When I was 13 years old I was first introduced to methamphetamine. A friend of mine who I had known for about two weeks kept on hassling me to smoke speed with him. I had rejected his offers time after time because speed was the main factor in breaking up my family and causing me to have to move out of California. Now with my mother in jail and my brother recovering from addiction himself I had my family around me for the first time in years until One day I had taken some kilonopin (8 2mg pills exactly)and my friend had little trouble convincing me to give it a try this time. I don't have much memory of the experience due to the effects of the benzos I had ingested but I do remember holding a green crank pipe up to my mouth and blowing out a pretty big cloud for a first time smoker. I also remember walking outside lighting a cigarette and saying out loud "I'm going to do this shit everyday for the rest of my life" from that moment on my lifes path had been decided... I was an addict. Addiction has taken me places I never thought existed from the seediest inner city alleyways to the entire top floor of the Marriott. From begging for change outside a grocery store to running a darknet drug empire. From being at the top of the world without a care to a maximum security cell where you get one book per week and the toilets attached to the sink. After a year of smoking speed consistently my teeth began to deteriorate rapidly and by the end of the year since beginning smoking I had an infection in my jaw line causing me incredible amount of pain and suffering. After my first teeth were removed I was prescribed Vicodin at 13 years old after I told the dentist I had been using speed? How could he possibly think this was a good idea? By the end of the next year at 14 I had injected first Dilaudid then heroin and immediately after seeing a documentary about heroin addicts in San Francisco I relocated at the age of 15. Pain and suffering ensued. Greatness was achieved and new lows were discovered all in the space of my Young Life.