7 Years of Freedom

In this episode, I’m taking you back to the darkest, most chaotic stretch of my journey. I’m sharing the unfiltered truth about completely losing control, the sheer velocity of the financial spiral, and the final binge before everything changed.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Today I celebrate seven years clean and sober. I love my sober birthdays. You know, it's it's so much better than my normal birthdays. Not because there's loads more presents or anything, because there isn't. It's just it feels like such an achievement every time I get another year under my belt, you know. It's an incredible feeling. I woke up this morning, had a real spring in my step, um, you know, got all the jobs done that I usually do first thing in the morning while my wife and the kids are asleep. Um, and I I I just feel so much better about myself. You know, that sense of achievement is it's like no other. I mean, I as you probably know, I I I run a lot of 10K events. I try and do one once a month. Um, and that sense of achievement crossing the finishing line is it's kind of like that, you know? Probably less intense than crossing the finishing line, but it's still, you know, over the course of the day, I just feel generally happier and and just just well in myself. So today I'm gonna be talking about the build-up to rehab and obviously a little bit about the last seven years. The build-up to rehab was quite a bizarre feeling. I remember going to my mum one night, um, you know, probably a few weeks before I actually went, uh, to tell her that I was a crack addict. Now, my mum kind of knew bits and bobs about my using, certainly about my drinking, but she had she didn't actually know how bad it had got. Now, for many of you that have read my my memoir that I published in 2021, you'll know that I came into some money in late 2018. It was it was an inheritance from a family friend. Um, I got 109,000 uh, or there or thereabouts, 109,000 pounds. Now, at the time when I got that money, I thought I'd won the lottery. Because I mean, a six-figure sum like that was just incredible. I mean, I could do with it now, to be honest. But um I remember getting that money, and at the time I was unemployed, kind of mid-mental breakdown. You know, I'd recently walked out of my job because I just couldn't cope anymore, I couldn't cope with life, and I was getting myself into debt again, um, and life was at an all-time low, and I was handed six figures. Now, I could say I don't have any regrets, and really I don't, because I certainly don't dwell on them. Because where I am today, I'm kind of glad that everything in my past happened in a strange sort of way. Obviously, there are certain incidents that that I do have regret about, um, but overall, where I am today, I'm very happy with, and I see those experiences as learning experiences. Because if you sit and regret them for too long, you just it's just going to consume you, you know. So, anyway, I was handed this money and I went on a spending spree. I was mentally unwell, I was I wasn't really on cocaine at the time because I couldn't afford it, I wasn't working, but I was drinking a lot. And because I hadn't kind of addressed those issues, I hadn't addressed my drinking or my drug taking, it was almost bubbling away in the background. So I got this money, I started buying things I never dreamt of buying before because I never had the funds to do it. Um and it was a great feeling, it really was. Uh, but it was kind of it was a happiness, but a very empty happiness. Because, like I say, I hadn't addressed the underlying issues, you know, trauma of the past, my addictions, um, all that kind of stuff. And I remember going to a shop in Cheltenham in in the town centre called Trapeze. Now, anyone from Cheltenham listening will probably know Trapeze or remember Trapeze, because it's not there anymore. But it was the shop to go to. I mean, growing up, I was a bit of a chav. I like my designer clothes, but I I didn't I didn't come from money. And I remember seeing a lot of my friends at the time whose parents might have had money, you know, as growing up as a teenager. And I remember their parents just giving them like 100 quid, 200 quid. Oh, go on, treat yourself. And we used to go into trapeze with them, and like me and the friends I had that didn't have much money would kind of just look in awe and just see like these little designer badges on the clothes and stuff, and like, you know, your mouth would water almost. It was, it was um, it wasn't, it wasn't the best feeling. I used to get very jealous of um everyone else who had all that money. Um so when I came into this money, I did everything that I had ever kind of wanted to do in terms of material goods. I was in drapees, I was suddenly on first name terms with them instead of being like followed around the shop thinking they were I was a shoplifter. Um, and I was going in there on a daily basis, sometimes multiple times a day, just picking stuff up, trying it on, yeah, that'll do, and buying it. I was going into jewellery shops um and just buying buying