Oxycontin

OXYCONTIN

Oxycontin doesn’t seem that bad. When I first started doing it, at 16, no one really knew much about it. It was just a pill, and it didn’t carry the negative connotation that came with crack or heroin. That’s why it is so easy to get caught up in it – you didn’t feel like you were doing anything wrong. Because it came in pill form, produced by a company, it couldn’t be like doing heroin, which we all grew up knowing was the worst thing you could do. I found out later, you could use oxy and heroin interchangeably. It didn’t matter which one you did because they felt exactly the same.The stories you hear aren’t true. You don’t become addicted the first time you try. You don’t wake up the day after the first time craving for it. It’s a slow, gradual process, which is worse because you don’t realize what the fuck is happening to you. For a while, you just do it when it’s around. Then you start asking friends for it when the topic is brought up. And then you start actively seeking it out. The time frame all depends on the person; mine took several years. Before you know it, you go from buying pills from a friend to driving 2 hours one-way to some city, buying them off a guy on the corner. Stuff you never could imagine yourself doing when you were younger.The worst part about the drug, no matter how horrible it makes you feel, no matter how much money you wasted on it, no matter how much family you let down by doing it, it keeps drawing you back in. It’s hard to describe the pain of withdrawal. I’ve never really been able to talk about it. I’ve felt the vomiting uncontrollably, the shakes, and still I wouldn’t be able to tell you truthfully that I will never do it again. That is the worst part about it, it never leaves you. You remember how good you felt when doing it and somehow that makes you forget about the bad.You know when you’re buying something from a store, first you stop and think if you really need it, then you think about the price. Not with a drug like this. There is nothing stopping you from spending every cent you ever had. Nothing will stop you from getting it. You wouldn’t go into a hotel room you knew the cops were watching unless you needed the drug. Your rationale and morality are all gone. You become a different horrible person you never imagined being. I had a few friends go to jail – normal, average kids you wouldn’t imagine going to jail. One went for 8 months. One day after he got out he was arrested after breaking into his next-door neighbors house. You would think he would have gotten over it after 8 months; but no, it was the first thing he was looking for when he got out. I got out better than most. But even after all this time, the nightmares still come. I don’t know how long they’ll last or if they’ll ever end. They are reminders of the utter torture I put on myself. But like I said, I don’t know if I could turn it down if it was put in front of my face. And that’s why there is no getting out once you start.