Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - The Dark Side of Dealing | How To Overcome Addiction

Episode Date: December 24, 2023

The Dark Side of Dealing | How To Overcome Addiction

By the end of high school, I was selling but I never actually got busted for selling. It wasn't until after I had quit selling for a while before I got arrested. I had a pretty normal childhood growing up. I played a lot of sports, spent a lot of time with family and friends, and kind of did okay in school. I was bored. I was smarter than the grades I pulled off. I was just bored and didn't really apply myself. right i was always kind of middle the road you know later on in life is when i started to kind

to kind of get a little crazier started to kind of rebel a little bit late middle school i would say was like the first time that i kind of push the envelope exactly yep sneaking out smoking pot a little bit things like that you know um helped that i had a older brother who was like a senior in high school at the time so i was exposed to things that probably most people my age weren't right um so that kind of facilitated it a little bit i think but i started with smoking pot every once in a while you know kind of not even a weekend thing like once a month maybe later on in high school it progressed to a daily thing and then it progressed to eventually me selling it and and making quite a bit of money in high school from it i played sports all the way up until middle of

high school um i was a basketball player by the end i played football played football and basketball and lacrosse when I was growing up, but I only played basketball into high school and then quit after my sophomore year. And when I quit basketball is really when stuff started going downhill. So that was probably the single decision I would say that had the biggest effect on how my life would, like the trajectory of my life. You know what I mean? Like the biggest fork where I could have avoided a lot of the things I ended up having to

through had I stuck with sports I think personally what did your parents say they you know my parents God bless them they were really not strict so they were willing to let me kind of do what I wanted to do as long as they didn't see it as destructive and they didn't know about like the pot and all that kind of stuff until way later I was pretty good at hiding it so to them they thought I was just kind of quitting playing basketball I never got into any legal until I was way later. Actually, that's not true. I got, I did get a minor in possession of cannabis at one point, but in Colorado it was like a $50 fine or something like that.

It was nothing. So that was like the only trouble I got into until my mid-20s. So I was pretty good at hiding it. So they didn't really know what was happening until it was late, too late. So, I mean, did you still graduate high school or? I actually graduated high school early. early. I had to, I didn't have the greatest GPA, um, but I was good enough to go to school. I started off as like a biochem major in college. Um, eventually I realized I was not good enough at math to

finish that degree. So I changed my degree to psychology. Um, and there's a whole lot of things that tie into that. Like I worked as a pharmacy technician for a while right out of high school, um, train myself, actually. I ordered some stuff. over the internet and taught myself and then got certified as a farm tech in pursuit of the goal to be a pharmacist, which is what the biochem degree was for, right? I know. But with my drug addiction, exactly, that was not, that was what led to me leaving being a pharmacy tech, actually, because I knew I was never going to be able to stop doing drugs, being around

them constantly. And the math part was going to make my degree hard. so I just kind of folded on that idea and switched to psychology and then follow that for quite a while and that was kind of woven into my story with my addiction and being educated on it from like a book perspective through psychology and addiction and like psychopharmacology classes and then on the other side like my treatment centers that I had been to and my own personal experiences with you know my friends who were addicts myself who was an addict things like that so um that was what consumed my life that topic consumed my life for pretty much up until recently till i

switched to to radiography okay so what happened were you like out of high school were you i mean out of sorry during college were you selling drugs were you yep so i started selling cannabis when I was like right after I quit playing basketball. So I think I was a sophomore or it was like the year between sophomore and junior year in high school. And I started selling cannabis and that led to me selling other drugs as well. By the end of high school, I was selling cannabis, Coke, ecstasy, mushrooms every once in a while, pretty much all of the lower level party drugs that most people would be doing.

Right. And kind of stuck with that. It was mostly cannabis was the large weight that I was selling. Everything else was kind of lower end, just more personal use level stuff. Right. But that continued on into college. But I never actually got busted for selling. My charges somehow for the long time that I had been doing that, never got busted, never got in trouble for distribution or selling or even any type of personal use. use amounts. It wasn't until after I had quit selling for a while before I got arrested the first time, which is kind of ironic. But how did that happen? So the night that I got arrested, were that in, you were still in college? Uh, yes. So I was 26 at the time. Um, and I had been struggling with, I was an IV user by that point. Um, I started using, I know, the story is wild. Um, I started using. IV when I was 18 or 19 I had moved to Texas for college, came back, and right after I came back and got back into my old circles, I kind of was right at the time when they stopped making

the oxy cotton pills the way they used to. And so shot up and became really popular. And so I graduated to that and had been an IV user for a while. And the day I got arrested, it was my my first time relapsing after getting clean. I had gone to Florida and spent a month in Florida getting clean. I was coming off of Suboxin and Hibon because I had tried to stop. I had gotten on Suboxin, but then continued to use. So then I was on Suboxin and dope at the same time, which was a nightmare. But anyway, so when I get back from that trip, I had been sober for the month that I was in Florida.

I get back. I was okay for a couple of weeks. and the first night that I relapsed, I had gone to get dope, and I had pulled around the corner from my house. I didn't do it at home, but I was in my car, like, around the corner, because at the time I was living with my parents. And shot up in the car, and it was like February in Colorado, so it was really cold. So I left the keys in the ignition so that the heater was running while I was doing it and fell out kind of, it wasn't an OD, but like I fell out to where I was not responsive really, but I wasn't dying. I was just kind of asleep. And somebody walked by and saw me slumped, called the police.

