Now What Do I Do?

• I graduated at 17, started college for barber/cosmetology at NATC. I felt alone and isolated for the first time in my life. I was away from younger friends that were still in high school, and most of using buddies weren't interested in college.
  
  I turned 18, and was making some older using buddies. With that came the "harder" drugs. I started doing cocaine on occasion. I drank in a bar for the first time with a classmate. No matter where I seemed to go I always gravitated towards people that used drugs.
  
  That same year I began dating one of the two biggest mistakes in my life. I wouldn't know it until about a year and a half down the road. His name is Eric. The first six months seemed to be rather perfect. We had fun, and seemed to be functioning well as a couple. We were also doing a lot of drugs, so maybe I was just blind to him being an asshole.
  
  Around six months, I clued him in on a little secret. This ended in me getting my ass kicked (the first of many times), and the only time I fought back. I must say I kicked his ass back. He fully had it coming though. We both went to jail, and I vowed to myself no one was ever worth going to jail for again. Besides, the courts don't care if you're defending yourself.
  
  That was also the first blemish on my adult record. (I did get an underage at 16 when I went to a concert.)
  
  Somewhere in all of the chaos that was going on, I had a very brief moment of clarity. I thought, "People probably don't party like this. Maybe I should do something about this, or just stop." Unfortunately that was as far as that thought went. And because of the incident with Eric I began having a little contest with myself. I tried on a daily basis to put as many, and as large quantity of drugs into my system. It didn't matter if it was pot, mushrooms, acid, X, Valium, cocaine, and whatever else I could get my hands on.
  
  Never once did I try and stop, but then again I didn't have a true desire to quit using. Along with physical abuse, Eric was beginning to break me. I wouldn't look anyone in the eye, I spent less time with people I really cared about, I was afraid to speak to my male friends, I thought I was worthless, and this was as good as it was going to get. I was afraid to tell my family what was going on. I was living in fear and shame.
  
  This point in my life was like being at the top of a massive roller coaster in the clouds, but you have no idea when you're going to drop, or what's waiting for you at the bottom.