After hours of getting ready to go see the fireworks with my family, I called them to let them know that I wasn’t going to
make it. The moment I hung up I burst into tears. I love my family and wanted to see them. I had just spent hours trying to hide the fact that I had lost so much weight again. I couldn’t remember the last time I had slept. I didn’t want my family to know that I had failed again and was back on meth. I was a drug addict. The past six years my life was meth. I had given up my dreams, my life, my family, and my friends. I hated that I couldn’t stop using. A week earlier I had fallen on my knees and cried out in a broken voice, sniffling between words, telling God that if he was real then he could help me. My aunt had given me a bible a couple weeks earlier for my birthday. So I asked God to speak to me, and tell me how I was going to get off this drug, and opened the bible in desperate search of finding an answer. The passage I read spoke of death, so I flipped the pages and prayed again saying, “God please speak to me and tell me how I’m going to get off this drug.” I flipped through the pages and the same thing kept happening. This freaked me out so I put it down. This went on for about a week straight.I knew that I had to tell someone what was happening, but I didn’t know who I was going to tell. I ended up calling my grandma and asked her for her pastor’s number. This was the pastor that had come to see me when I was at tent city. When I called him I told him I was using and could not quit. I asked him to keep me in prayer. After that he continued to check up on me, periodically calling me for the following week. The morning after the 4 of July, I received a call from him asking me how I was doing. I told him that I had to move somewhere but had no clue as to where. I just had to get out of Phoenix. I knew that God had a place for me to go, and I knew that he was going to tell this pastor where. I asked him to pray about it and let me know if he had any ideas where I could move to. About an hour later he called me back and told me that he had a place for me to go. It was a place called U-turn for Christ. He said that it was $800, but that he was going to pay for it. During my first day at U-turn I really wanted to leave because it was hard work. But, when I was on my way out I met this guy who was an ex-heroin addict whose life had completely changed. His story amazed me. So I stayed for a while, but after two weeks I left U-turn and walked to the nearest bus station in Perris, California. After I was back in Phoenix for a couple of days, my uncle told me that I should go back and finish the two month program at U-turn I had started. He said that he was taking his son to the beach that weekend and would give me a ride. Although I had no desire to go back to that boot camp for Christ type a place, I agreed to go back. The next day I relapsed. Then later that night I went to hook-up with this girl. God turned it into an all night bible study. I couldn’t believe it. By morning I was getting ready to leave and I was so angry at God. But I felt convicted because I could tell this girl needed prayer. I told her, “I have to be honest with you about something, I’m high right now; but I’m going back to this place called U-turn where my prayers are going to be powerful, and I will keep you in prayer.” She said, “I have to be honest with you about something: I’m HIV positive.” After that night I realized that God wasn’t joking. Since that night my life has changed like I never thought it could. After six years of being hooked on meth, I went from an addict to a young man with a hope and future.