They had to break my window, my driver's side window out, to pull me out of the window because I was not responding and the doors were locked. And my dope was sitting on the seat next to me, so there was, you know, no question. And that was what culminated my first arrest. I actually got really lucky during that arrest because as horrible, of an idea as this was. I was a concealed carry holder for all that time before because I had no criminal record. And the night I got arrested, I didn't have my gun on me. I had taken it off and set it down right before I left to go get my dope, which was not common of me. Like, I usually wouldn't

even go to the gas station without my gun. And that night I did, and thank God I did, because it would have been a special offenders charge had I got caught that night. What was the charge they charged you with. So they gave me a DUID and they gave me possession of Schedule 1 felony level at the time. Now it's not a felony. That same charge, that same amount today is only a misdemeanor. But back in 2016, that was a felony level charge. Okay. So that led to me being on papers for the last eight years. Actually, I haven't been on papers since that arrest because of lots of things, but that was the first arrest. cool so yeah so that was the first arrest and after that first arrest um obviously i wasn't

able to stop using just because i got arrested so um while i was on pretrial that whole time i had been using a um well i'm sorry wait so were they saying like when you got arrested like they bring you downtown they process you they let you go and then they did they give you an attorney I had to bail So I had to bail out And then my parents helped me With an attorney But yeah

What was his name? No I said what's his name? Is he saying oh you'll get probation Or is he saying bro you're fucking gonna do a year No I wasn't looking at any time I didn't think at the point Because it was my first offense ever He's named probation

Basically yeah Probation but it's a felony charge also You know what I mean So it's like not At the time they were still pretty serious about it so it was not insignificant but it wasn't like oh my god I'm losing years of my life already you know right that ended up happening more or less but at the time I didn't think that was the case so yeah so while I was on pretrial kind of going through all my

court stuff I didn't stop using but I was on UA's for pretrial so I was using a WISinator to try to pass my UA's. And eventually I just couldn't put the effort in and failed. You know, one of the tests was too hot or too cold or something. And that all came crashing down. So that, they catch you with it? They caught me, they didn't catch me with the Wizzinator, but they caught me with an adulterated test, basically.

And basically said, we're either going to hit you for evidence tampering or we're going to let you pee again and you can provide a hot UAE. which is what I ended up doing. So, yeah. Okay. Oh, listen, I talked to a guy who literally said, he's like, I look down and this guy's got a fake fucking dick. Yeah.

He goes, I mean, it's like, that, listen, what are you doing? I was like, no. He's like, yeah. Things are in a really bad way when you're going to that level to try to continue. Yeah, you have to admit at that point. I think I have a problem. I'm buying prosthetic penises to pass UA's. And taking risks to get felon.

he's doing it because i'm walking into the courthouse with a fake ua device which you know what i mean like trying to fake a ua at all for any reason is technically a felony when you're on felony probation so i was reckless to say the right for sure um luckily i didn't face as bad of a consequence for that as i could have luckily um wasn't always the case for everything that happened to me but i was lucky, obscenely lucky in so many cases during my story. It's kind of ridiculous. But, um, so yeah, so that was the first arrest. The second major arrest, well, do you want the second arrest that led to like DUI and possession charges? Because between those, I had some like, they would came and did like a home inspection and found some stuff. So I got like

a bond violation and you know what I mean? That happened a few times. And so there were some arrests in there, but they didn't really, they were just kind of, exactly, they were kind of tacked on to the back of the major arrest. It wasn't until I caught, like, the whole new case was my second DUI. What are, what are your parents saying at this point? They are motherfucking me up and down the wall. They are pissed off. They're helping me. They're not kicking me out. I mean, they love me so they're not, you know, going to make me sleep on the street. They're giving me a place to be that's safe but they're not they're trying to help me get treatment but they're not going to um and on you potty yeah they're not coddling you know they're just like

you need to get your shit together yep and actually they ended up being the ones who saved my life during all of my overdoses um my dad had to give me CPR at one point um they both had to narcan me a couple of times so they've been there they've gone i put my parents through unspeakable hell that I could never, never make peace with. But for the rest of my life, I will definitely make the effort to atone for it, I should say. Right. So what happened, ultimately,

what led to the next kind of arrest? So my next arrest, I'd been on probation for years by that point. I'd, because of my, because of the constant, they kept extending the, probation. Yep. So I would I would do some time or and then it would get extended because I would fail a test or they would do a home inspection and they would catch me with like paraphernalia or

something to that effect. So it got extended twice I think before they ended up revoking me and then I got sentenced to a drug court, which was at the time they told me like this is your last stop before prison like if you can't make this work then you're going to prison because my original deal for the first case was like a deferred but because i couldn't stop using that went away and then it was okay you're gonna if you complete it we'll wobble it down to a misdemeanor and then you know so progressively as i was screwing up my chances the deal for that case was getting worse and worse um so while i was on probation they had moved me to drug court and I while I'm failing out of drug court because I can't get my shit together because I'm still

using and not complying I mean I guess I'm 90% complying but I just like everything else I'm doing I'm making all of my classes taking all my tests they're just not it's not horses right right I don't always that don't count like it's not hell it's not hand grenades it's a good point but that's the addict brain you know that's the attic mind thinking I'm almost there mobile you know um so while i'm in drug court i am still using but by this point i had progressed to fentanyl use because at that by this point the pills were everywhere now just to backtrack real quick i'd actually done f***inol my first time in high school back then it was patches and suckers um so i had been doing fission since i was in high school but then it

kind of went away for a while and it wasn't street available like it is now. But then eventually when it became street available, I progressed from heroin to and that's what led to my second arrest. And so my second arrest, I was in my car, in my neighborhood again, same neighborhood, different corner, fell asleep. I was on my way home from a girl I was seeing his house and I stopped by just to smoke real quick before I got home and fell out with keys in the ignition and basically a whole repeat of the first charges. all over again, except this time they didn't give me felony drug charges

because they said that they were doing a welfare check and in Colorado, a welfare check makes you immune from drug charges if they find out. So yeah, so I guess they decided that I didn't deserve the felony or at the time now it would have been a misdemeanor.

