Coming Back to Life

I am a miracle and I’d like to share my story with you. At 5:15 a.m. on January 17, 2008, as a result from a drug overdose from taking Xanax, Ambien, and Methodone, my mom found me unconscious in my bed, covered in vomit, barely breathing. I was totally unresponsive and barely alive. Let me tell you how I got there.

I grew up in a Christian home with loving parents. My parents took me on vacations every summer. They taught me the importance of having a relationship with God. As a teenager, I played in the church orchestra and even lead worship for the church youth group. Throughout high school, I made A’s and B’s in my classes. I was also an active member of my high school band, playing percussion and competing in prestigious competitions.

From 2003 to 2008, I became addicted to drugs, which ranged from meth, marijuana, heroin, cocaine and prescription drugs. I made several attempts in those five years to stay clean, but I would always get back into drugs. My dad passed away suddenly when I was 20 years old. His death took a hard toll on my family and my life. So, I used drugs to cope with the pain of my dad’s death. I felt very lonely. Even though I had family and friends to support me, I used drugs to numb the pain.

The choices I made had a lot to do with the people I hung around with. Late in high school I started smoking marijuana with some friends. It was their idea, but I wanted to try it. Then a band friend invited me to try meth at a hotel one night, and I wanted to try it. That was the only time I tried meth for a year.

I began classes at Texas Christian University in the fall of 2003 majoring in Music Composistion. I had long, stressful days and resorted to drugs for relaxation. A lot of the time I smoked marijuana with the drumline.

The summer after TCU, a group of my friends, from my church, began smoking meth and I wanted to do it, too. I never worried about whether it was right or wrong. I never worried about any consequences; I never wanted to quit until well after my dad died.

I made several attempts to quit and it worked for a while, but I was always trying on my own and would never let anyone help me. I started stealing expensive items from my family to pawn. I even pawned my own things. I would go to any lengths just to get that fix that drugs gave me.
Once, I was making a trip back from picking up drugs and driving under the influence of meth. I wrecked my mom’s car and left it on the side of the highway. I called a friend to pick me up because I did not want my mom to find out. I was oblivious to what others saw. I wouldn’t even get out of bed to go with her to have the car towed to a repair place. I was always mad at my mom no matter how insignificant the issue was.

My mom kept giving me chance after chance, but I kept letting her down. I was letting myself down, too. At one point, I agreed to go to rehab, but I stopped going after the first week. I thought the program would not help me, and I thought I could do it on my own. I was wrong. I checked myself into inpatient rehab again about a year later, but left after two days, because again, I thought I could do it on my own.

In between those times, I had a couple of good jobs. I even moved into my own apartment in Grapevine for a few months. But each time when things were going well for me, I would hook up with the same old friends, thinking I could control the addiction, but I would end up going right back to the drugs.

At this point in my life I wanted to experience something different. I began using heroin. The other drugs were not giving me the intense high I wanted. First I snorted it. Then a “friend” taught me how to shoot up and it felt really good – so good that I can never go back to heroin or any other form of drugs because it made me a terrible person. I believe God has delivered me from my drug addictions but I know I will always have to be careful and rely on Him.

Along the way, I did poorly in school, I lost good jobs, and I got arrested and spent a night in jail. After that, I started a methadone program because I wanted to quit heroin. Then a friend got out of jail and we were both addicted to meth, so I was tempted and started doing it again. She was my “partner in crime” and we were negative influences on each other. I was doing great until then, but I started on my last downhill slide. I don’t really remember the weeks before my catastrophic accident.

The paramedics who answered the 911 call had to work on me for 45 minutes to bring me back to life. I was rushed to Harris Methodist HEB Hospital. My doctors didn’t think I would live through the first shift. But I did. They didn’t think I would live through the first day, or the first weekend, or the first week. But I did. I was on a ventilator; I had aspiration pneumonia, brain injury, liver and kidney failure. I had six or seven dialysis treatments before my kidneys started working again. I started waking up after several days, but my doctors thought I was just having involuntary responses. Over the next few weeks there were many medical complications.

Eventually all my organs began to function and I was able to stop dialysis and begin trials off of the ventilator. And, eventually my body stabilized enough to be transferred to Ethicus Hospital. For the next 80 days, the staff at Ethicus worked with me to get me breathing on my own, eating solid food, drinking thin liquids, wean me off pain medications, and started physical therapy. During this time I was bed ridden and lost the ability to perform normal physical functions such as walking or holding things. I received a muscle relaxation treatment, which finally allowed my tightened muscles to stretch out and I was able to sit up, and then stand up! Standing up brought tears to my eyes and I wanted to scream because it hurt so bad. I was finally ready for Baylor Institute for Rehabilitation (BIR).

At BIR, I underwent two surgeries to lengthen every tendon in both of my hands and feet. After a very painful recovery, I started learning to stand, walk, balance, and many other normal, day-to-day things. They worked with me on my speech and cognitive skills as well.

Currently I am at Pate Rehabilitation where I work on cognitive skills, occupational therapy, physical therapy, and speech therapy. They got me from a wheelchair to a walker, and I can now walk without a walker. I can roam independently with my walker, indoors and outdoors. My goal is to ditch the walker all together and have no assistive device at all.

Now after a few months at Pate I am finally home and just going in for daily outpatient rehab. I know I still have a long way to go, but I am looking forward to the challenge and the new opportunities that lie ahead.

I thank God for my second chance. I know that He has given me this chance for a reason. I have a purpose in life! It will be a privilege to help someone else, even if it’s just one person, to not make the same mistakes I have made.

Out of everyone listening – if you just take away one point from this – please DO NOT make the same mistake I have made. Ask for help!