"It just starts with a couple small steps."
“Life in active addiction, for me…it was hell, to be honest. It was a very lonely place,” says Chris.
“The first time I tried drugs, I did them every single day after for years. It filled some part of my soul that I didn’t know I was looking to fill and took hold of me. And the issues that came from that came very quickly.”
Over time, his addiction isolated him. “The longer I was in active addiction…friends were disappearing. I was pushing everyone that loved me out of my life. I used to think my daughter and all these people would be better off on the other side of me being gone. They didn’t know the struggles internally that I’m going through. Especially in the industries that I work in, tough guy bravado is just part of it. So, the man shows up to work, he outworks everyone - we don’t need to know much more than that. Meanwhile, internally, my soul is degrading and my mental health is suffering. Yeah, it’s no way to live a life, that’s for sure.”
For Chris, deciding to make a change was terrifying, because in some ways he felt comfortable in his addiction. “Because as bad as all the thoughts I was having, the life I was used to-it’s comfort. I was comfortable with chaos and suicidal thinking all the time. I knew that. I think I just decided, I’m going to give this one last go, and I’m going to go all in.”
Chris looked for help and learned to accept care from others. “I reached in a drawer, and there’s this old phone list. It was ratted and dirty and tattered. I called the very first number on that phone that I saw. Told him, I got no car, I’m desperate, I’m in a really bad place in life. I remember walking outside my house, and he took me to my first two meetings, and I remember walking out and being like ‘I have no clue who this guy is.’ But these people kept showing up around me that like generally felt like they cared. And I had to step back a little bit and allow these people to love me for a little while.”
“Life these days is nice. My relationship with my daughter is in the best place it’s ever been.”, Chris says. “I sit back sometimes in kind of amazement on the amount of things that have changed over the last couple of years for me.”
“You don’t need to suffer. Just start the path. Take one step in that direction. It turns into a couple miles over time and you’re far from where you were. But it just starts with a couple small steps.”