Friendship

in recovery you make a lot of friends and lose a lot of friends. since I came to florida I've witnessed so many people that I got close with either relapse, nearly die, or wander off somewhere to go use drugs. you can never expect to have a long lasting friendship in this life of recovery. some may die, most will either most will either move on to somewhere else, or go back to the lifestyle that could end up resulting in their death.

its sad to watch a fellow addict that you become close with go back to using hard core, it makes you angry, and scared for them. anxious that they won't make it back alive from their run. when your clean and your friend relapses and leaves the program of narcotics anonymous its hard ton understand. its hard to understand why you would want to lose everything you have when your clean to go back to beimg high and having nothing. its hard to understand when your clean why someone would chose to go back to that life... until your the one who relapsed.. and everyone is worried about you.. then its easy to understand. by any means, once you pick up that first drug that first time I will keep using by any means necessary. by any means necessary.

I've lost many friends to this disease of addiction. if I count up every one of my friends who have died from overdosing or some drug related cause it would probably be about 12 people that have passed away. death triggers every demon inside of me and brings out a side of me that's sad, dark and reckless. the irony of the fact that when I lost a friend of mine named Anthony who was from Boston but I'm treatment with me in florida due to a combination of Heroin and Cocaine.. it put me in a dark place.. a month before he died I sold him a bottle if dilaudid pills right before he went home and I felt a guilt inside of me after he died.. like I enabled his death by selling my friend those drugs.. so what do I do? I leave treatment and I go out for a night and shoot heroin and cocaine.. the same thing that killed anthony.. this is the insanity of this disease.. 

I guess when I lose a friend to an overdose some part of me feels like I should be dead too. like why did God decide they needed to die from this? I'm about as reckless if an addict as you can possibly get. I throw away great opportunities for heroin and meth because in the end those two chemicals are my main desires. I'm ungrateful and selfish.. I do whatever I want whenever I want and I blow off anybody who has ever supported me and go do exactly bag at Ethan Range wants to do. because in the end that's all that matters. why do my friends have to die? why am I still here? I've overdosed several times. and after I get out of the hospital the first destination i run too is my drug dealer. when I'm using I don't give a fuck about ANYTHING. why do I deserve to live and these beautiful people deserve to die? it's not fair.. 

it's not fair that I take advantage of my life and the good things that come my way. its not fair that im still breathing. life is glorious when you take advantage of the good things in it. I shouldn't throw the good things in my life away like a piece of trash..its not right.

friends come and go. I've been lucky to have a few long term friends in recovery that have been by my side for a year now and I'm thankful for them every day. I would do anything for the few friends that I have that haven't left my side since I entered recovery. every time I relapsed they were always there for me. true friends are hard to find. but even when I take my life for granted I am forever grateful for the few friends I have that are long term and alive still fighting this battle with me.

Lauren Ehret

Samantha Santos

Anthony Demarco

I love y'all forever and I'm so grateful for all 3 of you and how you have stuck by my side no matter what.

when you have a select few true friends in life keep them close because you never know how much time you have left with them. I cherish every moment with them and thank god that he blessed me with them in my life. Lauren is the greatest girlfriend I could ever ask for. and Sam and Anthony are the best friends I could have ever asked for. I've lost many friends due to this addiction but I'm so blessed with the people that I have in my life.

Castle Of Thorns

my mother has always told me that I was the easiest baby to handle that she has ever seen. my mother said I rarely cried, I barely ever threw a fit. I slept most of the day and I was the cutest thing from what people have told me. everyone expected great things from me. my grandmother said that the first time she held me in her arms that she looked in my big bright blue eyes and she saw wisdom in them. she said I had the "eyes of an old soul' I was adored by everyone that came across me. and I was always smiling and genuinely happy baby that was very easy to manage.

I think back on how it must have felt for my mother to go through the struggle of my addiction. I think about how hard it was for her to see me strung out on several drugs with her memories of me as this perfect angel of a baby that would fall asleep on her chest for hours. I think about how this happened. why I was cursed with this disease of the brain. a disease of the soul.

addiction doesn't have any standards. it will take hold of anyone any race any gender. it will destroy lives and destroy the lives of addicts family's as well. my mom has seen me at my best and my absolute worst. she knows me better than anyone else in this world, and she knows when I'm doing good or falling off just by the sound of my voice. 

