Drug Addiction Stories & Info

As I sat in the group session, I felt for the first time like I was not alone. I saw others, men and women, who had been where I was. Sure, we have come a long way here in America and women are allowed to go to war for the country they love, but still, it is hard and with several of my friends having died over there, plus being the only girl in my group of friends who had gone the military route, I felt alone as Memorial Day approached.

That may be why it was so easy to just go along with my friends a year ago when they talked me into going to the party and why I accepted the powder that cute guy gave me. The chance to forget for a few hours what perhaps no one in the room had been through? I was all for that!

But that night started a spiral of addiction to cocaine. My family soon noticed the difference but were unsure if it was related to my service or what. I didn’t have the heart to tell them it was a little of both. I couldn’t sleep without seeing my friends’ faces, the ones that died in Iraq. I couldn’t sleep without being back over there. Now, the craving for forgetfulness was marred by the craving for cocaine.

Eventually, my family figured it out and my parents approached me. My dad had never been in the military because of his back and both my parents were only children. With three daughters, I was the oldest and the one who went into the Army and then to war. Still, my heroes are most assuredly my parents as both had a discussion with me one night with my sisters, some friends, an uncle of my mom’s who had served in the military and an intervention counselor.

This Memorial Day is one I can now look upon with strength because I know that my survivor’s guilt is a common feeling. I know that having others to talk to who have been there, even if it means a 3 hour drive for my family, is worth it in order, as they say, to “get the old me back”.

It still kind of makes me nervous when someone who knows I was in the Army says thank you to me. I still think the real heroes died over there. But I am learning to deal with the nightmares without turning to cocaine. I am learning to pause and take a breath without worrying that I don’t have time to think because a bomb could go off. I am learning to see children here and realize that they are innocent and lucky just as I am lucky to live in this country. And every now and then, when I am able to get to a meeting and stop the urge for cocaine, I can almost hear my combat buddies who died whispering “Good Soldier” to me as I get through another day.