Drug possession charges so they just gave me the DUI charges. and then my third arrest was right after that. I was going to say, do people know what fell out was? So it means you basically were, you were passed out. Basically, yeah. Yep. It's not OD but it's not responsive.

Right. I was going to say the first time I ever heard somebody said, yeah, yeah, he fell out. Well, I was in prison. And somebody said, I was like, fell out. Like, but then I've, since then, I've heard it in just like regular everyday use. Yeah.

When you see somebody who's falling out after you hear the term, it makes perfect sense because you know, like you see somebody who's just slumped and, you know, like it just, it's perfect. It's a perfect. Well, I've heard nod it out. Noted out too. We used to call it the nod squad. Boom. Yeah, I think I mentioned there was a guy that he ran. I mentioned this before, not to you, but I wrote a story about this place about a pain clinic and this guy was running the pain clinic. and one of the doctors calls him in the back and says, hey, can you check on something for him? And he goes, yeah, what's up? He said, I've had several patients come in here and they've got like brown smudges like on their face or their nose or their cheek. He's like, it's like, I've had like four patients today that have had this. I don't know what it is. And they don't know what it is. Like I've said, what is this? They're like, I have no idea. And like, can you figure it out? He goes, okay. So he walked outside and he, or to the

the to the visitation room and looks around and he notices that there's several guys that are sitting there with ice cream cones, chocolate ice cream cones. And they would get the, because they're, you know, they're drug addicts and they're waiting to get like, you know, like sugar. Right. And they're all waiting to get their prescriptions refilled for oxies. And they would sit there. And so because they had so many people in the waiting room.

So this was called American Pain. It was American Pain. It was a huge place down here. So the ice cream trucks and the food trucks would come by constantly. And this one guy came by and all they had was chocolate ice cream and they bought up the chocolate ice cream. And so there's eight or ten guys, you know, bought it up and they were sitting there and they're taking their ice cream and they're dozing off. And then they're hit that ice cream would hit them in the head and they wake up. They don't realize that they've got ice cream because they're so numb.

Then they go and see the doctor and they've got these little brown. spots on their foreheads and there and he was head I was looking I was like could it be the ice cream I stared at this one guy he said he was literally watching the guy as he went boom and sat back up and had a little patch he was like ice cream

so he went and the doctor said people were nodding out in the fucking thing from the ice cream it was you know it was a it was a mill it was a pill mill so like the doctors are all kind of in on it you know they know they know what's going on they're trying to avoid having those problems not because they care about the patient

just because they don't want the heat right so anyway i thought that was but that that's definitely nodding out yeah you're absolutely like i said when you see it it definitely it's like aha that's that's that's what nodding out is so they they they were on the on the next DUI what they arrest you for i mean it was the same exact thing all three of them were the exact same falling asleep in the car and having possession of something and the keys in the ignition um only thing i've ever been arrested for other than like a violation of bond never been arrested for literally anything else other than that exact scenario um the third one go ahead at this point come on bro like you got i know i'd been in and out of treatments by this point i mean i was trying to to get sober i had had some

sober periods had periods where i was screwing up um so i was totally aware of the issue i had by that point probably been through like three treatment centers put a lot of effort in tried to educate myself got on the track of becoming a peer recovery coach and kind of working with my own peer recovery coach thinking that might be the direction I wanted to head eventually if I could get my things figured out but that definitely it just kind of kept slowly escalating but not without being recognized, you know what I mean? Like, we were definitely, I was trying, in my opinion, hard, very hard to get my stuff under control. I just was failing miserably.

Are you working at this point? I had, so I never worked anywhere super long, but at one point I was like a warehouse manager for electronics recycling company. I worked at Bed Bath and Beyond as a warehouse manager, so a lot of retail stuff. Nothing, I was always working, doing something, but it was never like a great job or a career or anything like that. But yeah, I was always had a job or going to school or both. It wasn't until after my violation of my first arrest that I stopped going to college because I just couldn't afford to anymore with what was going on.

um so that was kind of the end of my psychology degree back then and then eventually recently I switched and kind of picked back up wanting to go to to radiography school so um okay so well on the third time that you got arrested what happened well you should have gone to jail at this point I did um oh you mean like prison prison like yeah you're right definitely um so I got arrested at a gas pump. I had pulled up to a gas station and finished getting my gas, and before I pulled away, I smoked a few pills, fentanyl pills, and knotted out again, fell out again. The cops show up. Actually, it was a canine unit, and he woke me up at gunpoint this time. I, yeah, I had knotted out, and he tapped on the glass with his pistol pointed at me,

and I remember waking up and looking over my shoulder and seeing his pistol pointed at my face like a couple inches away and being so out of it that it just like didn't even really register like i just reached for the door like yeah really wild situation when i look back on it um but yeah so i got arrested there um taken to jail again which was right after it was like a i'll say it was like two months after my second DUI arrest right so i got my first arrest and then i didn't get it in trouble again with new charges for like six years or something like that and then i got my second and third DUIs within two months of each other um and so the third DUI i was still going through the court cases for the second one um lost my license all that kind of stuff had to get an interlock

um and now i'm on probation still dealing with that and if i complete probation then i'm good to go um and i'm free and clear i've already completed all of my requirements for probation, paid all my fines, done all my community service, all my treatment, all my DUI classes, everything. So I'm literally just reporting and taking my UA's. That's it. But you didn't go to prison. You just got arrested and got bonded out and just... Yeah. So I, the reason I didn't end up going to prison was because I went to treatment. Instead, I went and did like a three-month like ComCore out here. It's called ComCore Community Corrections. So it's kind of the step between like county and prison it's like a um is it a residential yeah it's a halfway house basically

