This Story of Hope features Everett, now in addiction recovery from fentanyl, who had used drugs off and on since age 18 due to hanging out with the wrong crowd.
A week before his oldest grandson’s high school graduation, Everett made a decision: He was going to attend the ceremony sober. He was ready.
Drained physically and financially from his fentanyl addiction, Everett wanted to fully experience his grandson’s big day. Plus, he wanted to give the college-bound boy a meaningful graduation gift.
“I knew I wouldn’t be able to give him $100 if I was still using that crap,” recalls Everett, 64, now an Ideal Option patient.
Everett had used drugs off and on since age 18. He’d managed a decade drug-free during his Air Force tour, but upon retiring, he says, “I had too much time on my hands. I started hanging out with the wrong crowd.”
Opioid pills and meth were easy to come by, especially among the neighbors in his apartment complex. “It was always, ‘Hey, try this,’” Everett remembers.
Everett tried to quit several times, but withdrawal always got the best of him. “Within 24 hours, you get so sick with all the wicked withdrawal symptoms — the shakes, diarrhea, you name it. You feel like you’re going to die, so you give up.”
Tired of chasing drugs, Everett eventually enrolled in a Suboxone program through the VA. The medication suppressed his withdrawal and cravings, and to stay busy, Everett worked a part-time restaurant job. He felt like he was back on his feet.
But when the COVID-19 pandemic struck, VA appointments became scarce, and Everett stopped taking Suboxone. “I thought I could stay sober without it,” he says.
Everett quit working, too, and found himself without guardrails. “I felt like I needed to enjoy my retirement, but I was enjoying it the wrong way.”
By this time, fentanyl had overtaken the opioid supply. Everett noticed he needed more and more pills to avoid feeling sick. Staying ahead of withdrawal became an all-consuming chore.
“Before you’d go to sleep, you’d count what you have and think, ‘OK, that’ll last me till I find a dealer. Over and over, like a job. I didn’t like that job.”
Everett was spending so much on fentanyl — upwards of $1,200 a month— that he was flat broke. “The littlest thing, like even a pair of underwear, I couldn’t buy.”
He feared overdosing, too. “The dealers aren’t chemists,” he says. “It’s a crapshoot. You never know what you’re getting.”
Everett was living with his two teenage grandsons, who were aware of his addiction and wished he would seek treatment. “But they knew how stubborn I am,” Everett recalls. “They knew it had to be my decision.”
“I’d heard horror stories that if you take Suboxone too soon, you’re going to regret it.”
But with his grandson’s graduation coming up, Everett felt determined to try. He called Ideal Option.
At his first appointment, he was pleased to learn of a new regimen for fentanyl patients that eases the transition to Suboxone: high-dose initiation.
As Everett had heard, many fentanyl patients feel so sick from withdrawal that they give up before enough time has passed to safely start Suboxone. But as Everett experienced, high-dose initiation offers a more bearable path.
As soon as severe withdrawal began, he took a high dose of Suboxone and then a second dose an hour later. Meanwhile, he was prescribed three medications to curb anxiety, nausea, and other withdrawal symptoms.
Everett calls the medications “the triangle of success.”
“I basically slept through the withdrawal,” he remembers. All the while, his oldest grandson stood by his side.
Four days later, Everett watched the boy walk across the stage at graduation.
For years, while strung out on the couch, he had missed out on the boy’s high school experiences. “No way was I going to miss graduation,” says Everett.
Though he felt a bit drained from the transition off fentanyl, he says, “the adrenaline and excitement” made up for it.
He was proud to hand his grandson a gift of $100. His grandson was equally proud of his grandfather, telling him, “You’ve got this.”
Today, Everett has plenty of energy. His appetite has returned, and walking two or three miles around town is no big deal.
“When you’re doing pills, you just lay around and watch TV. Now I’m up and walking all over the place. I’m feeling good all around.”
He’s looking to join a church and maybe a VFW, to find community with other veterans.
This time around, he’s committed to taking Suboxone indefinitely. “It’s no different than a blood pressure pill,” he says. “If it helps me function, so be it. Everyone needs a little help.”
Everett looks forward to seeing his savings pile up and has made a list of dream purchases.
Tops on the list: an electric bicycle. He also hopes to take his grandsons to the Indiana town where he grew up and to Las Vegas, where he was stationed with the Air Force. “That would be a real treat, to show them around the base,” he says.
Everett also looks forward to supporting his 14-year-old grandson through the next four years. “He’s in a band, so I’ll be able to go see his shows,” Everett says. “He’s still got all of high school yet.”
Everett also looks forward to supporting his 14-year-old grandson through the next four years. “He’s in a band, so I’ll be able to go see his shows,” Everett says. “He’s still got all of high school yet.”
Specializing in addiction medicine since 2012, Ideal Option has helped tens of thousands of people just like Everett get started in recovery. Click here to make an appointment at Ideal Option today!
Next up: “I called my brother and said, ‘I want help. I want my family back.’” — Hunter’s Story of Hope