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A's Story

"I was born at Lenoir Rhyne Hospital in Hickory, NC. on July 18, 1988 weighing about 14 ounzes. My grandfather called me "hugey" and my whole famly thought I was going to be fat. My first word was "Ma" on May 14th, 1990. I don't remember much of myself as an infant.

I began attending middle school at Viewmont Elementary, were we had a guinea pig as a pet in my homeroom class. My dad owned three dry cleaning stores in North Carolina and I would help him after school everyday on weekdays. On the weekends I would usually be at my moms place of work, The Church of the Ascension. She taught Sunday school and she was my teacher, so I was always on my best behavior.

My father was very into golf and became a Pro at Lake Hickory Country Club. We played in a lot of father and son tournaments when I was younger and we were pretty succesful. I also enjoyed playing tennis and took lessons and practiced with my family and friends.

I moved to Sarasota, Florida in 1999 and began to attend a small private school called Out of Door Academy, I shortly got kicked out and started to attend Cardinal Mooney, were I did pretty well in school. I enjoyed playing the bass and practiced all the time.

I started smoking that marijuana in the ninth grade and experimented with a lot of other drugs as well as partying and drinking on the weekends with friends. I got kicked out of Mooney on my Senior year for failing a drug test and got charged with possesion of marijuana and a knife in my car. I then finished high school at Sarasota High, This was easy and I graduated with a good GPA and shortly after I went to Gainesville to start college. There I did very well, eventhough I was smoking pot daily and drinking occasionally.

My life became unmanageable when I returned home to Sarasota and all of my friends were doing pills and hardcore drugs. My life went downhill and I went from snorting pills to smoking oxycontin and then came shooting them. I was heavily addicted to the rush and tried quitting on my own many times without success. My mom knew there was something wrong with me but I denied it, until she saw track marks on my arms. She tried to get me clean by sending me to detox, which I relapsed from immediately.

After realizing I couldn't recover in Sarasota, my mother decided to send me to Synergy Group Services, and I couldn't be any happier. I came here on December 2, 2009 and now here 24 days of sobriety under my belt and for the first time in many years I am enjoying being sober. I am going to be staying here for another month and plan on staying in West Palm Beach because the change in environment has been really good for me.

LL's story

From what I can recall I thought I had a wonderful childhood, I remember how we raised Saint Bernard puppies and how I cuddled with them and rode them like ponies when they got older. We usually had at least two Saint Bernards and despite their drool I adored them and they became my playmates.

I did have an older brother and sister (half siblings), but they were always doing chores and I guess I was too young so I was left to play by myself. My father was really strict and my mother was always trying to protect my brother and sister, therefore her time with me was very limited, "not now Lynn" was a very common statement.

My first recollection of a weight issue was in day camp when I was in the 6th or 7th grade, I was called buck teeth and thunder thighs, I began drinking diet 7 up and exercising. my mother has always exercised every morning and I just copied what she did. My mother has always watched her weight and exercised as long as I can remember; she also had always hid food under her bed and in her closet so to me that was normal.

In early high school I would try not to eat all day and then eat downstairs by myself at night. My brother and sister had both moved out when I was younger to get away from my father so I was left with a very depressed mother ( who hid in her room) and a very lonely father (who was very bitter).

I cannot actually recall the first time I binged and purged but it must have been on the 10th or 11th grade, so about 15 or 16. I thought it was great to be able to eat and still not get fat so that became my new routine and practically my life, school, home, binge, sleep, binge, watch tV, and bed. I still had friends but didnt really hung out with any of them.

At 16 I got a job as a car hop, yes, I did wear roller skates. I am not sure if working around food was the best job but that is what I did for the next ten years or more. I did manage to go to college but I lived at home so I could live with my food. School, work, and food then I added alcohol.

So I graduated from colleege eventually with an english and paralegal and still continued to live at home and weitress; to this day I still live next door to my mom and dad, I think I may still be trying to get their approval. My parents love me in their own way, they have not actually ever said it so although my mom tries to say it I dont really feel it but I still keep hoping.

I have been to different therapists throughout the years, as a child I think I was depressed so my mother took me to different therapists, but I was never really honest I was just happy to spend time with mom and have the attention.

Perhaps my disease started out to get attention and then it turned into an addiction. After almost spending more than half of my life I am ready to spend the next half of my life healthy and happy.