okay halfway house that has a residential drug program inside it um so i did a three month program there completed it with flying colors um just did amazing didn't even get written up nothing so they started to kind of work with me and they're like okay if you continue to do well we will you know work with you and they kind of amend the sentencing requirements because of how well I was doing and how much effort they saw that I was putting in and up till this this point they they still have been working with me I think I've only had a couple of slip-ups since that point okay what's a slip-up slip-up is like you know I found some dope on the ground and used once or was with somebody

and use but then like stopped right so like i know to the average person that sounds crazy i know that sounds totally wild but uh there's a total difference between like an addict single use and an addict like just going back to being an addict you know what i mean like if i'm doing really well and i slip up one time but then i get right back i get my shit back together i don't keep screwing up i keep i get back to doing the right things that's different in the court's eyes than somebody who is an addict who relapses and then continues to fail tests and continues to use and all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, they probably could have been justified, not probably, absolutely would have been justified if they wanted to put me in prison, but I think they took pity on me.

Where are you now? Where are you staying now? I'm with my parents now. What are you doing? And what are you doing for, are you just going to school? So on the side, I help in some grow houses and I also help like painting and stuff like that. Nothing. Well, it's legal out here. Oh, right. And it has like an alcoholic saying, nah, I work at ABC liquor. Well, I don't, okay. Fair enough. I mean, I don't know if I see it that way, but fair.

Right. You know, I mean, well, I mean, from my perspective, but, you know, I have no experience. And I'm not saying I'm speaking from a, you know, a position of authority or experience in any way. Like, I have no idea. Yeah. But. Well, and it's definitely not a popular opinion that I have. So I get it. And most public probably looks at it the same way you do, which is like it's obvious, duh, if you get involved with that, it's going to lead you back. And I think that's the case for a lot. I would, I mean, I was going to say for me, I would even think this, it wouldn't just be like an alcoholic working at ABC liquor. It'd be like a drug addict working at a bar. It's like you really probably should remove yourself from that situation any time, any moment of weakness. You know, but then there's going to be people that have the same opinion of like, no, you should be able to work around all that stuff and not drink at all if it's a problem or not, not be tempted at all. If you have it under control, you know, but let's face it, it doesn't always work like that. Yeah.

My perspective is, so are you familiar with Matt Services, like medication assisted treatments? Oh, okay. Like methadone, Suboxin, stuff like that. Yeah. So this is going to also sound wild again, but personally, And personally, cannabis is like a mat treatment service for me. When I smoke cannabis, I don't do opiates. I don't do hair. Do f***le, right? It's like my methadone or my suboxin treatment, except it doesn't lead me to do the opiates. It keeps me from the opiates. When I stop smoking

is when I usually relapse and go back to the opiates. So I had an issue with drug court because they wanted me on methadone, which is infinitely more dangerous and problematic. and harder to come off of, and I wanted to be able to just smoke cannabis because it was serving the same purpose, right, in my eyes, and I thought it was much safer. But because of federal law, that became a sticky situation. But personally, it's a, it's a medication-assisted treatment. I have a prescription. I'm not just doing it willy-nilly. But I understand it's kind of a, it's not a popular opinion. It's not a topic that everybody agrees on. Right. I'd have, you know, it's my father, you know, was just, you know, he was an alcoholic and he had, you know, took prescription medication. And, you know, throughout my whole life, he would go on, you know, binges. And then he would sober up for a year. And then he'd go on a two-week bender. And then he would sober up for six months. And then he would go on, you know, and he was in and out of, you know, rehabs, you know, for, you know, they were, we always said, you know,

you know, alcohol rehabs. But the truth is, it was also prescription drugs. That's just, I typically, because it's my, my mother, my families, you know, the go to is, well, he, you know, he's, you know, that, that seems better than saying, you know, he's, you know, he's taking fucking, he's on dope, you know what I'm saying? That's, nobody wants to, like, they, it's a, it's, it's a, it's, it's offensive enough. Right, it's, it's, it's, I was going to say it's offensive enough that he's an alcoholic. But, you know, he's a functioning alcohol.

hall, well, he was not really functioning because he was a, like a, he would just go on these benders and then he sat for two years and it'd be seem like he was fine. And then one day he'd walk in and he'd slur his words a little bit and you were like, that's weird, you know, and then you'd go sit on the on the couch and you something's, what's that? And you look under the cushion and there's a fucking half empty bottle of fucking booze. And you're like, mom didn't put that there you know it's like what's going on like and within and he could maintain it for like four or five days and then at some point you're like oh this fucker's drunk and then if we go on a two week they fuck you guys and then two weeks it'd be he'd be a nut job for two weeks and then

he'd sober up and his company would put him in a rehab put him in rehab for 30 days or 60 days or 90 days and then he'd get back out he'd be fine so it's like I understand that he's clearly didn't you know this is not something that it's almost like I don't want to say it's snuck up on him but it's you know and and you know what I account it to because I don't have any real experience my only experience is me saying man I really want to lose 10 pounds okay well you know what you do just cut back on your calories eat twice a day do this do that ride the bike for 30 minutes you know like there's only a couple of things and you'll very quickly you within two weeks you've lost to 10 pounds very easily because I can easily lose weight.

And then, you know, three days into my diet, it's like, you know, I'm going to grab a couple of chips real quick. I'm hungry. I'm just going to grab a couple of potato chips. And 10 minutes later, I'm sitting there with an empty bag and potato chip crumbs all over my, my stomach and my, and my chest watching TV going, what the fuck does happen? Why have I got an empty bag of potato chips here? I'm going to have just one and then I'm going to stop. Oh, my God. And it's just like, And so I do, I always account that. And then, listen, then it's like, well, you know what? I've already eaten a whole bag.

