#74 Surviving to Thriving: Healing Addiction, Cancer and Trauma w/ Cathy Trinh
It started out as a way for me to get more work done. My friend gave me a couple of her prescription pills after I told her I needed to focus.
Innocently, I brought them to work the next day. After arriving at the office, I grabbed some water and swallowed the orange pill like it was a vitamin.
I didn’t know much about the effects of adderall, I was just told that it would help me be more productive. And since I had a vacation coming up, I was desperate to hit my sales goals so I could feel worthy of taking time off. This seemed like the perfect solution to make it happen..
30 minutes later, it hit me. My arms and shoulders started to tingle. I could feel my breath deepen and my eyes widen as I focused sharply on my computer screen.
Have you ever seen the movie Limitless? Where the guy in the movie takes a pill that allows him to use 100% of his brain. He has total mental clarity, taps into his power and is basically unstoppable?
That’s what taking adderall feels like. It’s hard not to get addicted to something that makes you feel invincible. The problem is that this drug is an amphetamine, which can f*ck up your life long-term if you become addicted to it.
It didn’t start out as an addiction for me. I took it only a couple of times per week. But I realized I could be so much more productive if I took it every weekday at work. But then on the weekends, when I wanted to clean my house, I discovered that I could get so much more done if I had the help of my little magic pill.
So there I was taking it every day. At that point I had a prescription for it because it was fairly easy to get. Surprisingly, a few of my coworkers had prescriptions too, and we would often ask each other, “Did you take it yet?” Assuming we were all taking these pills on the daily.
The fact that my coworkers were also using, made it seem less wrong.
What made it bad was that I stopped sleeping well. On a good night, I got 4 hours. Which made me irritated all the time. I snapped at my coworkers, my landlord, my roommate, my neighbor and my boyfriend.
Everyone around me was drama.
It took some time for me to realize that the common denominator was me.
Not a good look.
I had become a version of myself that I didn’t like. Someone I wouldn't even hang out with.
That’s when I realized I had a problem.
Recovering from my adderall addiction was a nonlinear process that took a long time. There were seasons of abstinence, where I wouldn’t go near it at all. Then I would relapse as soon as I took it recreationally, and from there started using the drug again.
When I found myself back in the habit of using it everyday, I hated myself for it.
This chapter was not my proudest, but I’m proud of myself for finally kicking the habit.
In my interview with Cathy Trinh, author, speaker, entrepreneur, humanitarian, she talks about her road to recovery after addiction to alcohol, drugs and sex and love. After hitting rock bottom there was no place else to go but up.
When you listen to her story, it’s hard not to be inspired by her family’s escape from Vietnam during the war and spending time in refugee camps, or her struggle of being a single mom while her ex-husband was in and out of jail, or her journey recovering from cancer.
Cathy is a living example of perseverance and resilience.
Life can get pretty hard. If you are in a tough situation right now, there are a lot of resources to get support: from helplines, to doctors and counselors, to support groups.