gold. I look I've always loved gold, and I still love gold. Um, but I was buying rings, chains, I had a ring for every single finger, big chunky gold rings. Um, and I loved it at the time. And as I was going from trapeze and the jewelers and this, that, and the other, and all the other shops, and just buying takeaways when I was eating, I was going from pub to pub to pub, and I was I was proud of the person I was, you know, I'd finally made it in life, and you know, people were jealous of me, you know, for a change. And I remembered I I would purposely go to um a shop, whether it was trapeze or another kind of expensive shop, and I'd have all the bags on show, and I'd go to Weatherspoons or other pubs just to have a pint in there, just to show people that I'd made it in life, you know, and I was really proud of myself. But like I say, it was it was a very empty happiness. It was it was like that. Money was like putting a plaster on a gunshot wound, you know. And slowly but surely, um, the money was just going down and down and down. And after six months, I had spent £109,000. And I remember going into the bookies one night, because I was gambling as well at the time, going into the bookies, and I was playing on the roulette machine, and you know, I I walked up for those of you that that don't go into bookies, I walked up to the to the uh the till, and the gentleman on the till um put like £500 onto the roulette machine. I put my card in, obviously, they put the £500 on. You walk over to the machine, and the credit goes onto the machine. And I spun the roulette wheel, lost, spun it again, lost, spun it again, lost. Went back up to the till, asked for another £500 to be put on there. Spun it, lost, spun it, lost. Um I remember going back up to the till and trying to put on another £500 or £1,000 or whatever it was, and the card declined. And I remember the feeling in my stomach when the card had declined because I had I had checked my bank balance a few times. I certainly did it a lot in the early days of getting that money. I remember going up with my debit card and just looking in the hole on hole in the wall just um just to just to see how much I had, you know, and almost have a little celebration to myself every time. But as the money was getting less and less, I stopped looking. You know, I just stopped looking. I didn't look at bank statements, didn't do anything like that, because I was in total denial that I had a problem. And it was during this time, you know, my mum particularly was was pleading with me, like, Matt, please give me some money to put away, just even if it's a thousand pounds or five thousand, whatever. No, no, no, mum, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. And when I was in the bookies, the feeling, I can still feel it now. I was stood there in a kind of panic attack almost, thinking, I've spent all my money. And that and that was the the realization, that was how I came to that realisation because my card declined. So anyway, I I had the you you used to get like, I don't know, they still do like a complimentary can of Pepsi Um that they give you while you're playing the machines. And I took the can of Pepsi, I went into the into the toilets in the betting shop, and I went into my sock where I had, you know, a little, you know, the kinder egg um pots, you know, the where the toys, where you build the toys. I used to buy those and I used to make crack cocaine at home, and when the crack cocaine was made, I would put it into the into the kinder egg pot. So that was in my stock. I went into the into the toilets, pulled it out, got my pipe out of my other pocket, um, and I I lit up the crack pipe in the betting shop. And at a moment to myself, the panic sort of subsided, obviously. I was under the influence of crack at this point. Um, and I and I walked out and I I remember I I could almost feel the blood like gone from my face. I was just no sweating, I was I was feeling just remorseful, ashamed. Um, and it hit me. I've spent 109,000 pounds in six months, and I could not believe it. So I left the betting shop, checked uh the cash point with my card, had pennies in there. Um, and I remember this is on the lower end of the high street in Cheltenham, and I thought, well, I need a drink, I need a drink. So I left the betting shop, started walking up to the top end of town, and in that time, I went on a payday loan company uh website, and I borrowed like 200, 300 quid to pay back on payday. Um, and the thing is, I didn't have a payday coming up because I was unemployed still. I still thought everything was fine, I've got loads of money, I don't need a job, I'll just live in the pub. And in the time it took me to get up to the top end of town, the money was in my bank. I went to the cash point, drew the money out, and drowned my sorrows. And I was drinking and drinking and drinking until that money ran out. And after that, I finally decided uh to get a job. A bloke I knew in the pub knew of a job going at his place in a warehouse. Luckily, he kind of put a good word in for me. The manager took me on immediately. I started the