Deferred: Addiction to Admission

my name is sha row I'm 37 years old I'm a student here at the University of Montana I am also a former inmate of the Department of Corrections I was introduced to methamphetamine at the age of 12 years old I didn't even know it at the time but I was well on my way to prison before I ever actually made it there I think the things that led up to that were a combination of a bunch of different things like my envir environment um of course drug use trying to fit in and low self-esteem kind of I was an instant addict 12 13 years old I was scraping marijuana pipes trying to get as much resin on them as I could you know getting metal shavings out of them and putting them in a pipe and just hoping that there was enough resin on these metal shavings to get one hit and give me a head change and I was so young I didn't really know what was happening at that time but uh I was already well on my way into a a pretty nasty addiction to drug those are pictures of me when I hit the intake unit at the at MSP starting at the top left and all the way to the bottom right from in chronological order there um one at the top I was 20 years old and down the bottom I think I was 32 when he was younger he was great I mean he was on the honor role he was very smart kid very funny and we were like like this and then he got into the drugs my nephew gave him some drugs some meth when he was 12 we lived in Clinton and in Missoula here I think till was sophomore you're in high school and then we moved to Missoula I didn't know about it for years you know he Sean never told me and I didn't everybody told me he's on meth you know and I'm going oh no he's not I was in denial about it because I didn't see you know any difference in him really except that he didn't kind of got bored with school and and the guys the kids he was hanging around with I wasn't thrilled about but there was not not much I could do about that Sean's dad lived in Jackson at the time that sea started doing the math and stuff we had split up when sha was about six his dad was a very hardcore alcoholic and very B want him iung hung with a lot of older kids and we lived in a small town outside of Missoula in a trailer court so there was a lot of poverty um not a lot to do and we just kind of were doing stuff to get in trouble to past the time you know I actually ended up being convicted of my first felony at the age of 14 years old um I went on to be convicted of another felony at the age of 17 so before I even turned 18 years old I was already a convicted two-time convicted felon I was in shock that the first thing that happened that the cops came to my house about was they had stolen a car and took it into Missoula and then I I found out they stole other things and a Truck in a boat or something too but his friend didn't say him and every he said he just did that by himself but I found out later through another friend that Sean was involved in all of that and I just was I couldn't believe he'd do something like [Music] that at that time I still didn't really realize what I was getting myself into for me looking back on it I know like I knew what I was doing at the time was illegal per se but it didn't really feel wrong to me which is something that stuck with me throughout my adult years too I it just kind of was like the way things were and it's what we did I've been through the state prison system four different times spent a little over 12 years there all together um I was in Act of addiction for drugs and alcohol for over 22 years I didn't like my life I didn't like my life for most of my life I would say um I didn't really know that there was any other way for me I remember my third time that I was incarcerated I spent about 4 and a half years straight in there at one point in time in my life when I was incarcerated I lost any hope that I was ever going to be able to make it out of that life at all I thought that i' been the way that I was for so long that there was no way out of it when you're sitting in prison you don't ever see anybody that makes it we just sitting there and we watch people come and go and come and go and for me personally I got it in my head that nobody ever makes it everybody always comes back there's no way out of this I didn't really have any desire to change or wasn't really going to try to change because I surrendered myself to my addiction and the criminality and all that long ago um so I knew that I wasn't done doing what I did and I got out and I was out for about 45 days and I went right back on another felony and when I went back on that felony you know I was sitting in jail and I just kept thinking to myself like I don't want to be here anymore I'm sick of being here and it wasn't even just being in jail I was talking about it like I was just sick of being alive and I was sick of hurting all the time and I was sick of hurting people I was sick of hurting myself I was sick of hurting my family and I I just didn't know what to do you know and I made a decision there that I was going to sit there and do whatever amount of time I had to do for you know what I had done that time and when I got out I was going to really give it a shot to try to change and at the time I didn't even really know if that was an option for me honestly I didn't you know I was going to try but I didn't know how to go about doing it or didn't even know if it was something that I was working towards that was a real thing so you know I made a PR that promise to myself when this is over I'll give you one more shot and then you know I pretty much decided if if I came back again I was just going to commit suicide because like I said I was just sick of being there the one thing that gave me a little bit of Hope was I heard somebody that had a story similar to mine um they'd been where I had been they'd been in active addiction for as long as I'd been an act of addiction and they had made it out of it and that was something I'd never heard before and that gave me just that little bit of hope I couldn't remember the last time i' built any kind of Hope at all I was like I'm going to next he says all right BR I'll see you next time oh [ __ ] that [Music] sucks at the end of that prison St I ended up going to a impatient treatment facility for the first time in my life um while I was there a few different