I live in a world far far away from everyone else's. my own mind is burdened by the demons that threaten my safety and self worth every day. the ghosts of my past. I chose the lifestyle that I entered. my father is a college professor teaching English and my mother is a high school English teacher as well. I never went hungry as a child, and Christmas was full of an abundance of presents under the Christmas tree every year. I chose to enter the high life. I chose to enter a dangerous world full of drugs weapons and crime. I've become what I've become because I've been a rebel since I was a child and instead of taking the route that my parents took I wanted to be a rebel. I wanted the "thug life" that's exactly why you got to be careful what you wish for... because you just might get it..

I was never meant to be running the streets. I was never meant to be a criminal. I was never meant to be a junkie. but I chose that life. I chose to fill my body with substances that turn me into a monster. 

so here comes the question.. why? why did this happen? why did this happen to me? I was a "beautiful child" with a bright future ahead of me. well... I don't have the answer to that. I was born this way, I was born in a world tbat diagnosed me with an addictive personality and a rebellious criminal mind state. I was born manipulative and selfish when I want what I want. my vices are horrifying and in control of me on a daily basis, and unfortunately for the rest of my life I will have to battle this disease of the soul I was born with.

I'm a soldier in the battlefield of my soul. I'm a warrior in the trenches of my heart and mind. I'm a fighter fighting demons trying to bring me into the depths of hell on earth on a constant daily basis. I'm in a world that consumes me daily and takes 24/7 effort on my part. I live in my own world. when I picture my world I see myself in a big giant castle of granite stone with several hallways and trap doors, there's a basement and an attic where I can escape the ghosts of my pasts lurking around the hallways and rooms of my castle. but in my castle it is completely covered in thorns. so every day I have to watch my step very very closely.. because I can slip up and get stuck by any one of those thorns in my castle and end up trapped in the basement with the ghosts of my pasts for who knows how long... if I don't watch my step 24/7 I WILL END UP TRAPPED IN THAT BASEMENT, in my world.... my castle covered in thorns...

Flow Forever

ive been on the run for too long
every single day I do wrong
every single day I stay faded
stay aimin I'm in basic training
I could chase the fame
or I could place the blame
on any fuckboy tryna erase my name
ima stay the same and whatever remains
it stays in my domain, that fire propaine
as I light the flame and try to maintain
the hardest thing I can seem to do is change
change my ways? get rid of hand grenades,
tommy guns, look at tommy run
I'm an animal, constantly coppin drugs
cockin guns and having lots of fun
I'm having lots of fun, with the automatics
shooting shells at these sluts and faggots
I got anger issues I'm a loose cannon
when it comes to the rap game I'm a fuckin bandit
in the whip with your bitch, call it cam candid
got extreme horsepower inside your girls punani
got loud packs for sale, got zuzu's and whammies
some people love me and some can't stand me
because I got the skill and I'm something you can't be
you lookin anxious home, riled up and antsy
cause I will not stop and I will keep advancing
fuck the mind games and the fraud romancing
the devils dancing and my demons are commanding
on the stairway to heaven and I'm finally landing
didn't know Range could rap when he's rarely standing?
I'm an addict till the death of me
a criminal minded necessity with every breath of me
i express myself indefinitely because its my recipe
and let my words flow on forever for several century's.

this is my recipe.
this is my recipe.
and let my words flow on forever for several century's.
and maybe one day when they mention me
they'll say that kids flow flows on for several century's.

21 Nights

21 nights on the road.

but don't misinterpret, I'm not doing shows.

I'm not on a tour bus, I'm walking the streets.

the pavement is stuck to the bottom of my feet.

I have no where else to run.

there is nobody else to love.

there is nothing else to give,

no more push and shove.

all the trust was spent.

all the pain was flushed,

in my veins.

but now I'm lit.

yeah.... now I'm lit.

now I'm homeless, no reason to live.

now I'm hungry, not too proud to beg.

cuts and bruises, tracks on skin.

why did I do this to myself again?

lord, why did I do this to myself again?