job and I thought, yes, this is it. I'm gonna I'm gonna save every month, I'm gonna put that money back into a savings account, I'm gonna get back up to 100 grand, you know. I'm I I was living in the dream world. It was um ridiculous, really. Looking back, the madness. But but the point I'm making is I believed it. I believed my own rubbish. I believed with kind of every fibre in my body that I was gonna save up and get that £100,000 back from working a warehouse job, you know, on minimum wage nearly, while I'm an active crack addict, active cocaine addict, active alcoholic, but somehow I was gonna save money and make and put that money to one side to build up that hundred grand. It's insanity, but I believed it. And it was around this time I was working in the warehouse, um, I worked there for a few months. Um, I was smoking crack in the warehouse. Um, you know, and and crack, it's a bit different because I I I I had used in previous jobs before I had sniffed coke, sniffed MDMA, MCAT, whatever at work, um, which was dreadful, but I did it and it kind of got me through the day. But the difference is with sniffing those drugs, I could kind of sniff them. It would put me on a level for kind of half an hour less say, um, and then I'd go out and do my job. But with crack, it it just consumes you, you know, or it certainly consumed me. And I was sneaking off with my little kindergarten into the toilets, doing a pipe, kind of enjoying the buzz for a few seconds, and then going back out and working. And this was in um coming up to the summer of 2019, so it was boiling hot in this in this like metal-roofed warehouse, and I was cutting up um cladding, big sheets of cladding that goes on the sides of walls and whatever, uh, on this machine, on this saw machine. And with crack, it it doesn't last half an hour like the other ones kind of do or used to for me. Um, so I was in and out of there non-stop, in and out of the toilet, in and out, in and out, in and out. And the lad I was working with, I mean, I feel awful now because he must have thought I was a right Wally, because I was coming out with all this rubbish, you know, oh yeah, I've got diarrhea at the moment, or I've got a bad belly, blah, blah, blah. And it was all rubbish, and he could see through it. He could see that I was off my head on something. I don't think for a million years he would have thought it was crack cocaine. Um, but that's what I was doing. The days were so long. I remember being stood there operating, you know, quite dangerous machinery, a forklift, this, that, and the other. Luckily, there was only two of us in the warehouse. Um, but it was it was reckless, it was so dangerous. I was like falling asleep standing up almost, um, going in daily with hangovers and this, that, and the other. Um, but I remember, I remember when I went to my mum to tell her that I had the problem. Um, now I will say in this episode, actually, my mum got quite a lot of flack um from people she knew, people that had read my book, people that knew my story, that followed me on Facebook, this, that, and the other, um, about how did she not know that I was using all these substances? How didn't you know? How didn't you know? And she she got really upset by it because she she felt like she should have known. And a lot of people would. I'm sure I'd be really disappointed if I didn't notice one of my kids doing it, you know, when they're older. But I don't think people understand the the complexities of addiction, the the sly, sneaky behaviors that come with addiction. I mean, addiction, when you're displaying these behaviors, it's like a survival instinct. And you get so incredibly good at covering your tracks, hiding stuff, you know, you have to protect your addiction and you have to do it at all costs. Now, my mum and dad care about me more than anyone else on this planet, you know, I'm their son. So I had to protect my addiction from them because if they try to intervene, that would mean that I might have to stop drinking and taking drugs. And as an active addict, that is simply not an option. And like I say, my mum got a lot of kind of criticism about that, and I want to make it clear that I was a very good addict, I was extremely good at hiding my using, um, manipulating people, including my mum and dad, for money, for lifts to town or whatever, anything I needed, I got. Um, and I and I went to extreme lengths to get what I wanted. And to think that my poor mum thinks that you know she should have known, and other people criticize her for that, is it's quite upsetting, you know. Um, so anyway, that leads me on to the next part of the story, which is I went to my mum um to tell her that I needed rehab. I had got to a point where the drugs weren't working for me anymore. I was totally exhausted um at the thought of going out, getting drugs, using drugs, you know, manipulating all that stuff. I had come to my kind of personal limit. I just didn't have any more gas in the tank. Um, so I went to my mum one night. I remember I texted her, I think it was in the morning or in the afternoon, whilst under the influence, of