Testimony

I hope to reveal the major points of trial and suc­cess that were imper­a­tive in my devel­op­ment. Through the drugs, Anorexia, Obsessive-Compulsive Dis­or­der, con­stant mov­ing, fam­ily trou­bles, and my intel­lec­tual strug­gles I want to pro­vide some­thing that some­one else might relate and receive encour­age­ment from.

Ver­sailles

I pro­gressed from drink­ing in junior high to pot to acid and cul­mi­nat­ing with a cocaine addic­tion. All through these years (which this band lasted through high school), I was able to deal drugs to all those that came to our con­certs. And I took might advan­tage of this. I started deal­ing just pot to coke and any­thing else I could get my hands on.

The drugs were to be a con­sis­tent and dev­as­tat­ing crux for the next 5 years. In addi­tion to this I started a down­ward spi­ral of Anorexia. My senior year pro­vided another chance for reflec­tion, as I real­ized I had not been in a rela­tion­ship all through high school. I decided that it wasn’t due to my per­son­al­ity, drug prob­lem, or my irre­spon­si­bil­ity but my weight. So, mid-way through my senior year I decided to start eat­ing less and less. I went through this process con­tin­u­ally for over a year, but dur­ing the remain­der of my senior year I lost 60 lbs. For the first time I had women actu­ally look­ing twice at me, and I thought I had finally found the solu­tion to my lack of rela­tion­ships (although I was to found out later I couldn’t have been more wrong). I would get up each morn­ing at 5 a.m. to go and work out and weigh myself or else I would’ve been mis­er­able for the remain­der of the day. I still remem­ber wak­ing up every morn­ing to see the scale go down and down; if it did not go down, or if it went up, I would be held cap­tive to my rumi­na­tions of misery.

Post-Graduation

I started to party a lot, and I left my plan to attend Wright State Uni­ver­sity. I almost never went home, dealt con­sis­tently, and com­pletely aban­doned my fam­ily. I felt no regard for any­one else; the only thing I was con­cerned of was my own desires. I was invited to live with two of my friends. Since I was already absent from my fam­ily, I decided to move out. My fam­ily moved back to Tipp City, and I stayed in Ver­sailles. I received a lot of money for grad­u­a­tion and that only per­pet­u­ated my grow­ing cocaine addiction.

Cocaine was to be dev­as­tat­ing. I spent thou­sands of dol­lars in a few short months. Cocaine, not only kept me high, but it also acted as an appetite sup­pres­sant and calmed my mind while I was high. I spent incred­i­ble amounts of time and money into this ter­ri­ble addic­tion. The drugs took hold of me, and I was in way to deep with using and deal­ing. I was sus­pected in sev­eral drug traf­fick­ing cases. One of which, involv­ing Oxy­con­tin, that I almost got busted. Although none of these instances slowed down my fer­vor for drugs and money.

The Road to Sobriety

I was forced to swal­low my pride and move back in with my fam­ily in Tipp City. I started work­ing at a McDonald’s when I was in Ver­sailles, and I trans­ferred that job to the Tipp store. I made a promise to myself to not spend any more money on cocaine. When I received my first check liv­ing in Tipp, I took that money and spent almost all of it on cocaine. I went with friends to Miami Uni­ver­sity to party, and it was this night that was to be my low­est point of my life (and still is). After a night of indul­gence I lay awake, geek­ing for cocaine, and was lying on a floor in a dark apart­ment of some­one I barely knew and was forced to think about what had hap­pened. It was the most empty I have ever felt, but that night was also the last time I ever used cocaine.

I started a road of recov­ery. Even though I stopped using cocaine, I still used pot and hal­lu­cino­gens. I did mush­rooms one last time, and I would in Feb of 2002 get busted for drug pos­ses­sion (mar­i­juana). I did mar­i­juana one more time after that, and that was the last time I used any form of illicit sub­stance. I decided to go to school, and I started at Wright State for the spring quar­ter (my admis­sion was still valid from my pre­vi­ous appli­ca­tion). I remem­ber so vividly pulling myself up on those days off work to go and find infor­ma­tion about WSU. I got every­thing straight­ened out, and began my life anew in school.

