oh it's the life story entry....
07/12/2005, 03:01

When I was approaching twenty, I went into a rehabilitation centre for three weeks. This was because - though I vehemently denied it at the time - I was a drug addict.

I was staying with my aunt and uncle at the time. My parents were staying at the home of an elderly relative who was very ill, and sadly, she passed away while my parents were there.

Back then, I was living the partydude lifestyle. I was out nearly all the time, going to pubs and clubs, getting stoned on all kinds of drugs, then crashing at the homes of people I met and taking yet more drugs in the hope that I would always be having a good time.

I arrived at my aunt and uncles house about ten am one morning, and from the moment I walked in the front door I could sense something was wrong.

Intent on crashing out and having a mammoth sleep - I had, as I recall been up about twenty or so hours - I resolved to get whatever confrontation that was about to occur out of the way. Silly fool...

My aunt and uncle were always very jolly people, and I associated their house (which is huge and provided great adventure when I was a young dude) with happy times, as it always seemed to be full of smiling, kind, laughing people. That day however, they both looked anxious and exhausted. A massive stash of various drugs was on the coffee table in front of them, and even then, the realisation that they had found my not very well hidden stash only caused me to think "Shit, now I'm gonna have to get some more stuff," rather than to feel shame and horror at being caught with a large quantity of illegal substances in a house where I was a guest.

They were naturally very upset, and after a few (quite justified) yells and harshly phrased questions, they calmed down, and were clearly worried about me, and set about trying to get to the bottom of why I was abusing myself in this way.

I was flippant, and sarcastic as I batted vague, empty, substanceless answers toward their many questions. I cursed, I denied, I yelled. My aunt started crying, and my uncle, a very intelligent, caring man, was not allowing me to sweep this under the carpet.

He dragged me to his doctor, and we sat in the waiting room in silence, until I could be squeezed in to the days appointments.

Once inside the doctor's room, my uncle explained to the doctor what he had found, about how I was up all night, slept erratically, was as thin as a rake (every cloud, etc... I wish I still was) and had gone from being this happy-go-lucky dude to someone who could barely raise a smile. I sat there throughout this whole exchange, giving monosyllabic answers and sneering at the people who wanted to help me.

The conversation took a turn toward rehabilitation centres. My uncle and aunt worked all day, and couldn't keep an eye on me (like fuck you would anyway, I thought. As soon as I get out of this surgery I am away, dude) and my uncle thought this was a good idea. I remember allowing these comments to break through the facade of Mr. SuperToughDude I had put up around myself. I sat there open-mouthed. I wasn't going into some fucking shithole where I sat round discussing my childhood with faux-sympathetic fuckers nodding and scribbling down my life story.

However, salvation came for me when the doctor explained to my uncle that places in these sorts of centres were very hard to come by on the National Health Service. I could be waiting months, he said, to my delight. Unless of course my uncle was willing to pay for me to attend a centre privately.

HA! Like the old bugger is going to cough up, I thought smugly.

Wrong. My uncle said he was fully prepared to do that, and with astonishing speed (pardon the pun) a place was secured for me at a centre thirty miles from my uncles town. (I would later be even more gobsmacked when I found out that the cost of my three week "vacation" cost just over �20,000 - about $32,000 for my dear US readers.)

Well fuck it, I thought. I might as well go away to the countryside and enjoy a nice three week break. Besides, it was bound to be like prison, no? Drugs freely available, if you were willing to pay. It would be easy, a piece of piss.

I was confined to barracks for the next three days, while I waited to go on my holidays, as I called it. I screamed and yelled and said some filthy things, in the hope that my uncle would throw me out of the house, and want nothing more to do with me, but to no avail. Instead, I spent most of the time in bed, feeling sick, tired and empty, as for the first time in ages, my body had to cope without artificial stimulation.

My suitcase was loaded into the car, and my aunt hugged me and wished me good luck, said that she would come and see me as soon as possible. I told her to go fuck herself, and let my arms hang loosely by my sides while she gripped me tightly.