course, to say I needed to speak to her and I'd be round that day to speak to her. But I was so incredibly nervous about telling my mum that I was a crack addict that I put it off and put it off and put it off. And I didn't end up going back to her house because I was living in a flat in town at the time. I didn't end up going back to her house till late that night, and obviously I was under the influence, um, wasn't really uh making much sense. But I went there and I told her that I needed rehab. Um, even though I had spent that £109,000 at the beginning, um, thankfully, I had paid back my mum a huge chunk of money that I had kind of borrowed over the years, you know, her her savings, her retirement fund, you know, which I was ashamed about at the time. But thankfully that money enabled me to give it her back, or at least some of it, you know. So I knew my mum had some money in the bank again. And I went round basically to beg for rehab. And the first thing she said to me was, is it really that bad? Um, and like going back to my last point, my mum was that oblivious, she had no idea, even though I was like losing weight, um, you know, not eating food, erratic behaviour, that sort of thing. I had hidden it so well that she actually questioned me, you know, is it that bad? And I had to kind of almost plead with her and come clean totally because I knew I needed rehab. I I couldn't I couldn't see a way of doing it on my own, you know? And I had very little recovery knowledge at that point, you know, because since since in the last seven years, I mean I've I've learned a huge amount about recovery um and addiction and and the reasons for it and that's that kind of thing. Um so I spent a few minutes kind of sitting with her, telling her how bad it had got. Um she cried. I didn't cry because I was under the influence. I was I was kind of numb at the time. Um and I never really cried much in active addiction. I I think the only times I ever cried was when um I was out of options and I needed to manipulate one of my loved ones for more money, for example. Um, but I wasn't an emotional person because over the years I had suppressed my emotions so much with drugs and alcohol, I didn't really feel the feelings I was supposed to feel. Um so anyway, after the conversation with my mum, she agreed to kind of Google some rehabs. I didn't know how much it costed, um, didn't know the process or anything like that. Um, I'd only ever seen rehab in films or heard about it through celebrities, you know, celebrity stories. Um, so I went back to my flat that night, continued using with whatever money I had. Um I was in the process of kind of selling all my stuff anyway. Um, and my mum got back to me, I think, the next day or a couple of days afterwards and said, look, I found I found this rehab. It was in terms of rehab, it was very cheap, or it was one of the certainly one of the cheaper ones. Um, and I had made it clear that I couldn't do rehab within a 50 mile radius of Cheltenham. I had to get away from Cheltenham. I knew that my hometown was holding me back. I didn't want to see people I knew, I didn't want to be close to any drug dealers. I mean, I could have done rehab on the North Pole, and if if you want drugs, you'll find it on the North Pole. It doesn't matter. But I didn't really know that then. I just thought if I can move myself as far away as possible from my hometown, it would give me a better chance. You know, even in my drug addled state, I knew that was the best choice, and I'm glad I did. Um, my mum found a place in Runcorn in Cheshire, up north. Um, she told me about it. Um I think she gave me like uh some stuff she printed out. I vaguely remember that. Um, I remember having my initial assessment with with a man from the company that ran the rehab. Um, and I, you know, I answered very honestly. It was I remember the feeling it gave me when I was talking to him. You know, it was a man. I later found out he was in recovery, as a lot of people in the industry are, but I remember that feeling of talking. Talking about my addictions and just speaking openly and honestly. And I remember feeling really comfortable with that. And it was the first time someone had really understood me, you know. And I'd never really spoken about my addictions before. I mean, I had a short stint at uh the local drug and alcohol service some years before, that kind of thing. But he he seemed to get me on a level that no one else had. And of course, he he works for the the admissions team, so he he's he deals with this on a daily basis, or did back then. Um, so I spoke with him, went back out, carried on using. Um, and as soon as I got the confirmation that I was going to rehab in, I think it was in two weeks after the initial conversation, that was it. I I was full throttle using, drinking as much as I possibly could. I mean, I I went all out. I sold every bit of furniture I had, my microwave, my kettle, everything. Sold my bed, even the mattress went. Um, and I just had a flat in town, which was basically a drugs den. It was it was a drugs den. Um, I remember that the living room