I am here today at Synergy Group Services to begin a new life of happiness the old Lynn with bad habits will always be remembered to teach the new Lynn how wonderful and happy and healthy life can and will be.

My Story

“I remember smoking my first joint by the wood stairs when I was eight years old. That summer I asked my father who owned a bar and gas station, if my brother, cousin, and myself could have a beer from the fridge in the garage. He said “drink all the beer you want” as he laughed.

As I walked I walked away in front of my family telling them I would hate the taste, my brother, cousin and I two to three beers each. We all enjoyed feeling the grown ups at the party at our home on the lake. Some more partying, some more drinking, except we no longer asked, we just assumed it was ok. Then one day my dad caught us in the garage getting drunk and screamed at us with out cousin being told to get his “god damn ass out of the garage”. My brother and I were beaten as per usual and sent to our rooms which was worse because it as noon on Saturday and we knew we couldn’t leave until at least a week, except to eat and use the bathroom. My brother and I never, ever got the message. We always drank and smoked pot from that day on.

I had a friend who let me grow marijuana with him and I sold it to fellow students and high school students who were right directly next door to our junior high. I would hide it in the drop ceiling in the boy bathroom, then carried it in my gym bag, then I got into a fight in one of my classrooms and was told to go to the office. I refused because I had a half a pound of weed in my gym bag, needless to say the principal came down and got me and said “bring the gym bag”. After finding my stash he called my father and he was there in no time. He walked into the office, bitch slapped me across the face and kicked me in the shin. The principal stood up and said “Mr. Millard I am not going to have any of that in here” my father screamed “sit the F*** down, I am running the show here”, he turned around and kicked me and slapped me again!

I was suspended for ten days, I pushed and shoved all the way to the car. He took me straight to the barber and shaved my head which was past my shoulders, then he took me in the car, punching me on me my legs and ribs, slapping me on my face, the whole way home. When we arrived home he made take my door off my bedroom and screamed at me for hours. This didn’t work, I drank even more, I felt worthless and I started working our like a mad man, running four miles a day, lifting weights and rowing my boat around the lake. I was training to kick some a**!

I was suspended ten times for beating up people by the ninth grade. I was drinking a fifth of whiskey a day with my friend doing the same. This was the only time I made the honor roll. Nobody knew I was drunk, I sat calmed and listened. I quit smoking pot in the tenth grade due to paranoia and not being able to approach or be around girls. My drinking continued yet I excelled in sports and fighting, I was brought up to varsity football as a Sophomore and was kicked off the team for coming to practice drunk. I also made the varsity basketball team as a sophomore and was kicked off for the same reason.

After high school I continue to fight and drink for a short time until I was arrested twice for beating up people and was charged with drunk and disorderly. My life was out of control. Then things went from bad to worse, my mother left my father and I decided to move in with her, she told me that if the porch light was on I could not come home. I spent many night sleeping in my car. One night my father jerked the door opened and asked me what the hell was I doing? I told him the truth. He said “come back to my house, your mother is smoking crack and dating a drug dealer”. This just floored me because my mother never drank or drugged, she was a health nut athlete. I started drinking to the point of black outs and fighting every time I went to parties, drove on the road and knocked a janitor out cold in a small bathroom.

In 1986, after that I knew I had to leave Michigan. I moved to Florida and got a job and became sober. Obsessed with working out four hours a day six days a week drinking was now binge drinking only on the weekends. My life was better being away from all the drunk friends, and my mothers crack problem. In 1989 I got married to an Irish girl whom I had gotten pregnant. We had met a year earlier and partied like rock stars.

I was a good father and loved my wife, my drinking was still there but I would never black out, I only drank once every other weekend, six to eight drinks tops. My marriage ended in divorce due to my wife cheating on me, I was devastated. I had also been having major health problems since 1990 due to a surgeons negligence, leaving a clip on my bile duct for four days during gal bladder surgery, resulting in fourteen operations including bypass surgery.

I met a Christian girl in 1997, lived a basically clean life, sang at our church and loved all my kids like crazy. We grew apart in 2000 due to the fact that she never worked once in three years. I paid child support and supported her and I working seven days a week. By then I didn’t want a relationship. I was scared of women and didn’t have any long term relationships for six years. Partying the hardest I had ever had before. I was so lost and lonely and I felt I would never meet someone. I always met very beautiful women all the time but would be afraid to get hurt. I hurt a lot of people so I would just go out and get drunk. By then my mother had been using crack on and off for twenty years and was really ill and was now drinking hard because her twin sister died of cirrhosis of the liver from alcoholism that year yet she continued to drink. This drove me crazy and made me feel like a piece of s***!