things happened to me um one I was able to get clean because when I was in prison I couldn't stop using drugs for the life of me they were around all over the place and if I had access to them I could not stop myself from using them and that's another thing that I struggled with was I didn't even know if it was ever going to be possible for me ever to stop using drugs because I've been obsessed with getting high since the age of 12 you know it was like a habit that was ingrained in me and I just I just couldn't see me ever not wanting to like even though I wanted to stop a lot of times most of the time like I couldn't see myself ever not thinking about it and obsessing over it so you know I kind of started doing some spiritual stuff while I was in there trying to find something to believe in you know what I mean something something bigger than myself and bigger than this world to believe in because myself and what I'd seen in this world there wasn't a whole lot there to go off of and I needed something more than that and uh I kind of started to develop a relationship with a higher power and it came to the point where I knew that I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life or what I should do with my life so I kind of just surrendered that to the higher power you know I said you know I don't know what to do so show me what I'm supposed to be doing why I'm here show me a reason to stay here even I was relieved I was so happy and I was just praying to God it work and it did I was shocked because I have a nephew that's been three times and he's back in jail again right now and I know other people that have been through treatment and back on it you know two months later so I I was praying to God at work for him and it did while I was in that treatment facility um I met a man who became a really good friend of mine um when he was moved into my room he was trying to do his first assignment and I realized that he didn't know how to read so I decided you know maybe I should try to help this guy learn how to read at least a little bit and uh I tried real hard and he tried real hard um I did not do the best job I'm not a very good teacher but I tried and he tried we both tried real hard you know and that meant a lot to him and I could see that and he told me one time and this is something that stuck with me and changed a lot about how I think thought about myself and just the world in general um he was asking me do you have any kids and I don't have any children I was like no I don't have any kids man and he said you should have some kids man because you got a lot to offer and that really stuck with me and from that point out I knew that I wanted to do something to try to help other people in some way and I knew at that point too that it was going to be something to do with people who were in my position who had been where i' had been and who were struggling because helping that man with his reading helped me to you know I got that the feeling of what it feels like to help help somebody who's struggling and I know what it's like to be struggling so uh I made it through that program and uh it was one of the things that I always struggled with getting back out to the streets was a sense of belonging like when I was incarcerated it wasn't hard for me to make friends um I always had a bunch of friends I got a bunch of validation for the kind of crimes I would commit um I felt like I mattered in there to people I guess you could say and then I get out here to streets to the streets and I've been gone for so long that I didn't even really know anybody in my hometown anymore didn't know where anybody was at and I felt like a nobody out here and that's some that's kind of a hard thing to deal with where you go from being with a bunch of people who are your friends that care about you care what you got going on in your life then you go to somewhere where you're nobody and nobody cares what's going on with you or who you are or any of that I knew a lot about Sean's history before before we met I did not hold it against him in any way because I have a history myself um I'm a convicted felon I got a felon DUI in 2010 so I have my stuff too and um it actually attracted me to him more to know that like he'd been through all of that and has been able to overcome it CU I know that takes a really strong person I've been clean from Fentanyl and meth I mean I was addicted to everything but I've been clean for about 15 months it was not easy for me to get clean it I've been to rehab 15 times I definitely thought I was going to die I ODed four times I was living on the streets in California it was very serious I'm really happy that I came out the other side he reached out to me on Facebook we had a lot of mutual friends um who are mainly in recovery so I think he could tell that I was probably in recovery and he sent me a message and we started talking and went on our first date about a week later I feel like he motivates me and inspires me every day he's the only um person I've ever been with who I really truly believe he helps me be the best version of myself that I could be and you know my family sees that my friends see that it's very obvious to everybody around us that we balance each other out and this is healthy we share so many of the same passions and we have just a lot in common you know so when I'm down he can really help kind of lift me up and it's definitely been instrumental in my recovery to be with somebody who understands and who just motivates me [Music] I go to 12-step meetings for to deal with my addiction that's the only way I've been able to stay clean it's been a huge change in my life and through those meetings I found a support group too of people who I hadn't been incarcerated with people who would be a bad influence on me you know because get out and you start hanging out with your friends from prison like I did every other time and it doesn't take long for us to go back to doing the same thing that we used to do together you know we feed off of each other in that kind of aspect and so I found a support group a of new people that I needed to meet that I had at least some common ground with I wouldn't per se I wouldn't say that I felt really comfortable around these people but I felt more comfortable with them than I did when I was in a store or talking