carpet was an absolute state because I used to have a little shoe box of all my drug paraphernalia, um, you know, crack pipes, bicarbonate of soda, because that's what you use to make crack out of cocaine. I had spoons, you know, lighters where I heated up the stuff. Um, it was all very, it was a very grubby, murky world uh that I was living in. And I remember I'd sit there, because it was obviously a heat wave at the time, I'd sit there sweating profusely from from all the crack that I was smoking, because that's one of the side effects. My heart would be racing, I'd be sat on the floor because I had no furniture. Be sat on the floor with my little shoebox, um, and I'd be I'd be smoking a cigarette, flicking the cigarette ash one side of me on the carpet, and on the other side of the carpet, because I was washing up, um, washing up the cocaine into crack, my mouth would water so much, I'd I'd salivate at the thought of the next pipe, the next hit, and I would spit, I'd spit on the left side of me. So I'd there'd be a pool of saliva on one side and cigarette ash on the other side, and a shoebox in front of me full of paraphernalia. But I think back to that time, it is absolute, it's madness, the chaos of my life, the the curtain twitching, you know. I was convinced there were there were drones being flown up to my third floor flat and looking in and watching me, so I was kind of army crawling underneath these sash windows so nobody would see me. Um it was a it was a crazy time, a world away from where I am now. But um that went on for about two weeks. I remember handing in my notice at the at the warehouse um about a week before I went to rehab, maybe two weeks before. And I remember that the manager at the time, he was very, very kind to me. And he took one look at me. I mean, I was in withdrawals, I was shaking like like a leaf all over. Um, and he took one look at me and he said, Look, Matt, you need to go now. You I can see you're in with withdrawals. Um, I accept your notice and wish you well, but you're not working any notice. He said, Go home now. Um, and that was the right decision. So I walked back to my mum and dad's because they lived closer than my flat was. Um, and I walked because I had lost my driving license a few weeks before. That was one of the kind of uh final consequences of my um of my using. And I'm pretty sure I went straight down to Weatherspoons. Um, can't remember how I got the money or how I got there, but I went home and went to Weatherspoons. Um, and I remember that that last night before I went to rehab. I'm gonna be talking about my rehab, rehab experience in next week's episode, so I'll I'll kind of end with this. But I remember the night before uh rehab, um, my mum and dad wanted to take me to Runcorn, they wanted to drive me there. I mean, I was trying to even manipulate that situation and say, no, no, I'll get the train, I'll get the coach or whatever, because I knew that I could drink and news and whatever on the way up. Um, but they insisted. So I kind of reluctantly agreed, and I promised my mum that I'd stay around her house the night before, you know, so she would have some peace of mind that I was there, I was safe, and I wasn't going to overdose or have a cardiac arrest from all the crack. Um so I went to the flat the night before and I stayed there as long as I possibly could. I washed up all the cocaine that I had into crack. My lungs were in a horrendous state. I remember I couldn't even take a full breath without it hurting, you know. Um, I was I was in a dreadful way. Um, I was the skinniest I'd been in a very long time. Um it was it was horrendous. And I remember begging people like acquaintances that I smoked crack with, begging them to come round and basically help me smoke the rest of my crack. And I remember texting a few of them and they were just like, nah, I can't be bothered because that they knew I had no more money, they knew they couldn't get anything out of me, so they were doing their own thing, and I ended up staying there till about two o'clock the following morning. Um, before I finally got a taxi home to my mum and dad's, or back to my mum and dad's, sorry. It was total chaos, but I I reached my limit, and I'm so glad I managed to get that taxi back. Um, I can't even remember what I did with the rest of the crack. I'm sure I would have smoked it. There's no way I would have flushed it. Um, but I certainly had none left when I went back to my mum and dad's. Um, and I got the taxi home. And I'm gonna leave it there for this week, leave you on a bit of a cliffhanger. Um, but I'm really, really happy to be seven years clean and sober today. Just talking about that now in this episode, you know, it's it's it's mad to think how different my life is now to what it was then. Um so yeah, thank you so much for joining me. Uh, I'm gonna pick up where I left off next week, uh, the taxi home to my mum and dad's before rehab, and I'm gonna talk about my rehab experiences next week. So if you've enjoyed the show, please uh hit follow, subscribe, tell your friends about it, and I will see you next week.