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Darkina describes how her drug use escalated and recalls why she decided to get help.
Darkina:
I used drugs for four and a half years. I started drinking at the age of 13 years old. That led on to prescription drugs, Percocets. Percocets led on to crack cocaine. Crack cocaine took over my life for four and a half years. I lost everything I ever owned. I was left with absolutely nothing.
I went into treatment again, on August 18 and it got to the point being out there using the drugs I didn’t know why I was using the drugs. I didn’t want to use the drugs anymore. I was crying and using the drugs. I was crying being a prostitute. I had no understanding on, “How did my life end up the way it had ended up?” I was being raped numerous times, beaten numerous times, and didn’t understand, “Why can’t I stop? I don’t want to do this no more.”
I went to jail several, several times and I am going to call it a god thing that the third time that I went to jail two weeks apart from each other, the jailor said, “I am going to give you a chance. I am looking at 2.5 years.” She said, “I am going to give you a chance. I think you are going to do it this time; you might mess up one time,” and she gave me a chance. She gave me three years probation. I called my probation officer and told her I needed some help. She gave me the number over to Ebony House.
I called Ebony House. They said there were 30 people ahead of me and I told them I was sick, “I am getting high talking to you; I need some help. Can you please come and help me?” And they told me to come over on a Monday. That was a Thursday, they told me to come over Monday. My life changed. At that point I surrendered. I gave up everything.
It wasn’t about my children anymore. It wasn’t about my family anymore. It wasn’t about no one but me. I needed some professionals to help me figure out what was going on because I couldn’t figure it out anymore. I went into Alba House. I sit down. I shut up and I listened.
I didn’t want to run anything anymore. I needed to find out why I did not have control over a demon called crack cocaine that did not have a brain. It only moved when I moved it. I didn’t have no understanding. How could I not have no control over it? So I went in there, got some, you know, I got a chance to deal with my molestation as a child. I got a chance to deal with my life coming up as a child, you know, how things that I just blocked out.
At the age of 18 years old, having six children, only four of them was mine, taking care of my entire family – never learning to have no time for myself. It wasn’t ever about me. It was always about my family, always…that led me to crack cocaine. I could never please them. I could never make them happy so I figured if I got on the level of some of them then maybe hey, then maybe they will understand me, what it would be like not to have me around, and I didn’t realize how important I was to my family until I began to use crack cocaine.
After getting out of treatment, today it’s about myself. It’s not about my children. It’s not about my family. It’s all about me. Today, I know to love me. Today I take care of me and if I take care of me and I love me and I stay clean and I stay sober, everything else is going to follow accordingly. That’s my life that I live today.
The cravings do go away. The cravings do go away. I am a year clean. Do the dreams go away? The dreams don’t go away. Do the thoughts go away? No, the thoughts don’t go away. How do I deal with that? That’s where treatment comes into play. They give you tools. They teach you how not to act on the filling. There was a point in time because the filling came about, I had to act on it. Today I don’t have to act on that filling. Today I call on god sincerely. If it’s too strong, I call on god sincerely but even out of my addiction I pray and ask god if you show me god that I do not need this drug, you know, give me anytime, showing me that I don’t need this god, I will never turn around, and he showed me that I don’t need to wake up to this drug anymore. I don’t need this drug.
I go to my meetings - very important of my sobriety – go to my meetings, hang around people that’s doing the same thing that I am doing and live my life without crack cocaine. I know I cannot be around crack cocaine. I can’t go to places I used to go, do the things that I used to do. I love myself today. I understand my addiction today and because I understand my addiction today, I don’t have to use crack cocaine.
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