On February of 2006 I received a phone call from my first love, Cathy who lived in Orlando. I went to visit her two weeks later for a drink. We sat at the dinner table after not seeing each other for twenty years, put our head together and held hands, it was beautiful. Like we were in 1982, we dated for a year, long distance. She saw my drinking problem and instantly put and end to it, and I stopped, she cheated on me. Heartbroken as I was it only lasted about a month. We lived so far, 182 miles apart with careers we couldn’t possibly leave, we both knew in our hearts it would end we just never talked about it. The night we broke up I drank until I blacked out. Did that for two weeks on and off and then decided to get a second job to keep myself on track, I did that until November of 2007, when I met Kelly.

We met at a bar and moved in together two months later. I drank with no control because she didn’t know me and my problem. She never really once got intoxicated, staying in control yet having fun with me. I soon learned after falling in love that I had made a mistake. She was cold and unloving. I was left to do all the house work and responsibilities around the house. Laundry, dishes, mop the floors, garbage, mail, etc. The worse problem was the loneliness I felt. I couldn’t leave, my heart was so in love with her. She didn’t go out to bars and didn’t cheat on me. For once, someone faithful. I had to put up with her faults. After a year of this and her being gone from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. and sleeping all day and sometimes three days in a row I would get so lonely, I would tell and justify in my head looking back now, that I can go and have a couple of drinks, but it would turn in to twenty or thirty. Sometimes missing work.

I have put her through a horrible time I have been hurt as well but take full responsibility for her leaving me, yet, I found myself so hurt and lonely. I am focused and so grateful that I convinced my case psychologist to put me in PHP instead of IOP so I could get the tools that I needed to take this plan I have, one day at a time”.

Terry's Story

“I was born and raised in Freeport, Long Island. Soon to move and settle in a beautiful new development named “tree area” in Hauppauge, N.Y. My biological family included Richard, Anita, Nancy, Timothy and I.
My early years were great. Very fond memories of playing especially baseball, but I was a bundle of fire from the get go. We had a retention pond across from my house which we called the sump. My second home “the sump” was truly a wonderful thing, we created a little eco system in there. We would ride our bikes to Blydenberg Park and catch fresh water bass, trout, sunfish, carp and catfish, which we would bring them, back to the swamp where they took off and grew to be a great fishing area.
I played little league baseball in which I excelled very fast. School was another story, I really have too much interest I did minimal requirements to graduate and all my electives were home economics, wood shop, or auto mechanics. Most were home economics, because I love food and I was the only guy in the class.
I smoked my first cigarette at age 12 and got sick as a dog but by age 15 it had become an everyday thing. I got drunk for the first time at age 14, we went over to a friend’s house and his parents were not home. We took a bottle of scotch and Brian and I drank most of the bottle. I do not remember much of that night, but I will never forget the shame, regret and sick I felt the next day. Around the same time in the tenth grade I smoked my first joint. I did not feel a thing. The next day at lunch period I smoked another joint with Mike and when we went back inside everything was echoing and I felt as if I was on a “really good trip”. I really truly enjoyed it. Of course looking back now, it was a pathway to my destruction lasting the next 32 years. In March, spring tour, when the tour bus came by I got on and that is when it all began, I found Jerry Garcia and The Grateful Dead.
The Grateful Dead was a major part of my life for 14 years. The Dead would tour 3x a year, spring, summer, and fall. My geographic boundaries in which I followed them scanned from Buffalo down to Virginia and out to Ohio. I would guess I saw around 300 shows until Jerry Garcia died on August 8, 1995. His death was attributed to a heart attack, while in Rehab. I guess that life style was not healthy and he also was obese and a drug addict.
Rewind and Recap:
I graduated Hauppauge High in 1980, leaving with my high school sweetheart Cathy. We started dating when I was 16 and she was 15. We were together in what I considered a wholesome relationship, I was in love with her, but it did not last. In my third year of college we had been a couple for about 7 years. At this point she wanted to get married. I told her my plans were to finish college and get a job and after I have saved some money we could take the next step. She was not content with this, so inevitably we went our separate ways. I was truly heartbroken, and went camping foe about 12 days by myself and tried to fill that hole in my heart with Pot and Beer. Eventually I got over her and graduated from Brooklyn Polytechnic University with a Bachelors of Science in Civil Engineering.
While I was in school I was working at the “Tool Warehouse” as a salesman, stock person and when we grew, 3 new stores were built in Long Island. All during college I had to work to pay tuition. So I was determined because it was money that I was spending. I did not have the luxury of getting a free ride from my parents, like most of my classmates. Being one that did not have any formal math or science coming out of high school, I really had to work hard to get through college.
During college I met a girl at the Tool Warehouse named Maryanne. She was, as it turns out, on of the best things to happen in my life. To this day she is my best friend. She came from a family of 13 siblings, very religious and family orientated. I would like to call her a “friend with benefits”. In the beginning and for years to come, she always seemed to keep coming back into my life. As she said “I am like a wart on your ass that won’t go away.” She was there for me always when I needed somebody in my life to talk to.