We arrived at the centre about eight or nine am on the Monday morning. It was like a beautiful mansion, surrounded by high walls, with a security guard at the front gate vetting the incoming traffic. Once in the reception area, I was seated, and given a cup of flavourless tea while my uncle went off to have a discussion with a consultant dude behind closed doors.

A while later, my uncle came back and I stood up, was made to sign some papers, and without so much as a glance at the man who so desperately wanted his nephew to get well, I was led to a doctors office where I was made to give a blood and urine sample. Hell, I can handle this shit, I thought to myself, forcing a rockerdude swagger. I was going to fuck these guys over. Help me? Nah. They were only in it for the money, I knew that. You won't catch me revealing all in tear filled storytellings, you won't make me become one of you. I smiled at the doctor, a smile that said "Fuck you, fucker. You wanna fight? This one's on me." Yeah, I was so tough. Mentally and physically. Come near me with your needles and your electrodes and you'll be fucked up the arse with your own thermometer.

The doctor dude asked me a series of questions, that ran something like this:

Doctordude: So, smash, do you know why you are here?

Smash: Well, my mummy fucked my daddy, and bingo! Mr. Smash was born.

The doctordude just gave me that patient "When you're ready stare."

Smash: Presumably because my paranoid aunt and uncle think I have a problem with drugs, which I don't, by the way, but let's just say I could do with a rest so I thought I'd run with it for now. If I don't like it though, I'll just fuck off and leave.

Doctordude: Oh, I wouldn't think so.

Smash: What the fuck?

Doctordude: I have here (he brandishes some paper) a form which you have signed, all of half an hour ago, to say that you will stay here for twenty-one days.

Smash: So?

Doctordude: We can also get an injunction to stop you from leaving us, if we decide it is necessary.

Smash: So fuck it, then. I'll stay three weeks. The rest will do me good.

Doctordude: It won't be easy. You will be expected to attend therapy sessions with other inmates, you will also be afforded certain responsibilities once you have proved that you can cope with them.

Smash: What?

Doctordude: You will help out with cooking meals, cleaning the rooms and various other chores.

Smash: I hope you pay at least minimum wage.

And so on. I deflected his questions about various things, not just relating to my habit. He asked about how I treated people, and what sort of people I associated with, where I went and how I spent my time.

A cup of tea and some biscuits later, and I was introduced to the eight people in my "group" that I would be spending the next three weeks with.

I was overwhelmed to find out that the treatment centre wasn't just for people who were drug addicts (though of course at this point I was so in denial I was convinced I was soooooo not an addict) it also housed alcoholics, food addicts, sex addicts, gambling addicts, whatever you could get addicted to, they catered for it here. I now know it's because of the type of counselling they offered, where they dug deeply to find the reason for your addiction, that allowed them to rehabilitate a person with any addiction.

The inmates were very friendly, and from all walks of life. I have always been a lucky dude, my parents may not have been swimming in money, but I never went without anything, and some of my relatives are very well off, and have treated me well. The ones I get on with at least, hehe.

But some of the people there were very poor. As I got to know them I discovered that some of them had had awful lives, and been in and out of centres such as this one for years. Some had been to prison, some had been totally rejected by their families. At the time I didn't give a rats fuck, but now that I can think about it with a clear head, rationally, I can see that I was one lucky dude.

I was introduced to everyone by a dude named Simon. He showed me the ropes, and again I adopted my metaldude swagger and acted like I didn't give a fuck. But inside I was beginning to feel unsettled. How did it all get so serious all of a sudden? One minute I was out every hour of the day, partying, drinking, taking drugs and having a great time, the next I was in a treatment centre being told I had a serious addiction. But I banished those thoughts from my mind and continued to act cool.

Simon showed me round the place, and I have to admit, aesthetically it was very nice. There was a large dining room, just like school, where the four groups got together to eat, and a library, a television room, a games room where they had computers, a pool table, table football, and board games. There was also a large room that was used for visitors, (who were only allowed in at weekends) which had a lovely view of the gardens. It was spoiled somewhat by the very high wall surrounding the building, but I suppose, in a way, that was the point.