21 nights on the road.

I have lost myself, 

I have lost my soul.

I have lost my friends,

I have lost my love.

I have lost the only one that I trust.

I don't speak to god, 

i've been gone for 3 weeks.

runnin the streets, hiding from police.

hiding from my loved ones, 

wishing I was deceased. 

praying to god this is the last one that will put me out my misery.

21 nights on the road.

blisters on the bottom of my toes.

my skin is sore, my bones are hollow.

the only thing I dread is waking up tomorrow.

I relapsed, and I won't stop now.

once I pick it up I can't put it down.

I will keep on going, yeah by any means.

when I was a kid I never expected to be a dope fiend.

but here I am, there I was.

heroin, cocaine and angel dust.

this is me.

this is what I choose,

and I've spent 21 nights living the drug addicted blues....

Faded Benevolence

when my life is clouded by every substance I can possibly stuff into my system, my morals and values go out the window. I'm a mean, brutal human being. I will take everything you have, destroy everything good you have going for you, and use everything you have to induce whatever I want. when I'm using drugs I couldn't possibly care less about anybody but myself. my only objective and passion in life is to fill a syringe with meth, heroin, or crack, and put it in my bloodstream so that I don't have to think, or care about all the bad things I've done in life. when I'm high I don't have to be the genuinely kind hearted, caring soul that I naturally am as a person. I can be a heartless, selfish, greedy bastard that makes being a chronic junkie a lot easier to handle. if I tell myself I'm a scumbag all day then its not as much of a nail biter for me to go rob my friends and steal from my family to get whatever drugs I need to get me through the day without going into the vicious cycle of fullblown withdrawal. sometimes, I sit back and think that I may have spent 75% of my life TRYING to be a bad person, knowing that deep down I just can't. I cannot be heartless. no matter how hard I try, I care too much, and that adds on pressure and emotions that I do not want to deal with in life. I don't want to care, and that's been the life long goal this whole time hasn't it...?

right now I'm sitting in the treatment center that I'm currently a client in, watching this corny educational video about the dangerous concerns of smoking tobacco, writing this blog while ironically waiting for my next cigarette break. as I exhale the smoke from my mouth I watch it slowly drift up into the sky and slowly dissipate into the air. watching it is actually relaxing to be quite honest. its kind of like my life, *up in smoke* once a large cloud, it slowly fades into the crisp air and evaporates never to be seen anymore, that is until I take my next drag. when I'm clean I'm that big bold cloud of smoke, full of personality, charm and charisma. my character is evident, my spirit is vibrant and hard to contain. but as the days go by, and the demons inside of me become more and more anxious to come out and play, my personality and all the good qualities that come with it slowly fade away. my values and morals become distant, the spark of spirit you can clearly see in my bright blue eyes washes away somewhere. and if I pick up the needle and fall back down into the black hole of active IV drug addiction I become a shell of what Ethan Range is. I'm a faded version of myself. I'm a light dimmed. im the sun being covered by a dark cloud full of precipitation ready to explode over everything and everyone. its a sad cycle that I live, and my insight never goes away throughout the whole process, I see everything happening the way I just described but the thing is I just don't care. I let it happen. I just don't give a fuck.

my whole life I've been told I'm somebody with so much wisdom beyond my years and "so much potential." I've been told that I have a big purpose in this world, I scored very high on my IQ test when I last took it and getting good grades when I'm clean takes absolutely no effort. when I was a child I was so energetic and full of ecstasy. I started reading at the age of 3 and started school a year early. I used to put on costumes and dress up like characters from movies and put on performances for my mom and dad because I had always wanted to be an actor when I was little. I wanted to be famous, I wanted to be on TV or on stage. I wanted the world in the palm of my hands and everyone expected me to end up having it