So why stop now? I've already crossed the line. There's cookies in there. What? I know that there's cookies. Might as well have some cookies. And listen, an hour and a half later, I've eaten a pint of ice cream, cookies, potato chips, a couple of yogurts, because I ran out of ice cream.

and I crawl into bed and I'm like, you're pathetic. What's wrong with you? Why did I do that? What just happened? And I do, and I do for some reason, I think, and that's just food. Like, what's a real drug? What's a real craving? So the way I try to liken it to my parents is like, because of how high addicts prioritize

their drug, like they'll prioritize it over food, over sex, over pretty much everything. So in their brain, their lizard brain is telling you this is needed for survival. Even though it's not, your brain is telling you that it is. So it's kind of like a mental illness in a way. But I liken it to my parents like, think about how thirsty you, like the thirstiest you've ever been in your life and then just not drinking or like being able to have a glass of water when you're the thirstiest you've ever been and just not doing it. like that's the level of discipline an addict has to exercise because that's how strong the urge is to use right like it's not it's not the same as like the average person not just choosing to stop drinking after two drinks you know what i mean like i i i don't care about alcohol i

i've never been a drinker i just don't like it i can have a beer and not touch it again for a year but my brother is the opposite he can't stop once he starts he's not really an opiate addict like i am He can't help the alcohol. So there's clearly something, some people just are addicts to everything. Some people are addicts to specific things. But there's clearly like a genetic mental tie to it past just like exercising self-discipline. You know what I mean? There's a really good movie that I've seen in almost every single one of the treatment centers I've been in.

It's called Pleasures Unwoven. It's a really good movie that. talks about like the disease model of addiction versus like the choice model and it goes into a lot of the science that's taking place during like a trigger or craving or what's going on in the addict's brain so just for anybody's curious sake if they'd like to look that up called pleasures unwoven I think it was back in like 96 when it was made so okay so what else? So what what what how did? And we ended up talking because you had watched a video and you left some comments and you were irritated with the guy that had, I forget what he had said specifically. And you were like, I'd like to have a conversation with this guy. He's way off and he's this. I was like, eh, it's probably not the best. I'm going to hear me this guy's thrown over. That's not going to go anywhere. Like, but then we started talking about. Um, but then we started talking. And I was like, you know, we should probably do a podcast. Like, you've got, you've clearly got, you know, some issues that have, you know, really dominated your life. Majorly.

Um, sorry. Hey, I have a quick question. What's the tattoo? It's a dragon. Does it go down the back of your neck too? No, it stops right back here. Oh. But, uh, I'd probably like to get some more done eventually.

But yeah, that's just, that's a dragon. I got that before. So this is something I left out of my story, but the felony charge that I got originally eventually got wobbled down to a misdemeanor like six years later. And so when that happened, I had already got my neck tattoo and had I not been a felon, I probably would never have gotten tattooed on my neck. But at the time I'm thinking, I'm a felon, there's nothing, a neck tattoo isn't going to stop me from getting anything the felony won't. You know what I mean? And then I wasn't a felon anymore, so I just got to make it work, I guess. Do you have other tattoos?

Oh, yeah, lots of tattoos. I'm all sleeved up here on my hand. I got a bunch on my midsection and back on my legs. Quite few. What are you doing? I love him, man. I love him. I've always been addicted to him.

Oh, I have a buddy who he's tattooed. I mean, his head, and him on his face all over his neck, he'd both arm, like, just his whole body. It's like, you know, he's also a tattoo artist, but still, I remember. I mean, this, I don't know if I'll ever be able to graduate to that. Yeah, he's got, they're just down like here and here on the neck. He's got like a little, it's kind of like an anchor or something right here. Like all these. And then when I got out of prison, I saw him, because when he left prison, he had tattoos,

but not on his face or his head or anything. And when I saw him, I said, bro, what are you doing? He's like, I know, I know. It's so funny, he'll say that like every once in while, someone will walk in or he'll walk up to somebody and they'll, kind of like look like like for just for a second like they're shocked or scared or something and he's he's always like what like I wonder what was that he's like oh that's right because I keep forgetting what I look like I get that a lot right I'm shaved with tattoos all over my head and my

face that I just walked up to this guy real quick he's the guy near they're shocked yeah it's it's it's wild how much differently people treat you once you have a neck tattoo it's it's absolutely true yeah he told me too uh when he got his neck tattoo that the because he was saying something to the guy that he because he was he was counterfeiting credit cars people he's doing carding people are getting arrested like he's thinking this is going to catch up to me I'm going to end up in prison at some point and he's he's like he's like five foot seven blonde hair blue eyed fair skinned 135 pounds he's like it's not going to look good this is not going to go well for me he's like I need something to toughen up my image so he went

to a buddy who was a tattoo artist and said hey I really think I want to get full sleeves, chest piece, you know, he's like, I want to toughen up my image. And the guy goes, honestly, like the placement of the tattoo, he's like, like, you get a face tattoo or you get a neck tattoo. He's like, that's really, that's saying something. He sends a message. Yeah, he said, what do you say? He said, that's like, that's telling society, like, I ain't getting a job at the bank, bro. Right.

He said, let's go with a neck tattoo. And then he got a couple of neck tattoo. Now it's the whole neck's done. but yeah it's definitely i think most people that get their neck tattoos there that's part of that where it's just kind of like an outward projection of telling people to leave me the fuck alone you know right like stay away um what was it i had one of my wife's co-definance has a neck tattoo that says trust no one i i did that at all i'm like what and then i interviewed this chick that had tacked all over and she had a she had a um the all-seeing eye and the the the pyramid on her neck

a neck tap and oh yeah right on the at like right in the front yes and and she just tatted it all up and everything else and it was just like grandma grandma what is that you know that's what i always picture how are you gonna yeah i'm just waiting for mine to get saggy and look awful too you know well honey back when I was a stripper At least it'll have a good story attached I guess right And grandma's a gangster So

Okay so So what's going on So what was your issue with the guy Which I don't know I think he was a police officer Yeah so I just I can't remember specifically What he had said either

But he had said something He was just being really flippant About like how people Oh no I'm sorry Now I do remember So in the video, he was talking about like an arrest that he or a stop that he had made. And the guy in the passenger seat had asked him why cops are always screwing with people, right? Right.

