Chapter 3 · Getting started

I was a child

Dangerous. It's not a word that I would have used to describe myself as a child. If you had asked any of my friends, teachers, or family members prior to 1990 they would have described someone who was a very loving, caring, and genuine person. Someone who always tried to find a way to get along with everyone. They would have described me as a thin wiry kid that was always moving around and loved riding bikes, camping, and playing video games. They would highlight the fact that I was a boy scout and loved the outdoors. They would not have called me dangerous, yet.

I know for a fact that my parents did not raise me to be a sociopath, nor did my quiet, suburban lifestyle, in a quiet little neighborhood in Beverly, MA inspire me to become dangerous. No, it was something much bigger. Something much more controlling and powerful than nature or nurture.

I really enjoyed being a good kid. I enjoyed doing the right thing most of the time, but a part of me also liked to do the wrong thing from time to time. Nothing too crazy, at least not yet. There was a part of me that dreamt about being a hunter, a ninja, a pro-wrestler like STING or the Ultimate Warrior, a police officer, or even a fireman. I often thought about being a part of something great someday, something important. I always felt like I was supposed to do something, like I had a purpose.

My friends and I often acted out these shared dreams by play-wrestling. We were willing to risk broken bones and bruises by carelessly body slamming each other and using other potentially harmful wrestling moves and holds from TV to incapacitate one another. This was always fun but also a little dangerous (which I liked), but this is not what made me dangerous either.

I was not a kid who was into extreme sports or someone who liked to take big, wild, or over-the-top risks. I mean, aside from my childhood tree climbing, skateboarding around the neighborhood, or going off of small jumps on my bike, I was a pretty cautious kid. I was always calculating the risks and trying not to get hurt. I would say that with only a couple broken bones, and the occasional cut or scrape, I survived being a free-range child pretty well.

I really like the phrase "free-range childhood". I feel like it accurately describes the way that I was allowed to learn how to be self-sufficient, social, and remain active outside away from my house. There are certain skill sets that I feel can only be learned in in the act of living as a child, that just cannot be explained or taught by a parent.

Now, since you are reading a book about addiction you might be thinking, "oh, this must be where his parents went wrong. If they just spent more time watching what he was doing, then he wouldn't have had these problems later on". If this is what you are thinking, then you would be mistaken. If watching your children more was the solution to preventing addiction and other life problems, then I assure you with our society's new and improved method of "helicopter-parenting", we would be seeing a generational decrease in kids finding reasons to use drugs.

I have had the opportunity to meet with many families who have tried many different approaches toward parenting. Even with everything I know, I still think that this version of "free-range parenting" offered the most opportunities for growth and character building for me as a child. But this story isn't about parenting styles. This is about how my childhood shaped me and how my addiction was able to re-shape me into something else, even with all of the love and support I had as a child.

I was loved

I was loved by many people. They saw me as a young boy with talent, joy, and happiness. It was visible to all who knew me, and could be felt when you met me. I was not a depressed child, nor was I oppositional or defiant or visibly struggling in any way.

My childhood felt free and enjoyable, and I believe others saw this as well. I was loved by so many, and they would ask about me at family events. People would sit with me and genuinely discuss my life, my hopes, or even my ideas because they loved me. I had cousins who were of similar age and friends who would worry about me or ask about me if I was ill or not at a function or event. I was loved and embraced by the people who knew me.

I loved others. I was able to show and feel love toward others through my words and my actions. I was beginning to understand what empathy and compassion were, and I was learning to express them when appropriate.

When I was maybe ten or eleven years old I remember learning that my mother was struggling through a miscarriage, and I could tell that she felt unsupported and in need. Even as a child who couldn't fully understand what that meant or what she was going through, I was able step in and offer love and support for her. I cared about my family and my friends. I was able to listen and offer advice, I was understanding and supportive to others in need. I loved in the same way that others had shown love to me. I learned how to be a good person, and I emulated what I experienced in all of my positive relationships. I would consider myself to have been a good person as a child.

This is starting to sound like my own eulogy, written by me. In a way, I guess it is, at least for this story. This is a glimpse of the person I was before I became dangerous. A snapshot of how both nature and nurture provided me with an amazing childhood, strong family, and enough good in my life to resist addiction when the time came. This glimpse into who I was may help you begin to understand and accept that there is no way to prepare, there isn't enough love or childhood rearing that can prevent someone from the struggles I eventually faced.

But I don't want to scare you yet, you just started reading, so let's slow it down a little bit. About fourteen years into my life I had made it into High School as a good student and a fairly good kid. Until this point there had been no drugs or alcohol for me, apart from the memory of finishing just the very bottom of my father's beer when I was a little kid, but this was not an enjoyable experience. Until this point I was just a regular fourteen-year-old boy, in a regular town, at a regular school, doing regular things.