December 2006
Hi Family~
My name is Phyllis-many of you know me as da taz and I'm a gratefully recovering addict. My life didn't start out horrific like may of you had, I came from a good family and had great parents. I never wanted for anything or had my parents split up like many do-yet my life became a total mess by the time I turned 18 and just got worse.
I moved to Florida with my parents in 1969 and that's when my troubles began. I fell into a crowd of older people that thought it "cool" to introduce me to drugs at a young age and were even willing to supply me with them for free ( or so I thought ) and I was trying to make "friends" so I didn't have enough sense to stay away from them. It was nothing for me to end up out all night and so messed up it would have been impossible for me to find my way home even if I wanted to try. And these "friends" had my parents convinced they would take good care of me and won them over so getting permission to go with them was no big deal. I was only 13 when this started and it didn't stop until I reached the age of 16 when I got bored with the same old things and decided to spend more time with my mother, having lost my father in 1973 and feeling like my place was with her.
In 1976 I married my first husband and began experimenting with different drugs again- first pot then it progressed to pills and acid. I didn't like the way the pot made me feel so I pretty much stopped that but kept doing the pills whenever I could. I tended to like "uppers" and was even able to get a prescription from my doctor for diet pills on a regular basis so I was high on them on a regular daily basis. Doing acid was something we did about every 3 months or so but still it made me speed so I loved it.
In 1985 I gave birth to my first child, my daughter Tara and I quit getting high for a while to raise her the best I could. During my pregnancy my mother became my sidekick and was with me all the time even living with us right before I gave birth. Things were great and I enjoyed having her with me during that time. Right after I gave birth my mother became ill and just a few days short of a month afterwards my mother passed away leaving a huge void in my life. What should have been the happiest time of my life became a big black hole for me. I got up every morning and took care of Tara but it was sometimes very overwhelming for me to make it through the day.
Not too many years after this someone introduced me to the drug that would become my everything-cocaine. I instantly fell in love with it and would do it in any form I could get my hands on not caring about me or anything else. I spent all my money on it and then would lie to everyone about where the money went to get more money to pay the "bills" and then turn around and get more drugs. One thing lead to another and eventually I got pregnant with my second child, my son Chris. It was during this time that I apparently wasn't "hooked" because it was during this time that I was able to stop cold turkey and I delivered him clean but to this day I don't know how-I just knew I didn't want to give birth to an addicted baby and was able to stay off the coke during this time. But it wasn't long maybe a couple months after he got here that I went back to the love of my life-cocaine.
Eventually the state caught up with us and both our children became wards of the state being placed in foster care. I tried to get and stay clean but by this time I was sunk hook line and sinker. It wasn't until I decided to try to make every attempt to get clean and leave my husband ( we used together and enabled each other to use ) that I was able to get clean for a little while. At this time it was like a revolving door thing for me- in and out of the rooms of NA always wanting that thing called recovery but never quite doing it. I guess I hadn't hit my bottom yet.
My bottom came when my second husband ended up in prison and I decided to put myself in rehab. This was in 2001 and was the best thing that I could have done for myself. I won't say I haven't relapsed a couple times since but I made it back- my last being almost 2 years ago now and I have now met someone who is also in recovery and is there to help me when I get stressed and or feel overwhelmed to the point that I may want to pick up. I will forever be grateful to this group for being here because if not for Milkmans I may not have ever met my Jack... both of us being members in complete oppose ends of the US yet finding each other. Life is good and so is living clean and sober! Thank you for letting me share.
Phyllis aka da taz