And he got all upset about it and was like pulled the guy out of the car and was addressing it to him. And the comment I had left was something along the lines of like, I don't understand why you're upset with the guy for asking the question that's like we all know cops screw with people. right like he was it's a fair question he might have been being an asshole and you might have had a good reason to stop that car but that doesn't mean the question he was asking you was ridiculous you know what i mean he was being the guy was being an asshole i'd fully recognize that but it was just i was just pointing out the hypocrisy of him being upset about it but also earlier in the thing he was talking about how other cops were super upset and and they were sensitive to how people treat them or how people react to them.

And then, like, the next story, he's, in my opinion, doing the same thing he was talking about. Right. But, yeah, so that was the gist of it. But it was just, it irritated me because I identify with addiction quite hard. Obviously, it's been a huge effect in my life. I have something like 30, I think I'm at 33 or 34, I have to check my book, but 34 people since high school that are friends and

acquaintances that have died to overdoses. um so it's a huge aspect to my life it's a problem and i know a lot of people in society like to look at addicts like they're just screw ups and that they're kind of the bane and a drain on society but in my opinion a lot of those people are struggling with something else and they could be productive members of society if the right things are addressed um and instead of throwing them away they would be able to like for me for example had i not got the felony charges originally and would have been able to continue with school and stuff, I think it's very unlikely my life would have turned out the way it did. Once I got the felony

and was unable to rejoin society, I didn't really have many other options than to try to survive the same way I had been living. You know what I mean? I definitely wasn't going to get a career once I got the felony. So, and since then, they've changed the felony laws and dropped them a misdemeanor for the drug possession, which I think it should absolutely be the case. But I think addicts in general, and not all of them, there's plenty of people who are addicts who love where they're at and will never try to get sober, don't want to be a part of society and are exactly the stereotype that most people have when they think of addicts. But I think a lot of other people are not, and those people just kind of get glossed over

because of the disdain for the stereotype. Right. Yeah, well, it's definitely something like it's, you know, like I've never, I've never drank or smoked or done anything. So I don't know exactly, you know, how it works. But what I do know is that, you know, I've seen people that clearly, you got to have this great, they're intelligent, they're smart, they know exactly what, you know, what the problems are. And then two months later, they're on drugs again. And you're like, what happened? And it's like, you know, like, this happens. And that happened. And I don't know why, but for some reason, I thought, you know what? I'm going to have a beer real quick. I could have a beer. Everybody's having a beer. I've been good. I haven't had anything. And for some reason at that moment, it made sense that I could have a beer. That one beer turned into four. And the next thing I know, I'm driving around this shitty neighborhood looking for a guy that used to sell me crack. And, you know, two days later, I wake up on a couch. And, you know, it's like, what the head? And he's like, spiral back quick. And then, Next thing you know, the guy's selling his car. Next thing you know, it's like, oh, my God. Like, what, like, you're thinking, like, exactly. You know, so, and then a week later, he's sober and realizes what he's done,

and he's going around to all these people that he's disappointed and try to ask them for help. And it's like, you know, it's upsetting because sober, it's like a great person and who knows and says all the correct things, but then suddenly there, they become, this it's almost like they become this other person and so it it's it's tough because ultimately you're right it does end up ruining ruining these people's lives and it's a burden on to me it's a it's more of a burden to throw them in prison than it is to keep to continue people like oh well you can't keep putting them in rehab really so you'd rather so you think that rehab is less ex is more expensive than throwing them in jail for three?

years. This guy could go to rehab five times in that time and not spend the amount of money you're going to spend on throwing him in prison and making him a felon and limiting his ability to get a license in a variety of different areas. And not only, first of all, possibly just eliminate it from being a possibility at all or at least making it so difficult most people shy away from it. I know plenty of people that have been sober, but they have a felony. And they won't try and get their real estate license, their mortgage license. They won't be trying to become all kinds of things because they're like, well, the problem is they want you to spend all this money, pass the schooling, pass the test, then go in front of a board and try and convince them

that they deserve to have this license. It's like, do you want me to spend six months and $10,000 of my time and money? On a whim, on a chance. to go in front of a board that may say, yeah, I'm sorry, we just don't give it to drug addicts. Or yours was for possession or your crime, you have two felonies that were three years apart. Yeah, we just don't do that. Well, why did you just have me go through the whole process? Right. It's funny you say that.

I'm sorry, I didn't interrupt. No, I was going to say, instead what happens is they say, yeah, I'm not going to do that. Fuck it. I'm just going to go a manual labor job, barely be able to pay my bills, really live on the fringes of society. which really just helps contribute to the fact or to me ending up using again. I can't really get my shit together. I'm around a bunch of people that are also using. Yeah, it's a situation.