i never saw what was so special about me, I never put the pieces of the puzzle together when it came to my gifts and my talents. I don't see what other people see, I don't value myself the way other people value me. I've been told I'm good looking my whole life, and I've yet to see that quality in myself either. I can't tell you why I'm blind to myself. I can't tell you why I shutter off compliments like they're insults. its a curse, a self fulfilling misery in my case. when I was younger I would tell my Dad that i was gonna grow up to be famous and move to California to be a movie star. I would point to the chimney sweepers on Mary Poppins and act out the whole scene where they're dancing on the rooftop in front of the TV. I've always felt the need to entertain others. I've always felt the need to put a smile on other peoples faces because I could never put a smile on my own. I genuinely have an altruistic nature. when I'm not living on the wild side I usually live a life of integrity and I'm.the biggest hearted person you would ever meet. its insane how fast me, Ethan Range as a person, the character that I am can fade away I'm an instant and I can transform into everything I hate.

As I Look Into The Mirror Of Myself

as I look into the mirror of myself I see an image distorted by my past and present. as I look into the mirror of myself I don't see a smile, I don't see a frown, and there's a twinkle in my eye that only makes its appearence when I have somewhat of a clear mind state and a level head. there could be that twinkle in my eye for a couple different reasons.. one reason is definitely because of my girlfriend, her names Lauren and we have been together for 8 months now, she makes me feel like the luckiest man on the planet (which I'm pretty sure is how every man feels when they have come into contact with their soulmate) she is my better half, my ride or die lover. shes my best friend and the reason I get out of bed every morning with any initiative to work towards a better life for myself and her every day. she's everything that I love. she's all that I love. because when I look into the mirror of myself I don't see a man I love. I don't love me. I never have. so everything I do, I do for lauren, I love lauren to the core of my soul because if it weren't for her I would have no reason to try anything to better myself. I would be back at the bus stop withdrawing from heroin at 630 in the morning trying to go meet my dealer and get my shot. thats all I know and drugs are all I've ever wanted, but lauren changed all that. she is the glimmer of hope I have to maintain a functional life because drugs aside I love lauren, and I want her. I want her enough to put the drugs and the lifestyle down so I can be with her and we can have a roof over our heads. and that's what's been motivating me. that's why im still here.

my whole life I've been looking in the mirror and I've never loved what I saw or who I was. I always thought and still think that I'm ugly, or fat. and I have this distorted view on myself that I'm a horrible scumbag of a person because of the things that I've done or have witnessed in my life. accepting Laurens unconditional love for me was hard. it was hard to believe that anyone would want to put up with my bullshit on a daily basis. I told myself that I didn't deserve her because I am a bad person, and the last thing in the world I want to do is hurt lauren, and I knew that by getting into a long term relationship with me I would end up hurting her over and over again even though it would be my last of intentions. but she has been willing to go through whatever it takes to be with me on a daily basis since January and I have been the happiest I have honestly ever been in my life. my journey now is finding out how to love myself and its the hardest thing to succumb to. right now all I know is that I love Lauren. thats all I know. but I can't just love lauren and stay clean. I will never be able to stop trying to fill the whole inside of myself with poison until I find some sense of reason within myself to keep living. I can't just live for Lauren and stay clean, but right now all the love I have for lauren and the zero amount I have for myself is keeping a needle out of my arm for today. and all I can do is keep trying to love myself a little more every day, because I realize I deserve happiness and a better life and so does Lauren and my mother, the two people that keep me going every day. if I didn't deserve an amazing supporting mother who loves me unconditionally or a trustworthy loyal beautiful loving girlfriend like lauren then I wouldn't have them. I do deserve to smile.

Heroin Tears

I came down here to florida a year ago in June. I had been using meth and PCP every day for 6 months straight and it had brought me to my knees. I thought nothing could top the disgusting misery and self hatred that came from an addiction to crystal meth. it turned me into a monster that I grew to hate. it made me a selfish beast and a paranoid backstabber always scheming and plotting to get my next bag. I never stopped, I never slowed down for anyone, I was gonna get my meth by any means necessary. i was gonna get high. countless people tried to stop me, numerous people tried to offer there support and love to get me off of that devilish poison that had total control over me. everything that was trying to be done to save my life was a failed effort by my loved ones. I just wasn't gonna stop for anybody or anything.

after coming to florida to get clean things haven't gone exactly as planned. I've spent a lot of time here using drugs still. but it hasn't been the same type of runs that I usually go on. my mission used to be to tweak nonstop, stay up as long as I possibly could and always be up. I've lost that drive. I was addicted to crystal meth for 5 years
 and honestly, its kind of gotten old to me. the amount of effort it takes to sustain an addiction to uppers is tiresome. and I have physical effects on my body that kind of keep me from having the desire to use uppers anymore such as epilepsy and mental issues that have come from meth addiction.. the paranoia has never gone away.