In June of 1992 I had crossed the line this was the first time I had tried Heroin. It was casual, recreational at first but soon turned into a love affair lasting 17 years. When I was hooked on Heroin it took my family 3+ years to find out, and the only way they found out was by getting a call from a police officer telling them I was arrested in lower Manhattan for possession of narcotics. Mean while my family was waiting at home to surprise me with a birthday cake. But, instead, they got a phone call. I was really pissed that no one in my family knew the turmoil I was in. they had started suspecting something was up, but they did not know what exactly was going on! It took my getting arrested and a court ordered detox to see my demise. I was carrying such a load for a long time and knew if I did not dump it soon I would go crazy. So up pops Maryanne into my life again. She truly is wise beyond her years. I finally broke and revealed my other half to her before getting arrested, and it felt like a ton was just taken off my shoulders. I was not ready to stop so I asked Maryanne to pick me up two hours after I was released from the Beth Isreac Detox so I could cop. I regressed to my old ways almost instantaneously. I found out that the vortex gets quicker and harder each time I fell back to my old ways.
I finally decided to become a better functioning drug addict. I got of the hard stuff and entered a methadone maintenance program on 1st ave. and 9th street in Manhattan. I was working in the area at the time so it worked into my schedule. I then became a really good functioning drug addict. My dual life was seamless, and I thought I could continue this path with no trouble, but I was mistaken again. My last ex, Lisa, who I went to college with, we had a good relationship at first but it ended bad. She had bought her parents house in Merrick, L.I. N.Y. We had a dog Colby, mix of Lab and Pit Bull. He is a great dog. We often would go to an animal shelter and feed all the dogs, who we would as it turned out, we would take into our house and love him to death. “Monty” was Carpee and Pit bull mix. He was a gush and we were head over heals with him.
In 2005 we went to Lisa’s parents house located near Cornell University. They had roughly 100 acres in which dogs loved. They ran around chasing critters and us chasing them. We all had a great time there, except the weekend of april 20 something 2005. Monty was running and playing as usual, I was reading a book with coffee. My morning ritual. But this turned out to be one of my worst mornings. I was doing my M.O and the dogs were doing theres, when all of a sudden I saw a new white caddy driving up the road and I heard a thud. I thought the worst and it ended up being even worse then I could have expected. The lady in the Caddy had hit Monty, at first he did not appear injured. He walked across the street to me and within 5 minutes died in my arms. The grief was nothing I have ever felt.
We went home but I was never the same and I knew it never would be the same. About 2 weeks later, I got this incredible pain in my chest and thought I was having a heart attack. I let it go and it went. Then it happened again and when these attacks started coming 5 times a day I went to the doctor. He diagnosed me with having a Panic Attack Episode. Not a heart attack. This diagnosis he prescribed Xanax. I had no more panic attacks, but a new addiction had arisen. My fault because I did not do my homework and read about the drug. I came to find out how dangerous and addictive it was.
I was now progressing in a merry go round I could not get off. I was on two addictive drugs now and felt hopelessly lost and no one to turn to but my best friend Maryanne. My ex Lisa did not know about the Xanax until I was on it for 3 years, and taking 8mg per day.
The shit hit the fan when one day I really wanted to get high. I knew if I did opiates I would not feel the effects with the methadone, so I ended up smoking crack. Wrong move again!! This led to my ultimate demise. I got into it heavy and lost everything, my girlfriend, my family, my job, myself. I knew I was in trouble, but little did I know how much.
The end came when I crossed a line I never would have dreamed I would cross. I was always lucky enough to support my own habit, but like I said I lost everything and money was scarce. I turned to stealing to fill that empty feeling. I had in my own mind crossed the concrete wall I thought I would never be able to cross. I took jewelry from my sister and brother in law, to get a fix.
I knew I hit rock bottom “Pun Intended”. I researched rehab places. I did not know my sister was also doing the same and we both converged on a place called Synergy Group Services, Inc. At first I thought to myself, “this sounds too good to be true”. But after I went to Palm Beach I realized this is the place I needed to be in, but I had one last task to fulfill. I had to confront my sister and brother in law about what I did in order for me to get what I needed out of rehab. I did it, and it was the most difficult thing I had to do. But I had to do it before I get better. Then “knock, knock” I was home at Synergy Group Services, Inc. and was welcomed with opened arms”.