My room was tiny, and I shared it with a dude named Steve. Steve was ten years older than me, and was also at the centre for drugs addiction. He had been there five days, and to be frank, looked like shite. He was quiet and withdrawn, but polite nonetheless.

After lunch I was thrown straight in to a group session with our counsellor, Yvonne. Yvonne was a tough cookie, I suppose you'd have to be to do that job. It was very cliched, I thought back then. We sat in a circle, and listened to Yvonne bitch and dig her way into someones life, and we were encouraged to offer opinions or ask questions, which was cool with me. It was like having your very own episode of Ricki Lake or Jerry Springer played out before your eyes, (but without the trailer-park trash, sadly.)

Tentative enquiries led to the disappointing realisation that drugs were not available in any shape or form in the place. Visitors and inmates were searched upon admission, and if anyone was found with so much as a mild painkiller, they were thrown out immediately, without any argument.

The counsellor was not happy that I had made my uncle agree not to tell my parents. Despite being fucked up I didn't want them rushing back up the country to be greeted by the soul destroying sight of their youngest son fucking up his life so badly. I owed them so much more than that, and threatened to get the fuck out of there somehow if they contacted them. So Yvonne agreed not to.

I was actually quite enjoying myself, in a strange kind of way, until it got to (I think) the Wednesday of my first week. It appeared that in our morning group session I was to be the focus of attention.

I hope you will understand, readers, that some of this stuff, while not particularly painful to write about anymore, is something that still touches me deeply, and whilst I am ashamed I ever got into this state, I no longer feel embarrassed or ashamed to admit it, when necessary. Just accept that I am a very different dude now to the dude I was then. I will also attempt to keep the snippets of conversation as accurate as possible, but I was ill and coming down from drugs at the time, so they may not be worded with total accuracy, but the events are true, and I will combine more than one session into this dialogue, to save boring you yet further with more, hehe.

Yvonne: Smash, you are a drug addict.

Smash: Yeah? Am I fuck.

Yvonne: It wasn't a question. You are a drug addict. But we can help you overcome that.

Smash: Oh good. I was so fuckin' worried you wouldn't be able to.

Yvonne: I know you are putting all your energy into denying your addiction, and into not breaking down in front of me. But you will. I can promise you that much. But play your game a little longer, if you must. But will you answer me some questions.

Smash: Seeing as you asked so nicely, Little Miss Fuckin' Head Fuck.

Yvonne: Thank you. I notice you have what you might call an unconventional appearance.

Smash: (laughs) Oh yeah.

Yvonne: I mean, you have long hair, you favour t-shirts with graphic images, you have an earring. Do you like to draw attention to yourself?

Smash: I'm a metaldude, it's the way I look. I don't do it for some token fuckin' reaction, if that's what you're getting at.

In later sessions, she carried on with this theme, and continued to extract further information from me. This was about a week or so into my stay, and yeah, I became very tired, and with the absence of anything to give me a high, I was feeling lower than ever, and my defences were beginning to desert me.

Yvonne: So, we have established that you look different to what you call "the norm." Does that mean you think you're abnormal?

Smash: In a way, possibly.

Yvonne: Why?

Smash: Well, I was always the tallest dude in the school, you know, by a mile. And I got stared at, and called names, and pointed at on the street. I still do now, sometimes. But I guess it bothered me when I was younger and wanted to fit in with the crowd.

Yvonne: That must have been difficult. What did you do about it?

Smash: Well, I would go drinking with other metaldudes in the pub, they didn't really care about things like height and stuff. And another group of people I hung out with, well all we were interested in was stealing cars and getting stoned. When you are sat round stoned with a group of people watching TV or playing games, nothing really matters then. But I suppose I always craved some form of anonymity.

Yvonne: And drugs were instrumental to that feeling of anonymity?

