
"I wish people would understand that addiction is a symptom. It's a symptom of unresolved underlying issues, or an attempt to self-medicate issues like depression or anxiety. My addiction was born out of an intense lack of self esteem and severe childhood trauma, and my continued drug use was simply terror at feeling exposed in a world that I felt I had no skills to negotiate. Heroin was a buffer between me and the harshness of humanity, and giving it up was the scariest thing I've ever done."