Is it really you? What is really in your heart? Are you saying and doing things because you think it will win the approval of others? Or, is it really how you feel? Do you make things up because you think it's what people want to hear? Do you follow in someone else's shadow in hope's of being like them? Why not be yourself? Are you believing things in life because it sounds right? Or do you believe it's right? How about being yourself and accomplishing what it is that you are here for...? Living in truth...is about following your heart. Not following someone else's.

I thought happiness was something that everyone could find. I looked for it desperately. Everywhere I went. In everyone I saw. In everything I did. I thought it was something that could be duplicated. I think back to my earliest years. I had such sadness in my heart. My being here and in this world did not feel right to me. Like it's just one big mistake (my being here). I didn't know where I had come from, but I wanted to go back. This whole "life thing" was not for me. I remember the first time that I saw Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer on TV. He had landed on the Island of Misfit Toys. I wanted to go live with them on their island.

I sat in the circle of people, eyes closed, leaned my head back. I had nothing to say to God. Rather than say nothing, I directed my thoughts and made the only plea that I could think of, "If you exist, show me what to do, please help me." The strange thing about drugs. I wished that I wanted to stop. I wanted to want to stop. But I didn't want to stop. I stood up from the circle and I have been clean ever since.

So, yes, it's true...I am an RN and I am a drug abuser. I have been clean for quite some time now. The most alone and scared I ever felt was when I nearly stopped breathing. I knew at the time that I would probably never come so close to death again (without actually dying). I lay there barely breathing, thinking "I am going to die". This is not what scared me. I was scared because at that moment, I realized that I did not care. I honestly did not care. -DH (DynamicHope)