Smash: They definitely played a part in it. My family life was good, my mother and father never really said much about my appearance, they were used to me being tall, and knew I liked metal music, so they weren't concerned or bothered when I got into that scene. I guess I've always been into stuff that some other people aren't in to. I never went in for sports, and in my teenaged years I didn't get on with my father too well, he's into sports in a big way. We just had nothing in common. I resented the fact he favoured my older brother, though now I know it was purely that he had more common interests with him, rather than him loving me any less. But for a while I thought he just didn't want anything to do with his tall, goofy son.

Yvonne: Would you say you are an aggressive person?

Smash: No, not really. I've got into the occasional fight, but usually only to defend one of my buddies, or if someone picked a fight with me. I work out any anger I feel by moshing to metal, or these days, dosing myself up with some shit.

Yvonne: You mean drugs?

Smash: Yeah, drugs.

Yvonne: What do you see when you look in the mirror?

Smash: A tall, silly dude.

Yvonne: You mention your height a lot. Even though you are out of school, does it still bother you?

Smash: To some degree, though not like it did when I first started.

Yvonne: Started...?

Smash: Getting stoned.

Despite Yvonne's delving into my past, and my uncomfortableness regarding my height, I still wouldn't admit to having a problem, being an addict. As I began to feel physically better with my now cleaner body relishing it's new status, I conserved more energy for deflecting Yvonne's, and the other inmates, questions.

Then Yvonne decided, in another counselling session, that she would drag my girlfriend, Joanne, in. I was in love with Joanne, I think properly in love. Drugs and relationships do not go together well, but despite my love of all things dope-related, I found a huge space in my heart for loving her, though I didn't deserve her. Not then. Again, we sat in front of the group, and I was mortified to hear my failings talked about in front of everyone.

Yvonne: Joanne, would you say Smash is a good boyfriend?

Joanne: Sometimes he's very loving towards me. He can be very kind, yet he's unreliable and gets into these moods.

Yvonne: Unreliable? How?

Joanne: Well, he stands me up on dates. I really look forward to seeing him, and then he won't even call to say he isn't going to be there, and I get to the pub or wherever, and end up looking like a fool.

Yvonne: Smash?

Smash: Yeah, well okay, occasionally I didn't meet you, but...

Joanne: It was more than just occasionally!

Smash: Oh you're jut blowing it all out of fucking proportion. You always were a miserable fuck.

Yvonne: Let's stop the insults, Smash. Joanne, do you use drugs yourself?

Joanne: I used to smoke the occasional joint with Smash, but other than that, no.

Yvonne: Did his drug taking bother you?

Joanne: It did when I found out how much he took, he tried to hide it from me at first. But then when he stopped turning up for dates and came to my house stoned or drunk, I realised he had a problem. He used to embarrass me in front of my parents.

Yvonne: How?

Joanne: Oh, he'd make nasty comments to my parents, tell them we were just going upstairs to "fuck." That kind of thing. Just to shock them. He used to be nasty to my friends as well. Just for a laugh. Then he started being nasty to me, saying he was fucking other girls. (She started crying here, I believe, and just for the record, I never did cheat on her, or on any girl I've dated. I was just being a twat.) He'd come over for dinner, and then just walk out saying he had to go somewhere. I knew it would be to buy or take drugs with his friends.

Yvonne: How did this make you feel?

Joanne: Like crap. I knew he wasn't good for me, but I loved him, I knew he was a kind and loving person underneath and I just wanted that side of Smash all the time. I still love him now.

Smash: Oh no you fucking don't. You just want some fucking dude that you can change, so you can say to the world "Hey look! I changed him, aren't I great?" You're a fucking arsehole, and I don't fucking love you, probably never did. Shut the fuck up and go and let some other dude stick his dick into you. You disgust me.

The situation naturally became rather heated, and Joanne left, in floods of tears. I knew I had been such a disgusting bastard. In all my life I have never regretted anything more than those things I said to Joanne. I was close to tears myself. I had just cruelly disregarded the feelings of the one person (outside my family) who loved me enough to come to what must have seemed to be an awful place and unwrap her life in front of total strangers. But I wasn't let off lightly. Yvonne came back and goaded me and made me feel so shit until I finally broke down.

