getting my ability to function back. When you damage your body for so long, it takes that long. The ability to concentrate on details, the ability to stick to your work after being reconditioned to a pattern of going where the wind takes you. I was trying desperately to be the old Eric again. I hoped for returning to the days of getting up at 5AM with all my work done by noon, and then finding something else to do, productively, for the afternoon. I still was a long way off from that.

I attained three months drug free. I have the little plastic chip in my pencil holder still, that says 90 days. I stood up and everyone clapped and I got a couple of hugs, As I walked out the front door and down the steps, some guy who was standing talking to his friend stopped his conversation, and asked “Eric right?” I said yes, he said, ‘Congratulations Eric, that 90 days is really great!”. I thanked him, and got in my car to go home. I thought it was really nice and supportive of him, but I didn’t feel pride. I was GLAD that I was at 90 days. All I could think to myself was, it’s a start. I could get up in the morning, I was taking an interest in friends I had neglected, actually had a little bit of motivation and hunger to finally push the business forward. Not out of obligation but finally from desire. I could watch television and follow what was going on. It felt good and I was glad, but not proud.

An hour after I got home, maybe two, the phone rang, and It was someone I used to hang out with wanting to see what my afternoon plans were. I tried to nicely (without talking down to him) explain that I hadn’t been doing that the last few months, and in fact, I didn’t have any drugs anyway, plus, all three dealers with whom I had done business, were all currently in jail. He said, “That’s ok, I’ve got plenty. Naturally, I said, well, what time can you be here?”.

That brings us down the road 11 more months and brings us to today.

I’ve exhausted my finances, crippled my cash flow, which has ground the business to a halt, and I don’t want to be witness to moving trucks and auctions, and watch my life be dismantled more than I’ve done myself.

This is a lifelong battle that I simply will not win.

I could inflict sadness, loss, and grief on the family today, or as an alternative, put you all through the mill for a couple of years, scrambling to be supportive, understanding, and doing everything you can do to help, only to then inflict the same sadness, loss, and grief. I could liquidate properties and pay bills, and I know and I know the money would all be wasted on drugs, and then I would be in the same position in a couple of years. At least today I feel I have a choice. I can feel that in the end, money will go to Fenway Community Health Center to assist those who need help.

I have no doubt that all of you would be there for me, 100%, fully understanding.

There is nothing in this letter that I consider too personal. It can be shared with any family member, friend, or relative, whether a close or distant relative, a close or long-lost friend. By sharing the experience, maybe it will get to someone, who needs to understand the reason behind the slogan for the new commercial.

Not Even Once

I can not believe, that I got to the end of this letter and failed to mention a couple of things. When I learned the details of this particular drug, it was already too late for me. I made it a point never to introduce it in the hands of others when I learned how dangerous it was. If they were already an experienced user, hanging out or not wouldn’t make a difference. Though before I knew the danger, it sickens me to remember, I did ask a friend if he’d like to try, and he did. That was in the spring of 2003. Later, in September 2003, I contacted him and he came over to have a long talk, and I apologized for doing that, and I explained to him everything, in embarrassing detail, how difficult it was for me to stop, including the tears for eight hours, and unable to get out of bed, the whole works. He assured me that he had suffered no effects, and I need not worry. I’ve seen him several times since, and he assures me that nothing ever came of it, but I to this day, still worry.

It takes a very keen eye to spot an crystal meth addict. Some people hide it better than others. The person who pushed it on me XXXXXx XXxx from Revere, I’d run over in the street if I saw him. It would take a while for me to realize, he was not a casual user, he was definitely a full fledged addict trying to cover up, (just like I did), but knowing the dangers first hand, saw fit to offer it to me. In fact, I did see him in September 2003, during my three weeks of good behavior, and told him what I had just gone through. Though I gave no hints to how I felt on the inside, he had the nerve to get all upset and say, “Well, I hope you’re not blaming me.” I blame him for what he did. I blame myself for what I did. He was in financial trouble, and went to Ted to refinance. I haven’t spoken to him since, but Ted mentioned one day that his house burned down. My guess is, he probably burned it down rather than have to explain to his family and friends why he would instead sell a house that he loved so much. It’s only speculation of course, but people go to great lengths to cover up things that they are ashamed of. If he is still alive, and can be tracked down, he should be first on the list to get a copy of this.