It's a cycle. Well, and it usually leads to somebody like the buddy you were just talking about. I highly doubt he wanted to go through all of those problems, right? Like you said, he doesn't ever, like even when he takes that first drink, he's not intending for it to end up the way it does like no i don't think any i shouldn't say that i don't think most addicts really want what happens to them right it's it's a it's a problem of not being able to stop not the fact that they don't want to you know what i mean i think there's a lot of people that want to and can't and what sucks is with addiction because it's a spiral and it picks up so

fast that one week moment you can be doing well for 24 23 hours of the day but if you have that one week moment at the wrong time it can just snowball and spiral out of control and so it's one of those things that you every second of every day you have to be aware of it and vigilant and i've struggled with that type of relapse myself where i was doing well and i there's really no excuse to to relapse and i still can't help it you know what i mean and that's most people don't want to hear that, but I try and have tried very hard, and I haven't always been successful. Sorry. I was going to say, we mentioned the, we mentioned, you know, you started to interject something

when I said, talked about getting licensed. Oh, yes. I'm sorry. So I actually with the school I'm going to, with radiography right now, I never would have been able to do that with my felony before. So once the felony got dropped, I started the process with that. But there is an ethics board. that you have to check with.

So before I go to the school and start school, because it's two years of schooling, I need to check with the ethics board to make sure that they will certify me, right? Because like you were saying, I don't want to pay for the school for two years and then go to the ethics board and find out I can't get certified. So they have like a pre-ethics or a pre-certification ethics review or something like that, where you can basically like apply to them and be like, hey, here's my past, here's my history. Am I able to get certified?

which is what I went through to be able to go to radiography school. But to start school, I had to get cleared by the certification board. And the certification board says, yep, you're cleared pending proof that you have completed probation. Well, I'm not completing probation until 10 more months or whatever because they won't release me early even though I have everything finished and I'm waiting to go to school. They still refuse to release me early because I'm not. motion the court asking for it and they denied me so I basically have to wait 10 more months and now because I can't start the school until the certification board gives me the clear and I can't

get the certification clear until I finish probation that I're 10 months of limbo exactly so when you do it for work then working like I said I'm I'm helping in the grow rooms helping buddies oh yeah yeah yeah small odds and ends jobs I'm not really trying to go find like a normal job and then have to stop again in 10 months when I go to school you know so just kind of lucky that I have parents that are willing to help me right now and kind of help me work through a rough point in my life um I think they've recognized how much effort I've put into trying to do the right thing and so as long as I continue to do that they're willing to help me so I'm lucky for that very lucky okay do you have anything else you want to cover that you can think of

anything specifically not that I can think of off the top of my head I mean there's all sorts of other things in there like I didn't really touch on the overdose as much or anything so like if you would like to do this again there's probably more I could get into it's up to you do it now I don't do it okay well I mean when you say overdoses I thought the overdoses were in the car but that was just you just not you just you just kind of passed out and yes those were just not out so my actual true overdoses were like I would have died without intervention All of them happened at my parents' house. I'm sorry, not, there's one that didn't. All but one of them happened at my parents' house. And literally, by the grace of God, every single time they found me, Oding, and got to me in time before I was done. The first time it happened, I was in my parents' basement, and they knew I had been struggling really hard. I was still IV heroin. Actually, this is a wild fact, but all of my overdoses came from heroin. I have never overdosed on heroin, even though way more potent, and that's usually what kills people.

Because of my route of administration, I guess, maybe. The fentanyl has been safer for me, and the Ivy heroin was what I always OD'd on. Just kind of a weird fact. But so my first OD was at my parents' house. They came down, they would kind of come down and check on me every once in a while just because they knew I was in a bad place and came down and found that I had hit too much in a needle. Needle was still in my arm. We had an arcane at the house, so they had to bring and hit me with Narcan. The second time, I mean, the two or three of them were kind of the

same situation. The third time, my dad had to give me CPR because I had, been down and out that I was no longer breathing at all on my own. He had to give me CPR until the ambulance got there and basically manually get the Narcan into my system. And then the last one was relevant because that was the one where I think I was officially dead for a few minutes. My body temperature was a different level of cold that I've ever felt before. They, they had to hit me with like three hits of Narcan when normally one is plenty to wake me back up. They had to hit me like three different times. Again, manually, chest compressions and stuff to get into my system.

And that one was by far the worst. And the worst part about the overdoses is they didn't scare me at the time. They had no effect. I would literally OD and then go back use like right after I got back from the hospital. which shows you how problematic an addict's thinking is like that's not normal that's not a healthy brain doing that you know what i mean that's not that's not reasonable right so i mean when they bring you to the hospital what happens so they take you into um the er and they hook you up they check to make sure that your um pulse and breathing and blood pressure and all that's in normal ranges.

But another reason why they do it is because they want to have you under observation because some drugs have longer half-lifes than others. Like methadone sits in your system forever. So if you were to OD on methadone, people have like overdosed on methadone, gotten Narcan, thought they were okay, went home, and then went back into an overdose

when the Narcan wears off because the methadone lasts longer than the narcan does. so if your dose is high enough you can literally make it through a narcan dose and go back into an overdose and some people have died that way so depending on the substance you OD on you may or may not be out of the woods after you get Narcan the first time so I think that's a major portion of why they take you there for a couple hours usually they'll watch you make sure if anything changes in that period they'll extend it but if everything seems to kind of normal by that point that's usually when they'll release you and then they send you a huge fat bill for it so i mean they don't it's not it isn't there like a baker act well it i think it's florida they baker act do they they have something like that you mean like involuntary um yeah so we have something like that here in colorado too like a 72 hour thing and then you're like i don't know

the ins and outs of it but we have something similar to that here um but i never that that was not done to me I think usually like your family has to go to them and say hey this is the problem if he gets back out he's on drugs he's using drugs he gets back out he was going to kill himself like and they're like okay so then they'll hold you for like yeah like three days until and then they have to release you I think there's different levels one's Baker Act one is March I think it's Marchman acted I think Baker acted is when you're like mental it's a it's like you're you know I don't I don't want to say crazy, but, you know, like you're mentally, they're afraid they're going to, they're going to commit suicide or something. And I think Marchman acted is when it's like your family says, look, this guy's a drug addict. He's, he's going to kill himself. And they like force you to go through treatment and stuff like that. They just hold you for like three days and they let you go. They can extend it for like 10 days if you say the wrong thing. But let's face it, after three days, you're going to say the right stuff. Yeah. Much better. So glad that this happened. You know, I, I, it would, it would. They were overreacting.