She read a letter from my buddy Adam, who never in his life touched anything other than alcohol. It did not make happy reading. It told how I let people down, thought only of taking shit, pushed him away when he tried to help me, and generally painted me as shithead all round. If I didn't stop using stuff, he said, then as much as he didn't want to, he wasn't going to be my buddy anymore. I raged and cried and yelled, trying to take all this information in at once. Not being friends with Adam would be like waking up without your arm. We had been friends for so long.

Unwelcome realisations flooded me. I began to see, with Yvonne's incessant questioning and opinions, that what I was doing was not normal. It wasn't good, it wasn't clever, it wasn't cool. I was a fucked up son of a bitch who basically didn't give a fuck about anyone, including himself.

Yes. I was an addict.

Once I'd realised this fact, I became so angry, which apparently is quite normal. Why me? I asked. Why anyone? Yvonne said. Through tears of rage and impotent frustration we worked out that I could be an addict for any number of reasons. But it didn't matter why. Not really. We identified why I was an addict, low self-esteem, fear of rejection due to being a tall freak, as I called myself. I was desperate to fit in and went along too easily with things. but I could change, apparently. I just had to want to.

And by the beginning of my third week, I found I did want to. I was so, so tired of pretending, of hiding the guilt I felt at fucking people over. I began to see that happiness wasn't in a drug, it was in my head, it was what I did personally that gave me a sense of self worth, of contentment. But it was going to be hard work. I had fought for so long against my demons, and I was going to have to learn new ways of responding to pain and other negative things.

In my time there I laid the foundations to giving myself a better life. It sounds cliched I know, but bloody hell, I had to change. I brimmed over with happiness at the fact that I had had the good fortune to be given a second chance. I could have died, anytime I swallowed a pill or put powder up my nose. I could have been hit by a truck, I could have had my head pounded in a fight.

But I hadn't.

I was still here and I was going to make the most of it. I cooked breakfasts, I cleaned rooms with a sense of purpose and felt happy, just like the old Smash did. I bounced around listening to metal, I talked to people, and told them my story, and gave them a little bit of hope so that they could get through it too.

The day I left, Yvonne took me into her office for a final chat. I apologised for being such a fucker, and she waved away my apologies with a dismissive hand. She was pleased, she said, that things had worked out, and that I was hopeful for my future, whilst pointing out that the long road lay ahead. I was off drugs now, but would I stay off them? I told her I would, and somehow, I really don't know how, I just knew that I would not go back on drugs. She told me that I was a tough case and that she had actually worried I was going to be a failure, but she smiled when I told her she had another point to chalk up on her scoreboard.

And with that I was out. There were tearful hugs and kisses with my aunt and uncle, and many thanks bestowed upon them. They were happy, but still worried that I might go back to my old ways. I promised them I wouldn't, and I meant it, so much. And I never did. I even gave up drinking for three months just to prove I could do without it. (I seriously don't ever think I could become an alcoholic, the hangovers are far worse than any come-downs I ever experienced with drugs, hehe.)

So there we go, the happy ending. Almost.

Readers of my diary will know from a previous entry that I met Joanne earlier this year, after not seeing her since I came out of the centre. For some stupid reason, she forgave me, and we hugged and she cried (okay, I cried too, but tell anyone and I will kill you.) So, I'm one of the luckiest fuckers that ever walked this earth. And don't think I don't thank my lucky stars every day for it.

If you have managed to get to the end of this entry without falling asleep, or crying tears of frustration, thank you. There was lots more happened in the centre, but it would make the entry longer, and I put in all the juicy bits for your entertainment. I know at the end of the day I'm just a gas mashin' rockerdude, but I'm as happy as a pig in shit, and couldn't ask for more.

Thank you for reading this, people. I hope you don't mind that spilled my guts on what was undoubtedly the most difficult part of my life. I'm proud of myself, pleased as fuck to have great family and friends who helped me, and, if you'll allow me the requisite schmaltzy moment, I really hope that anyone who reads this story finds the same contentment.

Goodnight.

Smash xxx