to other people because I had that common ground with them of we struggle with the disease of addiction um I kept going to meetings I when I was in pre-release I made a resignation to the fact that I was going to use it for what it was for I was going to use it to save up money to get a job to reintegrate myself back into society and more than anything to build myself a daily routine that worked for me while I was in there and then when I got out of there to continue on with that routine because I had never lived as a responsible adult in the real world at all never paid my own bills never had my own place I had my own car a couple times but that was all through ill gotten gains and I never really I'm 35 years old and I'm still a little kid also while I was in pre-lease I decided that if I was going to go on to do what I was trying to do to try to help other people that were in my position that I was going to have to get some sort of Education because nobody was going to care what I had to say if I didn't have a reason for them to listen to me I felt like so I applied for school here at the University for somebody with a felony record there is a very rigid screening process that you go through they want to know everything that you've ever done um all your convictions the circumstances surrounding it they want letters of recommendation they want references they want all you know there's a lot that goes into it [Music] and my record is I think atrocious would be a good word for it um I have nine felony convictions just as an adult um like I said I've spent over a third of my life incarcerated very little time out here on the streets I didn't graduate from high school I had a GED they told me no the first time I applied here they gave me what's called a deferred admission they wanted me to to spend another year out here on the streets to prove you know following laws following the conditions of Probation and Parole being a productive member of society to prove that I was sincere about my want to change and I was disappointed at first but I didn't let it get me down and like cuz before it didn't take much to get me to just give up you know what I mean that was that was myo things didn't go how I wanted them to out here things got a little too hard I just give up and go back to where it was easy and and uh I knew I couldn't do that this time I didn't have another one of those stints in me I didn't have another chance to go in there and try to make it out again I just didn't have that in me anymore so I knew that I couldn't give up no matter what I knew I had to be done with that life and stick to that and not give up on trying to build a new life no matter what so I waited that year I followed all the rules of preparation and parole didn't break any laws I stayed clean off drugs and alcohol and I reapplied and they admitted me into school [Music] that was a big deal for me I was pretty proud of myself um and a lot of people that I knew were proud of me too like people couldn't believe the change that they seen in me I couldn't believe in myself like I said it was less than a year ago I didn't even believe that I could stay clean off drugs or stay out of prison never mind start going to college so when I came here I decided I was going to major in Psychology and minor in license Addiction Counseling that way I can get to to a point where not only can I counsel people with drug and alcohol problems also I want to try to figure out a way to help people recover from being institutionalized because not enough attention is given to how much that really affects somebody like that profoundly affects a person when they spend long you don't have to necessarily be long terms of incarceration just incarceration period profoundly affects people the way they think the way they deal with their emotions all that and it's it's something that needs there needs to be more attention paid to that and there needs to be more solutions on what we can do to help people to recover from that and that's one of the biggest reasons why I'm majoring in Psychology um I am in a position today that I never ever thought I would be in um I've been out for about 2 years now and I have accomplished more in this last two years and I'm not even saying this like figuratively like I've literally accomplished more in this last two years than I have been my whole entire life and I'm about to turn 37 years old so that's a big deal for me and the best thing about it is I'm just barely getting started this is just the beginning I'm an only child for my mother I'm her only son um her only child period and it broke her heart so much to see me repeatedly going in over and over and over again to watch me go through the addiction for so long and just how proud of me she is I'm so proud of him I let know all the time look at him straight A's on the Dean's List you know I mean I knew he could do it cuz he always was smart I lost my father when I was incarcerated and I'll never forget when I got that obituary and it lists family members and it said his son Shawn of Glendive and I'm not from Glendive the reason why it said Glendive was cuz there's a prison Glen that I was sitting in at that time and that had like a huge effect on me you know what I mean like my Dad's obituary and here I am listed as being in a prison and then also when I went to that treatment facility my mom got a kidney infection and she almost died when I was there and ever since I lost my dad it was like a a constant fear you know what I mean that that same thing was going to happen with my mother and it almost did happen and that was also another thing that motivated me a lot more because like just the reality that when I go in there life doesn't stop out here I last year went to his grave site for the first time since I had a chance to you know and he died back in 2014 it took me almost 8 years to actually make it there and I had my three years of sobriety coin and I was able to put it on his Tombstone or the grave site you know and have a little conversation with him to say I'm here you know I did it so I mean it means the world to me I know it'd be proud of [Music] me

Channel: Montana Kaimin

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Id: d1nU6RgYDPU

Length: 23min 21sec (1401 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 25 2024