Jordan’s Story of Drug and Alcohol Addiction Recovery

After completing the residential addiction treatment for his drug and alcohol addiction, Jordan is applying what he learnt in the program to build a solid foundation for himself to recover on. This is his story.

My name is Jordan and since I was twelve I’ve been dealing with a drug and alcohol addiction. From the outside, I looked like I was doing well, but I was high functioning and eventually everything started to unravel until the point that I asked my family for help, they got me into drug and alcohol addiction treatment at Hader Clinic Queensland.

Alcohol has been the backbone of my addiction, but drugs have been there too. I was twelve when I started smoking marijuana. I was a shy kid and I probably used alcohol and drugs to take the edge off, help ease anxiety and to fit in. I knew that I was probably doing more than others but I didn’t really see the alarm bells going off as I was still enjoying it. I was about sixteen or seventeen when I started using party drugs like ecstasy, and twenty when I started using speed. I was about twenty-four when I started using ice (meth) and the party drugs sort of went away. So, I settled on drinking alcohol, using ice and smoking a bit of marijuana.

That whole time since I was fifteen I had been working as a plumber, so I didn’t have any issues going to work and holding down a job even though I was drinking and using, but I was still getting into trouble and making mistakes along the way. By the time I was twenty-four, I had been caught drink driving five times and ended up in jail, and drug driving three or four times before that. When I got out of jail I went to AA and NA meetings, but it scared me, and I never went back. I was a young man who couldn’t open up, I was too embarrassed to talk or say I had a problem.

Life moved on and I had a good job, bought a couple of houses, and from the outside things were looking good. Mentally I just thought everything was alright. But the reality was that things were building up until the last three or four years when it started to get the better of me and everything was falling around me. I was staying up too long, I was drinking as soon as I got home and using drugs overnight and then in the morning to last through the day. Eventually, I started to have days where I was too fried to work, or I just kept wanting to do what I was doing and not go to my job.

It really got out of control at this point, and I ended up in a psych ward. I ended up there eight times in about six months. In between I tried to go to another rehab but I only lasted sixteen days. My family has always tried to get me help for my drug and alcohol addiction but I was selfish because I didn’t want anyone to get in the way of my addiction, so I’d push them away. I had probably five or six cracks at recovery, but they didn’t stick and eventually, my drug and alcohol addiction got so bad that I just couldn’t understand why I was doing it anymore. It wasn’t fun, I didn’t see a purpose and I couldn’t see a future.

I was out of control but for the first time, I was saying I am an addict, I am an alcoholic. I had been saying that to myself for about 12 months, pulling my head in and not stuffing up. Then one night on Boxing Day I had been with my family and I got home and stuck straight into alcohol. I’d been up for a couple of days at this point under the influence of drugs but I thought I was doing okay. I’d been playing with the kids and my nieces and nephews in the pool and spending time with my family, but when I woke up the next day I had crashed my car, thirteen years after my last drink driving incident. It had been building up to this point and I just realised how horrible it was, that I couldn’t remember anything and that I could have killed someone. I realised I wasn’t in a good place and needed help.

That was the first time I really asked for help. My parents had offered me help plenty of times before that, but this was the first time I was asking them. In about two or three hours they came back to me and said they’d found a place in Queensland if I wanted to go. I knew I needed to do something and get out of the place I was in, so I went to residential addiction treatment at Hader Clinic Queensland.

It took me about three or four weeks at the clinic before I knew what was going on. I had gone in with the determination to give one hundred percent, listen as much as I could, answer all the questions and just do all the things that were asked. I knew I needed to do what made me uncomfortable, like opening up and talking about myself. I’d never done it before, but I had nothing to lose. It took about a month before I started to see a bit of light so then I started to pick everyone’s brain and ask questions and talk to the amazing staff and counsellors.

After five weeks I opened up and answered questions, which then my answers to the questions were answering my own questions, and it was just amazing. They’re really good at what they do and they were digging deep. I gave my all during my time in residential addiction treatment and it has really worked for me. I was even on medication for depression and anxiety for years, and about a month before I left Hader Clinic Queensland I managed to get off them and I’ve been off them ever since. Now I just take every day as it comes and use what they taught me there and everything’s been going really well.

Since I finished my ninety days at Hader Clinic Queensland, I’ve been going to one meeting a week in town, and I’ve got a few people I can talk to that I’ve met along the way. I decided not to work for twelve months so that I could cruise along and ease myself back into life after treatment. I didn’t want to put myself under too much pressure and wanted to build a good base while I tinker around my farm and do odd jobs here and there.

If you’re thinking of going to residential addiction treatment, you’ve just got to give it a go. What I loved about Hader Clinic Queensland is that they’re all ex-addicts so they do know. You’ve got to really listen and let everything go, even when it’s embarrassing and hard to sit with all those uncomfortable situations you’ve just got to do it. I turned to drugs and alcohol because I never wanted to sit with those uncomfortable and weird feelings and situations, but in there, you’ve got nothing to lose and you can sit with and address them. It can be challenging but it worked for me, so just give it a go.