There was a time when I was amazed at how they behaved. I wondered how they could act like that. Some are self-centered, have a sense of entitlement, break every rule, lie about most everything.
Then one day I connected the dots and realized that when I was in that age range I was the same way. Most of the time, much worse.
I never went to treatment on my own - period. A judge had to hang a five year prison sentence over my head before I went off to spend a year at Metropolitan State Hospital in Norwalk, California.
In over fifty years I'd forgotten that as a twenty year old I lived, as someone who knew me said, " like a wild dog." When I was out of jail - I did what I wanted when I wanted and was accountable to nobody.
My only goal in life was to escape the demons from my past. And the best way to do that was drown them in alcohol and heroin.
I would go on stealing sprees, then disappear for days in drug houses. I sold drugs, stole drugs, and smuggled drugs out of Northern Mexico. When I wasn't incarcerated, I traveled a long trail of pain and misery that only chemicals would blot out for a while.
And the strange thing about that is that I didn't think I had a problem. I thought that people who didn't live as I did simply didn't know how to party and have a good time.
So when I look at the young people we try to help today I can only admire them for being smarter than I was at their age. Even though they screw up sometimes, at least they're trying to change at an early age.
That's something I never did until I was over fifty years old.
