[JudasGoat]

I took opiates and other drugs to mask emotional pain. No doctor prescribed my first dose. No peer pressure was needed. My life had been absent of happiness, the first time I took a drug, it was as though the world rendered itself in colors other than black and gray. I haven't done any drugs other than weed for at least 5 years now. But there was a good 40 plus year period in which I did opiates daily. My biggest mistake was getting on a methadone program, that was a twenty year addiction that made heroin withdrawal look easy. It took 2 years of incarceration to end my methadone addiction.

I first used heroin when I was seventeen in 1972. It was the first time I had tried an opiate. At the time Heroin was pricey at $30 a bag/dose in the Boston area. Around 3 years later, I went to Phoenix where Heroin was $10 a bag. Taking a ride across the border to Nogales lowered the cost to $5. Making approx. $100 a week back then, a habit wasn't possible until I found lower cost drugs. These days I feel happier than I could have imagined. While opiates never really made me happy, They decreased my misery at times. As bad as all this sounds, I thank drug addiction for allowing me to survive until I learned how to live.