I've substituted meth for something else.. heroin.. I used it about 7 months ago down here in florida and it was by far the best feeling in the entire world. I had done it before but was always on meth so I never felt its full effect. heroin was everything I had been looking for. as soon as it was in my bloodstream all my problems, all my fears, and all my sorrow washed away in am instant. NOTHING MATTERED. it was the most beautiful experience I think I've ever had. and ever since that day I've been battling this physical and mental obsession with heroin every single day. I can't stop thinking, and glorifying it in my mind. I can't forget that feeling, I will NEVER forget that feeling, which is why I have been in and out of treatment several times since that first day. its all I want, and all I can think of when my mind wanders. its all that is consumed in the devils playground that is my mind. my daily goal at this moment in time is to switch my thoughts from telling myself how much I love heroin and want it again, to how many consequences I have gotten from using it these past 7 months, because even though that feeling of pure care free bliss is what I felt, after the high is gone there are more problems and more pain added on to whatever was already there before I get high. its a catch 22 circumstance. a temporary fix and a permanent scar.

when I was little I never expected to be a meth addict. when I was a meth addict I never expected to be a heroin addict. that's just how this game goes. everything I never expected to do I end up doing and everything I thought I was done doing I end up doing again. its just a continuous cycle of drama and pain. that's why I crave the heroin now more than ever. with all the drama and bullshit that goes on in my life that I create for one second, for one moment the dope eliminates all the worries that comes with this roller coaster ride of a life I'm living in south florida. that's what's so hard to give up. that one moment of pure bliss. there's one problem about all of this, I have to give it up...

Junkie

blogging was my passion. I'm an aspiring writer thats battling a major drug addiction that stunts my pursuit in this career. I haven't written anything since October of 2014. that was the last time I wrote poetry, a blog, the last period of time where I expressed myself through my words and when I am not regularly writing and getting out my inner demons I am a lost soul. now, in July of 2015 I made a new blog and although I am returning to writing, I am as lost as a human being can possibly find themselves. 

the past 8 months have been nothing less than an exhausting contradicting roller coaster ride that is my life. I'm exhausted, mentally, spiritually, physically and emotionally. I'm a 19 year old heroin and meth addict. a junkie. a junkie that when I'm fueled by my addiction to those drugs I will get my fix, fix any means necessary. I came down to florida to better my life. and I can honestly say I don't know if I've gotten better or worse down here. I've been in and out of different treatkemts all over south florida, barely making it a couple weeks clean without using some sort of substance to alter my mind. I know I want a better life that isn't involving the streets and trap houses and robbery's, schemes, dope finding and marks all over my arms from the needles that were inside of me without end. my use of needles has gotten progressively worse since I got deep into a heroin dependency. I've been back and forth from being strung out and a desperate pathetic wreck to entering a program of some sort and becoming a healthy drieven intelligent guy that I am whenever I'm not in my junkie mode. its safe to say I cant decide what I want for myself yet, or what I'm willing to give up. which includes everything and every thought that brings me back to the streets. 

right now I am on suboxone maintenance in a sober living program in west palm beach. the suboxone being a synthetic form of heroin is what I have become dependent on right now to keep a needle out of my arm. i can't seem to stay clean at all without some chemical in my body that brings me out of myself. I'm lost. I don't know what I want and I can't tell you my next move because I have been doing the opposite of what I want for months now. but I am alive, whether I'm lost and confused or not. and I won't give up, just for today I won't give up with the hope that a miracle will come.my way and end this cycle of despair I keep trapping myself in.. just for today.