Drugs - A Personal Story
Phill is a smartly dressed, intelligent, likeable, remarkably candid guy in his early thirties who looks distinctly middle class. When he was younger he did professional dance, played badminton and enjoyed Thai Boxing, in short, he was very active.
The memory of exactly when and where the recreational use of cannabis began is a haze, but it was around the age of 12 – 13, the same age that he started smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol (despite actually not liking the taste of it). The question of why it started is more memorable, “all my friends did it, so I did it to fit in, and it didn’t help I was being bullied at school because of my disability”. On top of that Phil had to come to terms with the death of his father at a young age.
“It was a social thing, we’d put money in to a kitty to buy for our group, but then it escalated from there”. The results were noticeable, he became uncontrollable at school, aggressive and took risks, so much so he was expelled. He recalls “It’s funny how you’re fearless when you’re a kid, we’d sit on rooftops smoking, or even on the roofs of lifts in the shafts, but now, I’m terrified of heights. There are even times I feel uncomfortable on balconies”.
At the age of 17, his use of drugs such as LSD and Ecstasy developed. At that time the infamous “raves” were in fashion, and so the harder drugs being used by him were all part of being “social”. He found that he had a sense of belonging, and enjoyed his popularity. He knew the bouncers and staff at all of the nightclubs he frequented, got in free, had access to vast quantities of drugs and as such, his links to the criminal fraternity also grew. The publicised deaths of drug users in the national press had no effect on his use, and it continued in a downward spiral, confident he wouldn’t become addicted. Again, if that wasn’t enough, Phill, in his own words, “did not have a clue” that he was also becoming addicted to Opiate based painkillers (“Opiates”) whilst trying to manage the pain of his disability.
The downward spiral continued when at the age of 23, he and a group of friends had been out clubbing and had returned home. He had gone through to the kitchen and heard a friend asking for “foil”. He was curious, and when someone uttered the words “Here Phill, get your chops around this” the change from “uppers” to “downers”, the use of Crack and Heroin started. At this point there is an anger in Phill’s voice, aimed at himself and the mistakes he made:
“It’s a myth you can’t get psychologically addicted with one hit. After that one hit, despite my friends warnings, I hunted this guy down for two weeks to get more. It helped with the pain, and I had tunnel vision to find more of this painkiller. Up until this age I had only committed petty offences, but now, this new me was a completely ruthless blur”.
In an 18 month period Phill went from having everything he ever wanted, cars, motorbikes, designer clothes, to nothing. The “wake up call” happened just as he got his first 6 year sentence, at which point he weighed in at 7 stone and looked like a “Belsen” survivor.
“When that happened, I thought, f***ing hell, what happened there. No way Phill, that’s just not you. I had never thought of hopping over a counter armed with a sawn off shotgun demanding cash, but I did it”.
Phill went through two rehabilitation programmes, the latest of which was a PASRO (Prisons Addressing Substance Related Offending) program. He was lucky with the Health Care team at Ashwell because they actually helped him to manage his pain levels, whilst a number of other places had thought he was just on the “hustle to get painkillers”. During his time serving his sentence he would see the same people go in and out of the “system”, and wanted his dignity and pride back. “I even knew of one guy who managed to cook himself on a fire because he fell asleep totally wasted. You see all of my friends who were part of that blur, now, they’ve either mostly gone legitimate or they’re dead. The others, my old associates, have gone back to old habits, but I don’t want to do that. I’m lucky because I still have the support of my family. Even when things got desperate I would never s*** on my own family by stealing from them or anything”.
Phill’s advice is to “get as much information as possible, and be susceptible to criticism because you don’t know everything“.
He is aware that it’s hard to stay clean, but he is determined to make a success of his life. There are plans for a future, something that may not have been possible had he not strived to change.
It's only fair that the last words are Phill's own, and are an acknowledgement to his family's support:
"Even when I was desperate I would never s*** on my own family and friends, by stealing from them or anything"