This Story of Hope features Emerald, now an Ideal Option patient in recovery, and her journey to overcoming fentanyl addiction.
At age 25, Emerald found herself at a low point: addicted to fentanyl, fired from 7-Eleven, living in a Honda Accord with her boyfriend and 2-year-old son. She’d steal food to eat and merchandise to trade for drugs.
“We would rent hotel rooms when we had the money, so that’s where we’d shower,” recalls Emerald, now 30 and an Ideal Option patient. She did laundry at her drug dealer’s house.
“I was so done, so tired of hustling,” remembers Emerald, “I was just so over it.”
Back in high school, when Emerald began using weed and ecstasy to establish a “cool” personality, she had a more glamorous life in mind. Her senior year, she dated an older guy in order to score harder drugs.
“I had this obsession with Curt Cobain and Courtney Love, and I had an aunt who went to prison for meth,” Emerald remembers. “I thought she was the coolest person ever.”
After graduating high school, Emerald bounced around, working random jobs, couch surfing, and “doing whatever drugs were available.”
Then, at 22, she began dating a guy who didn’t use drugs at all.
“That was my first time getting clean,” she says. “At that point, I wasn’t using every day, so I was able to move in with him and not have withdrawals.”
At first, Emerald didn’t mind the drug-free lifestyle. “I felt like, ‘I can always go back to it later.’”
Right away, she got pregnant. Meanwhile, her boyfriend struggled with an excruciating medical condition but did not want to take pain medication. Emerald grew frustrated.
“Here I was, pregnant and watching this guy crying in the shower all day. I’m like: ‘Take some Vicodin.’ Man up!’”
He took Emerald’s advice but quickly became addicted and began buying painkillers off the street.
Emerald stayed off drugs until their baby was 6 months old but then succumbed to temptation.
“My addict brain is watching him get high, and I’m over here sober and drooling and getting super jealous,” she remembers.
Life with two addictions and one baby got messy. Eventually, Emerald left town with the baby and moved in with a friend.
She stopped using drugs cold turkey, and despite miserable withdrawal, stuck it out. “I had a kid, so I couldn’t just lay in bed all day,” she says.
For three happy months, she remained drug-free and worked at 7-Eleven. Things were looking up. But then her ex-boyfriend came to town.
“As soon as I started feeling back to my normal self, I let him back into the picture,” she says.
Emerald began using again. Her boyfriend lived off disability and took care of their son while she continued working.
But then she got fired for not showing up. “Getting drugs was more important to me than going to work,” she says.
That’s when the couple got evicted and moved into the Honda.
One night, after a fight with her boyfriend, Emerald felt desperate and too exhausted to continue. She called a friend for help, and her friend called Emerald’s mom and cousin, who came right away.
“Mentally, I was ready,” Emerald says. “I wanted help.” Her boyfriend didn’t and continued living in the car.
Emerald enrolled in a treatment center for pregnant and parenting women. Each day, she’d drop her son off at daycare while she participated in classes and counseling.
“I was serious because I knew if I did not get clean, I was going to lose my son. I wasn’t going to let that happen. Plus, I didn’t want to disappoint my family.”
Emerald graduated from treatment after 6 months and then moved into an Oxford House that was a block from the local public school. She and her son stayed for three years.
“I loved living there,” Emerald says. “I put myself in a position where I ran the house. I’d been there the longest, and I’d done all the jobs, and I was the most stable person.”
Throughout her treatment, Emerald has taken Suboxone and has not experienced cravings. “I’ve never felt like I wanted to use,” she says.
Today, Emerald lives with her son and fiancé in an apartment. She’s taking classes toward a degree in business and plans to start a landscaping company with her fiancé.
“I feel stable in my sobriety and super proud of myself,” she says. “After all those years having to struggle, it’s just so nice to feel happy and healthy and sane and to know my son and I are safe.”
Specializing in addiction medicine since 2012, Ideal Option has helped tens of thousands of people just like Emerald get started in recovery. Click here to make an appointment at Ideal Option today!
Up next: National Recovery Month 2024 — Recovery. Hope. Healing.