52. Easter
Five years ago, I spent Easter in a jail cell while detoxing cold turkey from alcohol and Benzodiazepines in Orange County Jail. It turns out that the Easter Bunny doesn’t make a pit stop at the local jail to deliver candy and hide eggs for the prisoners. I’d been arrested many times before, but this time I was facing much more serious charges than in the past - ones that, if convicted, carry hefty prison sentences.
A mere week before Easter of 2019, I was arrested by the City of Middletown Police after pulling into a public parking lot and recklessly clipping a parked car. I was so messed up from eating Xanax “bars” and drinking beers earlier that day that I didn’t even realize I had hit anything at all. Obliviously, I parked, locked up my car, and went into the bar across the street to throw back a few more cold ones and keep my “buzz” going. A short while later I looked outside and happened to see police lights flashing in the parking lot that I had parked in. To this day, I still don’t know what I was thinking when I stormed out of that bar and up to those police officers, brazenly and rudely asking what they were doing near my car knowing damn well what I had stashed away inside. If this isn’t proof that drugs make you do crazy things, then I don’t know what is. The officers proceeded to tell me I was caught on camera hitting a parked car. Next, they asked if I had any weapons or drugs on me and it was at that very moment that I realized the jig was up, and I was done for. I told them that I did have “some” pills in my car that could be found in my driver-side door panel and the center console. Officers began searching my car, ripping through my belongings until they finally found two sandwich bags full of a combined 520 Xanax “bars.” They arrested me on the spot and charged me with felony intent to distribute a controlled substance, felony possession of a controlled substance, several drug possession misdemeanors, and tons of driving violations.
I woke up out of my blackout in Orange County Jail nearly two days later (no exaggeration at all) with absolutely no recollection of what I had been arrested for. Mixing alcohol and Benzodiazepines is extremely dangerous, often resulting in “blackouts.” I vividly remember waking up and reading the word “INMATE” written on the leg of my jail jumpsuit, and the horrible feeling of my heart sinking into my stomach that immediately followed.
I spent the entire week locked in a single cell, for over twenty-three hours a day in the medical unit. I was placed there for a minimum of seven days which is protocol for an inmate withdrawing from alcohol AND Benzos. I was let out of my cell for thirty minutes daily to shower and make a phone call. There were days when the COs were so busy dealing with other prisoners in the dorm that my shower and phone calls were overlooked. My cell consisted of a metal cot, a toilet with a sink connected on top, and a broken clock/speaker on one of the walls. My cell door had a small, sliver of window that looked out into the common area of the dorm where other prisoners passed time watching TV, eating meals, working out, and playing card games. I was only allowed to have two white T-shirts, two pairs of boxers, two pairs of socks, and one pair of “jail slides” (a slip-on shoe) in my cell at any given time. I wasn’t allowed ANY books or magazines the entire week. Time seems to slow down to almost a complete halt when you’re withdrawing from alcohol and drugs while locked in a jail cell with absolutely nothing to do. I was so bored that I resorted to counting the small holes in each concrete block of my jail cell’s walls. I was grasping at straws; doing anything to try and pass the time.
Easter arrived a week later, and I was still locked up. There would be no annual Easter dinner with my family that night. Instead, I found myself eating bread that I sprinkled a packet of sugar on. It was all I could manage to keep down as a result of withdrawals paired with how nasty the food looked AND smelled. I’ll never forget the stench of some of those meals; it’s as though the smell was burned into my nostrils. Although these memories from addiction are unpleasant, they help me remain vigilant against my disease of addiction. Someone once told me that if I forget where I came from, I’m bound to end up back there; and I most definitely don’t want that. Today, I get to spend Easter with my family and life just keeps getting better and better for me the longer I stay clean.
May this Easter holiday season find you safe and serene, as we continue to navigate life's journey, one step at a time. Cheers!
