I just received an e-mail from the staff at a rehab center I attended, the best ever drug addiction treatment center, which reminded me that I wanted to send an update on how I’ve been doing. I now have three years, one month and thirteen days of sobriety under my belt, and it feels amazing. I live with my wonderful sober boyfriend in the beautiful little beach town of Santa Cruz, where I currently work as a barista (still drinking the coffee!) and take classes at UCSC. On November 2 of 2006, I conquered my one remaining addiction - cigarettes - and have now been smoke-free for four months and seven days. If someone had told me three years ago that in a few years I would be sober and loving life in a sleepy Northern California beach town, I would have laughed and asked what they’d been smoking, but lo and behold, here I am today. I often think about my time at rehab and about how incredibly fortunate I was to arrive there when I did. I truly believe that drug addiction treatment saved my life, providing me with a place to break free of heroin’s death grip, and the tools to stay clean. I shudder at the thought of what could have happened to me otherwise. All I can say is thank you, thank you, thank you. I have my life back again, in all its gloriousness. Keep doing what you’re doing and reaching out, because it truly works.

A trip to a drug rehabilitation center may not be the best thing to do, but it can benefit you. Why? Because a drug rehabilitation center is supposed to set your life back on the right path. They usually work too. I went to a drug rehabilitation center just like lots and lots of other people have. It did for me what it probably did for them. It set me straight. I was having a hard time managing my life, my job, my wife, my kids and my friendships while trying to maintain a healthy addictions to cocaine. Hmmm, I wonder why I was having such a problem. Yeah, drug addictions aren’t the easiest thing to have in your life. I wasn’t really able to get myself to stop and take a look at how messed up my life had become while addicted. It was not the coolest thing in the world to need drug rehabilitation, but I can say that going to the drug rehabilitation center was exactly what I needed. I went there hoping to find some kind of help for my situation and that is exactly what happened. The drug rehabilitation center took me in and got me back on the right track where I needed to be.

i knew i had a problem, but i didn’t think that my drug and alcohol use was the problem. i thought my uptight parents, my jerk boss and all the boring people i ran into every day were the problem. then, i hit a serious bottom. i was arrested for drunk driving while my girlfriend was in the car. the next day she came over and told me something she had never told me before. she shared with me how a drug and alcohol rehab had saved her fathers life. something inside me told me to listen to her, to trust her, and i did. a week later i checked into a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center and i have to say, it changed my life. i thought only losers went to drug rehab, but i was wrong. the private alcohol rehab i went to, in Malibu, ca, was full of loving, caring people that all wanted one thing, to recover from drug and alcohol abuse. good people, loving people, funny people, sober people. most importantly, what i learned is that i don’t have to go through this alone. and now, like my girlfriend (who is now my wife), i get to share with someone else about how this Malibu addiction treatment center saved my life.