Cory’s Story
I experimented with weed and alcohol in high school, but when I tried opiates for the first time—I call it my first love. Especially Oxycontin. That was when it went from just experimenting to becoming a problem.
Before long, I was trying to balance being in college and being addicted to Oxycontin and those two don't really fly. I ended up getting a 0.0 GPA and losing all of my grants. I wish I could say that I stopped through my own volition, but really what happened is that my dealer ripped me off and he was the only way I knew to get drugs. I went through withdrawal even though I didn't really understand it—it was foreign to me—but I went through it and turned things around, graduated college, and got a job.
But once I started working full time, I felt an emptiness and a sadness that I started filling again with drugs and alcohol. Initially heroin, but again, my dealer eventually stopped answering my phone calls.
I should say that I always had a really big fear of getting caught mostly because I was always a very anxious person. But I was especially anxious about getting in trouble for drugs because the first time I ever smoked weed, I got arrested which, in a funny way, may have saved my life because it made me terrified of going out onto the street and finding drugs.
And so when a friend introduced me to kratom, that was perfect for me because I could buy it with my credit card and have it mailed to my house. And essentially, kratom became my life. I would wake up in the morning, I would do just enough to get a little buzz or not get sick, I'd go to work, I'd come home, I'd get high. And that was just my life for five or six years. Again, I wish I could say that it was my own decision to stop but I thought kratom was going to be made illegal and I didn't want to get caught with my pants down so I went to an outpatient drug and alcohol clinic that offered Suboxone as a one treatment option.
At the time, I didn't actually ever think I could get on Suboxone. So I got my comfort meds, I detoxed, and since I never had a problem with alcohol, I figured I would just stop using opiates but I'd allow myself to drink. Well, it turns out that pretty much any mood-altering substance—whether it was alcohol, whether it was medical marijuana—I would get addicted to it. So over the next few years, I went back and forth in recovery. Sometimes I would be sober, sometimes alcohol would be my main substance, but I would usually always go back to kratom.
My recurring pattern was that every time I would want to get sober, I would add something else to my recovery. At first it was therapy, then it was seeing a psychiatrist and getting on psych meds, and then an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP). But then finally, after Covid started and I felt like the world was falling apart, I returned to use again. And after a couple of weeks, I thought, "Okay what am I doing, I gotta stop this," so I called the same drug and alcohol program again. Only this time, they suggested that I try Suboxone. I didn't even know that was an option for me. I said, "Okay, let's try it."
And Suboxone, in combination with doing IOP—those two things really saved my life. It took a long time. But between the stability that the Suboxone gave and the coping skills that I got in IOP, that was what really unlocked recovery for me. Through going to IOP, I learned about myself as mind, body and spirit, and I realized that I virtually had no spirit at all. I sort of went searching for that and eventually, after meeting my now-wife, she introduced me to the Christian faith and that became a big cornerstone to my continued recovery. I am blessed to have over five and a half years sober now but I know that it's not a guarantee, it's something that I have to keep working on. Thankfully, all those tools and resources that I picked up through each return to use, I still have and have built up into a more well-rounded recovery that I am proud to say that I have today.
Just one last thing: when I was nearing the end of my IOP, I started helping out other people in my group. Like, helping someone with their resume. Taking someone to court. And I thought, I'm kind of already doing this on my own, I like doing this, I enjoy helping people so I figured why not become a Certified Recovery Specialist (CRS). So I got into my CRS class and I got a job and that has been a tremendous blessing in my life because the things that I work on with other people—I learn from that, too. It's been a blessing to be able to help others and to get a benefit to my own recovery, as well.