It's not that bad. Like, you're going to say the right things. Yeah, definitely. It's a good point. So, okay. So, yeah, they have the same thing in Colorado. Pretty sure. I don't know the term of it, but yeah, I remember being in treatment with some guys.

And actually, now that you say that, it might even be a step further in Colorado, because I feel like I remember somebody that I was in treatment with that had been put there. They didn't have any criminal charges, but the courts were able to force them to go through. And if they don't, then they would be held for a certain period of time in the jails or something to that effect. I don't know the ins and outs of it. But I remember it was past just like a 72-hour hole because I actually had an ex-girlfriend that went through that. But this was something past that. Okay.

So what else? That's it? Are we good? Yeah, I think we're good. I figured that was probably relevant to put in there. But yeah, I think that's pretty good. overview of the nonsense I've put myself through. Your poor parents.

Yes, very much. They are saints. I could never repay what they've done for me in a thousand lifetimes. Yeah, I was going to say, yeah, that's like my mom, like, he's coming to see me in prison. Like, Jesus, like, you're sitting there and you're just like, fuck, like, you know, they're, it's just like, what a, you know, you, I definitely. every time she came to see me like I was glad she I really really she came to see me and I wanted her to come see me for her because she wanted to come see me but for me it was horrible every time it was just like I'm destroying this person I'm just a horrible human being like I'm a shitty son

and that's a horrible feeling you know they they stuck by me through county at well I guess I didn't really go into that but I've only done like six months of county time two separate stints of like three months, but they were beside me for the whole time through that too. And similar to what you just said, it was hard for me to be knowing that I'm hurting them, but also to be in contact with the outside world that I can't be a part of. So it was hard for me. Like, I wanted to just kind of seal myself away and have no outside contact until I finished my time. So I didn't have the reminders of the outside world. But I knew for them that would have been hard. So I, you know, engage with them while I was in jail and they stuck by me and you know I wasn't that long nothing like your prison

sin but um but I can relate to that feeling well what do they do for our living like they're like normal people like so they were both um like corporate management uh my mom was part owner of an elevator company and my dad was like a product manager oh it's worse it's even worse it would like it would have been to jail they've they've got their problems they're both alcoholic they're there well okay so my mom's side they there's quite a bit of addiction that flows through the family but none of them have been arrested none of them like none of that none of have been a treatment nothing like that so i definitely was the black sheep in that in that stick it's all bad well listen i mean i mean i hope everything works out

at this point um yeah good talk and i appreciate it very much man It was good talking. It was good. I was surprised when you responded to me. So, thank you. Yeah, I try and, you know, I try and, like, you know, the problem is sometimes I get so busy. Like, I won't answer any questions or comments for three or four days. And people don't realize, like, there's 50 or 100 comments, sometimes two, 300 comments.

If it's a good video or two, there may be 300 comments a day. So three days later, there's almost 1,000 comments. And so, like, I never get to them. so you know i start answering the comments that are coming in and then so i can't that's where i'm always like i try and answer as many as i can't and maybe i'll get really good and i'll have a slow week and i'm literally every day answering comments every day and so some people will email and here's the other thing some people i'll check like i'll check my email you know whatever four three four o'clock in the morning i'll wake up and my wife sleeping and i'll pull my phone out and just

start looking through emails and I'll see an email that's like like that like I want to respond to that email that's a good I need to respond to that I feel I feel like I want to talk to this person I want to respond and then I'll I'll mark it unread and then I'll think I'll do it later like I can't do it right now I'm laying in bed and I'll type something I want I'll type something up later well then the problem is is an hour later yeah my wife wakes up we go to the gym we come back you know whatever. I answer a couple of emails or I do something. I pay some bills. She leaves. I end up getting on a podcast. It's two hours. Something happens. I have to talk. I have a meeting. I have another podcast. I do that podcast. Before I know it, 30 or 40 or 50 more emails have come in.

And now I'm answering those emails. And two days later, I don't remember that email anymore. And it's not that I didn't mean that I didn't want to. It's that there's so many coming in. And there are some people, you know, look, some people just say stuff. And some people just like, yo, bro, you know, I watch your stuff and it means so much to me. I want to just let you know. And, you know, and it's like super cool and I can send a quick email. Or sometimes they don't even, they're like, I don't even expect you to respond. I just wanted to let you know that, you know, you talked to this guy and it totally reminded me of my story.

And it was a great story. I'm going to let you know, keep going. Great. It doesn't really require. But some people say really heartfelt stuff. And I think, man, I'd really like to respond to that guy. even if it's just, hey, I got your message. I read it and I appreciate you sending the, and, you know, and I don't.

And, you know, I feel like a dick because of that. And it's not that I'm trying to, that I'm like, oh, you know, I don't have time for you, bro. It's because, like, there's so much stuff coming in and it's just me. You know, so, you know, if I, if I've missed anybody out there, it's like, I'm not trying to be a dick. It's just, I just happen to be one. It just happens to be happening. It's not my fault. people I think if people can't recognize that like you being you singly a person can't address every comment and still be able to provide everything that you've been providing content wise and have a normal life like if people can't recognize that that's a them problem you know right so I think I was impressed and surprised that you you were saw and addressed it so I think you're light years ahead of most content creators in that regard so like I said I really appreciate it well I'm

cool. Well, that's something. Definitely. All right. Well, listen, I appreciate it. Hey, I appreciate you guys watching. Do me a favor and hit the subscribe button, hit the bell so you get notified of videos just like this. Leave me a comment. I will try and respond.

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