My Story

I’m 15 years old, and I want to share my story.
I grew up in a family where addiction was a part of everyday life.
My father loved gambling and always seemed to put his friends before his family. Eventually, he became addicted to drugs as well. He died when I was three years old after getting into a fight while defending one of his friends.
My mother loved him deeply. After he died, she was never able to cope with the loss. She turned to drugs, and her addiction quickly took over her life. I witnessed two of her overdoses.
I remember the first one as if it happened yesterday.
I was about six years old. It was evening, and it was already dark outside. At home were my grandmother, my aunt—my mother's sister—and me. My aunt was also addicted to drugs. In fact, she was the one who had introduced my mother to them.
My mother had been in the bathroom for a long time. My grandmother started knocking on the door, but there was no answer. She listened for a moment, and then panic set in. She started screaming that my mother wasn't breathing and desperately tried to break the door down, but she couldn't.
My aunt ran to get help from one of the people she sold drugs to. He came over and forced the door open.
What I saw that night is something I'll never forget. My mother's body was bent forward in a horrifying position. I stood there watching everything unfold, completely frozen. I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. It felt as though my whole body had shut down. I stayed that way until the ambulance arrived.
It happened again not long afterward, this time during the day.
Because my aunt was addicted too, almost every holiday ended in shouting and violence. Several times, people connected to her kicked in our front door. To this day, I panic whenever someone knocks unexpectedly. That fear has never really gone away.
My aunt's behavior became more and more disturbing. She attempted to overdose on pills twice. Whenever she was about to do it, she would announce it to everyone in the apartment. Another time, she tried to slit her wrists.
My mother's third overdose was the one she didn't survive.
She died when I was nine years old.
After that, my grandmother became my legal guardian. But my aunt continued using drugs, and her health steadily deteriorated. She developed numerous serious illnesses.
Just before New Year's, she died too.
Her death was slow and agonizing. She spent two days dying in the room next to mine. I didn't sleep for either of those nights because I could hear someone dying just beyond the wall.
Since then, I've struggled with insomnia and mild paranoia. I eventually saw a psychiatrist, who prescribed antidepressants. So far, they haven't helped much.
Despite everything I've lived through, I've become deeply interested in addiction and the people whose lives it affects. I want to understand why it happens and how people can be helped.
Sometimes I think I'd like to become an addiction psychiatrist myself—someone who can help people and their families avoid the kind of pain that shaped my childhood.