His Story

My name is Kevin. . I am twenty one now and times are tough but I have a very optimistic view for the future as a sober being. When I was younger, I was active in many sports and every sport I played. I was one of the best! I learned how to ride a bike very young and was pretty dependent as a 4-6 year old. I remember leaving the house without telling anyone and I would go to a friend’s house. In elementary school, I had good remarks and I played basketball, soccer, baseball and football with my friends.
After sixth grade I switched schools because we moved. I had to leave all of my friends behind, which made me very sad. It took some time but I adjusted to the change.
At 14yrs I attended a big high school called Lakewood High. There, I played Varsity Golf my freshman year and was number four on the team. We set all kinds of records. My grades also were good in the ninth grade. My sophomore year was a bit different. (I never skipped class), but for some reason I started skipping and my grades started falling. During that period I was tested for ADHD and found out that I had it. Being diagnosed with that my parents decided to switch me to a smaller private catholic school called Cardinal Mooney. I loved it there, it was the best decision that could have been done. There, I became very religious, played Varsity Golf and Basketball. It was the best time of my life. I rarely partied and did no drugs. During my free time I played basketball all night and golfed all afternoon. I was very active and independent. I started to chew and use tobacco when I was 16 years old, but when I took up baseball I quit smoking to chew.
I feel that my addiction started when they prescribed me adderall for my ADHD. The first time that I ever smoked pot was with my two sisters and my aunt. After that I never really tried smoking for a while. But after I graduated high school I began to smoke a little. It wasn’t until my 19th birthday that I began smoking more. And at about that time everything started going downhill.
On August 30th 2007 I had about a dozen people at my place for my birthday and when the night ended there was a girl that was going 80mph with no seatbelt, crashed into a tree and died. I got charged with open house party and that really hurt me. That school year was over, I moved back home and started to work, play golf more and go to school. On October 2008, I began using Roxy’s. By February I told my parents I had a drug problem. I did a four day detox and stayed clean for a bit, but for the next four months I was on and off roxy’s. by June 1st I was using everyday and my addiction began to control me and everything around me. I began stealing more and although I was lying to everyone. I began lying even more.
Even with my addiction, I was able to have a 4.0 gpa and I would practice golf everyday. So I guess I just felt that it was ok.
By august, I began shooting Roxy’s again and using more. I turned 21 on August 30th, the morning after I was in jail. With possession charges.
My life was Fxxked up and now I am dealing with everything head on and I know if I can beat this, then I can achieve anything.

Hopes and Dreams

“When I was a young child I had many hopes and dreams, I wanted to go to college and play sports, meet the girl of my dreams, get married and maybe have children. But then at the tender age of eighteen I found something that made me feel better that anything I had experienced before, crack cocaine. The euphoria was unbelievable but what I didn’t know is that it would take everything I owned, and then it took my soul. It took away all the moral and values I had when I was young.

I went through numerous rehabs and went to jail numerous times. What crack didn’t tell me was that it would take away every hope and dream I had. My addiction told me it would stick with me and make my problems go away, including feelings, it took my soul away, and once it was done with me it tossed me away like a piece of trash.

I am not the only one, millions of people suffer from the disease of addiction and most need help to stop, without this help most will end up in jails, institutions and even dead. How many people do you know that have lost their battle to this disease and lost all their hopes and dreams?”