Hi, my name is Alison Carr and I'm a recovering addict. 600 words is too short for the full story so I will try to condense it. I grew up in Watertown, Connecticut as a young girl who loved math, swimming and animals. I always got good grades and never skipped class, even when my friends did. My friends skipped school a lot. They were the bad kids that the locals named the "mud kids." We were the kids that started doing drugs earlier than most, and I did pretty much anything anyone offered. It didn't even matter if I knew what it was. But I always told myself I wasn't an addict because there was one drug I would never do, heroin. This was because growing up with my father being an angry and abusive addict/alcoholic I knew that if I did heroin my chances of becoming an addict were high. I always said that was the line, no heroin. As long as I stayed away from that one drug everything would be fine. All the other drugs I could stop any time I wanted to, right? In high school I made honors and swam on the recreational team, high school team, and made varsity my freshman year for my breaststroke. I also competed in horse back riding dressage and jumping shows. But when I was diagnosed with juvenile degenerative joint disease I was prescribed percocet. I didn't really know how the prescribed pain medication affected me, I just knew it made me feel better. I would take pills before a swim meet in preparation of the pain, and after the swim meet to recover from the pain. I didn't even know that percocet was a narcotic. Around this time is when my friends started doing pills too. I started to abuse them and would save a few doses so I could take them all at once to get high. One day when I had taken all of mine and couldn't find any from my dealers, one of my friends came to me with the cure for my ailment, heroin. I snorted a little at first because I was scared it would be too strong. Everyone was always warning about how many people have died from overdoses so I wanted to be careful. But the feeling wasn't that strong, I barley felt it. I was presented with a choice, snort more, or try the needle. I'll give you one guess which I chose. I dropped out of college, lost my job, and was kicked out of the house. I spent about 8 years wandering from state to state, couch surfing, and homeless. I would get clean for a few months, relapse, wash, rinse, repeat. I had about 1.5 years clean and was elected as the chapter chair for the democratically run Wilmington Oxford Houses where I volunteered to go to houses and do their accounting/banking records, conflict resolutions, drug tests, and train other house members to be self-sufficient. But, after having a miscarriage I ended up relapsing for 2 months. I have now been clean since August 27, 2021 after being admitted to Wilmington Treatment Center. When I was released I went into another halfway house called Wilmington Recovery and attended NA meetings everyday. I managed a women's house for about a year and got back into school. I currently have a 3.857 GPA and have all A's since 2022. I have a full course load with 5 classes and only have 3 left before I get my Associates and can transfer to UNCW thanks to Narcotic Anonyms.