As a child, I remember being in the hospital and loving the feeling of morphine. I left there wanting to find that feeling again and I would say that’s where my story began.
I started partying in high school and told myself that anything but hard drugs were socially acceptable to try, but at 17 I did heroin for the first time. Sadly, I didn’t really know that much about it.
The addiction had me instantly.
I ended up dropping out of school and threw all of my goals and ambitions out the window.
At 19, I finally admitted to my mom what was going on. My mom went into crisis mode and sent me to stay with my cousins in California for help. Without permission I left my cousins, returned to Reno and was arrested as soon as I got back into town.
At 22, I had a new boyfriend and we did a lot of drugs together. The cops were starting to know me, and I was in and out of jail several times with 7 different felony charges. The last time I was behind bars I couldn’t sleep the first 4 weeks because my body was going through detoxification and I was so uncomfortable.
While waiting for my court date, my attorney told me I had a 50/50 chance of going to prison.
For the first time, I was really scared.
I begged the judge for help. The judge agreed and sent me to drug court, which is what saved my life. I got clean and was feeling good about it especially since I hadn’t been clean since I was 13. I connected with my boyfriend again while I was in drug court and I ended up pregnant. My maternal instincts knew I needed to stay clean throughout my pregnancy for the baby, so I did.
Six months after I gave birth I relapsed, and drug court sent me to STEP2.
I had to leave my son with his dad which was the hardest thing to do. I hated myself for relapsing because drugs consumed me, and I wasn’t the mom I wanted to be. The staff and the other girls here have given me a beautiful support group.
I love STEP2 and have only good things to say about it.