Even though I stopped doing drugs I still strug­gled with Anorexia. I remem­ber a time of low in that dis­or­der when I looked at myself in the mir­ror and could count all of my ribs. I weighed in that day at 147 lbs. This would also be the last time I looked down at a scale (and have no inten­tion of doing so again). All-in-all I lost 80 lbs (227 to 147). I took the scale that day and ran over it in an emo­tional, free­ing event. I also kept drink­ing; I knew I couldn’t do drugs respon­si­bly, but I thought I could do so with alcohol.

I enrolled in a treat­ment pro­gram for drugs, my eat­ing dis­or­der, and a bud­ding Obsessive-Compulsive Dis­or­der (OCD). My OCD became a man­i­fes­ta­tion of my anx­i­ety to which drugs for­merly cov­ered. I habit­u­ally washed my hands, and I was in a con­tin­ual state of rumi­na­tion. I received treat­ment by way of anti-depressants (to which I take to this day), and I was in an inten­sive out­pa­tient treat­ment pro­gram. I was told to start going to N.A. (Nar­cotics Anony­mous) or A.A. (Alco­holics Anony­mous) meet­ings. I didn’t like N.A., but I did find a home, and a spon­sor, in A.A. I just cel­e­brated three years of sobri­ety on Oct 22, 2005. This is largely due to my involve­ment in A.A.

The Spir­i­tual Endeavor

As my mind was clear­ing from the addic­tions, I was able to focus on things that I haven’t had the chance before. A.A., got me to take spir­i­tu­al­ity seri­ously. I was in school, and I was exposed to a plethora of thoughts and reli­gions. Dur­ing my addic­tion and early stud­ies, I was gripped by Bud­dhism and meta­physics. I was a pro­fess­ing Bud­dhist and Taoist for a short while. They appealed to my intel­lec­tual desires, and both reli­gions, being athe­is­tic, didn’t force me to belief in God or a god. But ulti­mately pan­the­ism (although it con­tin­ues to affect me) was un-fulfilling. I had always believed in a Divine Cre­ator, but I had never taken the time to find the man­i­fes­ta­tion of that Cre­ator (even through my sparse upbring­ing in a Chris­t­ian church).

I became entranced with new age/postmodern thought. I sub­scribed to a rel­a­tivis­tic world­view. I went so far as to attend a Uni­tar­ian Uni­ver­sal­ist church. I remem­ber study­ing Judaism, and I wanted a monothe­is­tic God (poly­the­ism never inter­ested me). Judaism I saw as absolute monothe­ism (as opposed to the Trini­tar­ian Monothe­ism in Chris­tian­ity). I started attend­ing the WSU chap­ter of Cam­pus Cru­sade for Christ. At that time I looked for a new group of friends at Cru­sade. In the begin­ning I could care less for Chris­tian­ity, but I just wanted a group to become social. They took me in and invited me to all their events regard­less of my cur­rent beliefs.

I started study­ing Calvin­ism, and it com­pletely altered how I viewed God and my pur­pose. I embraced it as truth (before I was even a Chris­t­ian), and it molded how I came to God. I felt God pulling me closer and closer, but I would con­tin­u­ally deny it. There was a point to which I could no longer resist His call, and he soft­ened my heart to receive the Gospel that I finally heard clearly (through the book of Matthew). It was our year-end party for Cru­sade, I left in a spir­i­tual high. I finally real­ized that Jesus was what He said He was. I stopped on the way home at a board of edu­ca­tion, and amidst a dark and empty park­ing lot, I got out and prayed to the Cre­ator and asked for His forgiveness.

Start­ing The Chris­t­ian Life

I embarked on min­istry in Cru­sade lead­ing Bridges Inter­na­tional. My inter­est for inter­na­tion­als grew and cli­maxed at the IT Project where God broke me for the unreached peo­ples of the world. I real­ized how mer­ci­ful my God was to me for break­ing my shack­les of sin, and I can’t keep this truth to myself. I grad­u­ated which opens up my next step in min­istry which is going to South­ern Bap­tist The­o­log­i­cal Sem­i­nary to get train­ing in the­ol­ogy and church plant­ing. My cur­rent church, Kemp Road Bap­tist, has been instru­men­tal in my spir­i­tual devel­op­ment of late.

I feel for the first time free. I have noth­ing but glory to the Cre­ator of the heav­ens and earth for his mercy upon my soul. He saved me from death and made me alive. “How Great is Our God.”

“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eter­nal life, and does not come into judg­ment, but has passed out of death into life.
John 5:24