How We Met

It was May 26, 2006. My chin-length black hair was tangled and knotted, and was standing up in all directions. It hadn't been brushed in several days. Before they took me there, I hadn't been off the floor of my apartment in several days. I don't remember how I got there.

I was sitting at a table in the main room of a large building. My head was down. I felt like I had been hit by a bus. I just stayed that way. Time passed. People walked around me.

Then, someone picked my head up by my hair. I saw blue eyes, an attractive face. "Are you ok?" he said. "Let me get you some ice water." When you're coming off a drinking binge, ice water is life. It feels amazing.

He brought it back to me and waited for me to drink it. "Better?"

"Yes."

"Listen, meet me in the kitchen in five minutes." and he was gone.

I was intrigued, which was a big deal given my current state. I met him there. He showed me a comb and said, "I thought I could comb your hair for you. It really needs to be combed." I nodded, and he combed my hair ever so gently. Then, he kissed my lips and left. I was speechless, so surprised, and the only thing I could think was, "Huh." I was speechless, even in my own mind. I wondered where this would lead.

I was in rehab. So was he. His name was Tony, and he drank as much as I did. No one ever drank as much as me. I had tried to quit once on my own and had a seizure from the withdrawals. That happened at work. I had since lost that job.

Tony didn't like being in rehab. He wanted out. He felt caged, and he rebelled. He screamed and wanted out. He wanted them to call his mom to come get him as soon as possible. I wanted them to make him stay. The idea of him leaving filled me with panic, despite the fact that we'd just met. But to my dismay, they let him go. His mother came to pick him up, and he was gone, just like that.

He left his phone number though, and when I called him from rehab, he sounded so excited to hear from me. He said he had missed me! He waited patiently for me to be released from rehab. He was already drinking again.

I didn't plan on drinking anymore, but once I met up with him, I quickly lost that resolve, and I was drunk with him. I started staying with him at his mom's house, and I abandoned mine. I also stopped talking to my family. They had tried repeatedly to help me, for ages. They had told me that if I started drinking again, I'd need to do it alone because they couldn't watch me die. But something between Tony and I had clicked, and I stayed with him. We were together.

Tony and I drank incredible amounts of vodka. Both of us. We needed it first thing when we woke up. We would wake in the middle of the night and need a shot to be able to go back to sleep. We would wake up and need a shot before we could get out of bed. We got the shakes if we went more than two hours without drinking.

Sundays, the liquor stores were closed, though. We had to plan ahead if we wanted to have liquor on Sunday, and one week, we forgot it was Saturday. That Sunday, we went to a nearby bar and had some drinks, but we only had a little money, and it didn't go far.  And early that Monday morning, Tony had a seizure.

It was terrifying to watch, and I was screaming. I ran downstairs to get Shallie, a girl that lived there, and woke his mom at the same time. They both came running. There was nothing we could do, of course, and I learned later that there's nothing you really should do.

The seizure ended, and Tony was unconscious for a minute. Then he woke up, remembering nothing. We told him he'd had a seizure, which he denied. I did the same thing when I had one, so I knew that was normal. We all sat down to discuss what to do. I told his mom that I knew it was from withdrawal, told her about my own experience, and said I knew if I went to the liquor store and he had a drink, he wouldn't have another. So she sent me to the store, which I walked to, alone, scared, and rushed, trying to make it back as fast as I could. There was a store that Tony and I walked to almost every day. I bought the large bottle of vodka, and walked home, though I wasn't calling it my home yet.

I talked Tony into checking into rehab with me, but since both of us had already been to West Pines, the "nice" rehab, twice, they sent us to detox instead. That's a far cry from rehab, where you share a room with one other person, you have nice meals three times a day, you go to groups, you have uplifting and strengthening activities scheduled, you have your own bathroom....

Detox was so different. It had one small room full of cots for women and a huge room full of cots for men. No doors. There was one bathroom for women and one for men. There was a small kitchen with cereal and juice, and that was the only food. There was a large room with tables and chairs where you sat to wait until you were released. Once every few hours, the staff would make everyone line up to have their vitals taken and their level of intoxication checked. This is how they would decide who got to leave.

...to be continued...