Pill Addict: My Generation's Epidemic

In a recent survey, children between the ages of 12 and 17, told researchers it's easier to illegally obtain prescription pills than beer.
A further 46 percent of the interviewed said prescription pills are the most commonly abused drugs in their age group, according to The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.
Stephen Chapal, 23, sees it this way: "This is the epidemic of my generation."
There was a time when you could guarantee to party hard with Stephen Chapal. He always had the good stuff.
That was seven years ago, when Chapal was still in high school. In addition to experimenting with alcohol and marijuana, Chapal was trying Xanax, a form of the relaxant called alprazolam.
Even then, the younger brothers and sisters of his friends were imitating their siblings and also popping pills.
The pills gave Chapal a sense of euphoria; he felt he could accomplish anything.
In Chapal's experience, it took about 30 days of incremental steps to grow truly dependent on the pills. He began with one or two pills and bumped up the dosage when the painkiller no longer delivered a high. It wasn't uncommon to mix the pills and wash them down with alcohol.
He remembers crushing Roxycodone and snorting it for an automatic high. He stopped short of the injecting the drugs directly into the veins as some do.
"Deep down inside, I was aware of the addiction," Chapal said. "I feel it took my soul away."
The best source for pills is doctors and pain management clinics. It was a cinch for his friends to visit a doctor, complain about back pain and get a prescription for a form of oxycodone. Sometimes it was a quick cash transaction, he said.
"My friends would go doctor to doctor," he said.
Most would avoid the chain pharmacies to fill a prescription, where it was more likely to get caught, and target the smaller mom-and-pop operations. In any case, the addiction overrules any fear of arrest, Chapal said.
On the street a 30 mg Roxicet pill, a "Roxy 30", costs between $10 and $15; OxyContin is more expensive, roughly $15 to $20 for a 40 mg, and up to $40 for an 80 mg pill.
Funding a habit can quickly add up. Chapal began borrowing money from his parents and friends. That source dried up eventually when he didn't pay them back. He turned to stealing and pawning his family's possessions.
"My reputation got worse and worse," he said.
Relationships were destroyed.
"You use people like crazy and after awhile they get sick and tired of it," he said.
He went through a lot of jobs. After high school he went to college in Gainesville for a few semesters. His habit kept him from making the grades.
The pills were "my first love. It came before anything."
Every day focused on the pills. It was a constant gnawing question in the back of his mind: "Do I have enough pills for tomorrow?"
The drugs came before anything. If he had $100 left over from his paycheck, Chapal would go buy some pills and let his cell phone go disconnected.
"You'll go to any length to get your next high," he said. "My whole life revolved around it."
Chapal remembers rock bottom. He was staying the night on a friend's couch. His mom had hung up the phone on him for the first time in his life. He was ready to die.
"I was just sick and tired of it," he said.
He had already tried to kick the habit a handful of time with no success. Chapal called several detox centers but all of them had long waiting lists. For months he despaired of ever getting help, but he finally got into a treatment center.
Weaning off the drugs "feels like a train wreck." There are cold sweats, sleepless nights, agonizing bouts of stomach illness.
"I felt I was going to jump out of my skin," he said.
He went directly from four days of flushing the drug out of system to counseling sessions with Jericho Road Ministries in Brooksville.
It's going to take time before his family is convinced this sober period is for real. He gravely announces that he is the father of a 3-month-old son. Will his relationship with the child's mother ever be the same? Chapel honestly doesn't know. As it is, he's still mending his relationship with his family.
For now, he's just glad to have a clear head for the first time in years.
"It's like I'm learning to live all over again."