My name is Gary and I am a recovered heroin addict. My date of sobriety is Nov. 1, 2008. I met David Hoffman, a.k.a. 'Pizza', in late Dec., 2007. I was a junkie living on the streets of Austin, Tx. Pizza was the only person in East Austin I felt I could trust with my dope and my money; he knew everybody who used and sold heroin and I needed his knowledge and resources.
Pizza needed a place to stay and I shared everything I had with him - a tent, something to eat, and my dope. Our "need" for each other created a partnership, a brotherhood that we vowed would last "until the wheels fell off". Pizza was quick witted, intelligent, and always thinking of what it would take for us to survive. You see, for junkies like us, we lived to shoot dope and shot dope to live - to survive.
Pizza shared his deepest darkest secrets with me. He shared his feelings, experiences, strengths, and hope for the future. He shared with me his life growing up; he told me about his love for his girls and his sister. He shared where he had been in his life, what he had gone through, and the desire to get his life right for those he loved and loved him.
I am not writing this to be a eulogy for David Hoffmann, Pizza. I am writing this with the desire to help others understand who Pizza was and what an addict really is. Pizza suffered from the disease of addiction. The majority of the rest of this is taken from the context of the literature of Narcotics Anonymous and paraphrased, to help those who do not understand. “For addicts like us our whole life and thinking is centered in drugs in one form or another - the getting and using and finding ways and means to get more. We lived to use and used to live; very simply a man or woman whose life is controlled by drugs. We are people in the grip of a continuing and progressive illness whose end is always the same: jails, institutions, or death.” Pizza continued to suffer until the bitter end. He experienced all of the above.
“When our addiction was treated as a crime or moral deficiency, we became rebellious and were driven deeper into isolation. Some of the highs felt great, but eventually the things we had to do to continue using reflected desperation. We were forced to survive any way that we could. We manipulated people and tried to control everything around us. We had to have drugs regardless of the cost. Failure and fear began to invade our lives.”
“One aspect of our addiction was our inability to deal with life on life's terms. We tried drugs and combinations of drugs to cope with a seemingly hostile world. We dreamed of finding a magic formula that would solve our ultimate problem - ourselves. That fact was we could not use any mind - altering or mood - changing substance, including marijuana and alcohol, successfully. Drugs ceased to make us feel good.”
“We were proud of the sometimes illegal and often bizarre behavior that typified our using. We "forgot" about the times when we sat alone and were consumed by fear and self - pity. We fell into a pattern of selective thinking. We only remembered the drug experiences. We justified and rationalized the things that we did to keep from being sick or going crazy. We ignored the times when life seemed to be a nightmare. We avoided the reality of our addiction.”
Most medical practitioners and mental health experts agree the disease of addiction was present, in the addict, long before the first time they used drugs. “We” did not choose to become addicts; most of us were born this way.
“We were constantly searching for the answer – that person, place, or thing that would make everything alright. We lacked the ability to cope with daily living. As our addiction progressed, many of us found ourselves in and out of institutions.”
“Like other incurable diseases, addiction can be arrested. We agree that there is nothing shameful about being an addict, provided we accept our dilemma honestly and take positive action. We are willing to admit without reservation that we are allergic to drugs. Common sense tells us that it would be insane to go back to the source of our allergy. Our experience indicates that medicine cannot cure our illness.”
“We develop a point of view that enables us to pursue our addiction without concern for our own well – being or the well - being of others. We begin to feel that the drugs are killing us long before we can ever admit it to anyone else. We notice that if we try to stop using, we can’t. We suspect that we have lost control over the drugs and have no power to stop.”
“Certain things follow as we continue to use. We become accustomed to a state of mind that is common to addicts. We forget what it was like before we started using; we forget about social graces. We acquire strange habits and mannerisms. We forget how to work; we forget how to play; we forget how to express ourselves and how to show concern for others. We forget how to feel.”
“While using, we lived in another world. We experienced periodic jolts of reality or self – awareness. It seemed that we were at least two people instead of one, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. We ran around and tried to get our lives together before our next run. Sometimes we could do this very well, but later, it was less important and more impossible. In the end, Dr. Jekyll died and Mr. Hyde took over.”
“At some point, our using became uncontrollable and anti – social. This began when things were going well, and we were in situations that allowed us to use frequently. This was usually the end of the good times. We may have tried to moderate, substitute or even stop using, but we went from a state of drugged success and well – being to complete spiritual, mental and emotional bankruptcy.”
“We regretted the past, dreaded the future, and we weren’t too thrilled about the present. After years of searching, we were more unhappy and less satisfied than when it all began.” Pizza shared with me these were his feelings.
“As addicts, we have an incurable disease called addiction. The disease is chronic, progressive and fatal. However it is a treatable disease. We feel that each individual has to answer the question, “Am I an addict?” how we got the disease is of no immediate importance to us. We are concerned with recovery.”
“We realize that we are never cured, and that we carry the disease within us for the rest of our lives. We have the disease, but we do recover.”
And that is through a twelve – step program that has been proven successful a million times over. This simple program requires we be honest with ourselves – admitting we are powerless over our addiction and it has made our life unmanageable. Pizza understood this about his addiction. The next step ask only that we come to believe there is something that is greater/ bigger than us; we have to be open – minded because our actions nor the drugs have been responsible for keeping us alive, after the life we’ve lived. Pizza admitted to me there was a God he turned to when nothing else seemed to work. At this point, we have to become willing to turn our will and our life over to that God of our understanding completely. As I said in the beginning, Pizza was always thinking of how he could fix things in order to make them better. He ran the show. He was the director. When all he really played was the part of a minute actor in this short play called life. He could not or would not let God run the show. Pizza wanted to “do it his way”. Being honest with ourselves, being open-minded about something greater than us, and to be willing to let that something guide our lives and our recovery: a simple program to a better way of living.
The last time I heard from Pizza he was returning from completing a dream of visiting his two daughters, now aged 17 and 22 years old, and a sister he had not seen in over 14 years. My last words to him were a suggestion that he contact me immediately before or after his arrival, and that I loved him. I said we would go to a 12-step meeting regardless of what I was doing at that time. He responded that was what he needed to do. At this point he was clean from heroin use for +/- 30 days.
During the week including March 17, 2009 the Austin Police Department reported at least five overdoses from heroin use in Austin, Tx. The ages of the deceased ranged from 21-58 years of age. Pizza returned to Austin, Tx. on March15, 2009. He turned 58 years old on his last birthday. I was contacted by his niece and told that the Travis County Medical Examiner identified him on March 17, 2009.
On March 17, 2009 “The wheels fell off.” I don’t hate Pizza for not calling me when he returned, but I am mad at him because, I loved him. The disease was still his Master. I hate this disease. I wanted to offer any help I could to help him overcome his disease, but I (an addict) understand why he could not.
May you reach out to your God and I pray you find the closure and understanding I have attempted to deliver by writing this. If you know another addict still suffering, please pass this message on.
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change and the courage to change the things I can…”
A friend and an addict forever, clean and sober one day at a time –Gary M
