By Dennis Fairweather

I grew up in a really dysfunctional household with lots of drugs and violence around me. My father went to prison for 10 years for guns, and drugs, andmy mother got busted selling cocaine as well. She got out when I was 6 and began raising me again. I had become a pretty messed up kid and eventually, two weeks after graduating from high school, I ended up getting busted and sent to prison myself. I had followed my family’s footsteps,and at the age of 18 was going to federal prison for distribution ofcocaine and heroin. I decided right then and there that I would never sell drugs again.

Although I stuck to that decision, I never dealt with all my underlying issues from my childhood and eventually became a drug addict and alcoholic myself. I got myself lost in a world of chaos. Every day Ilooked for my next fix and didn’t even know where to start in order to change.I had been taught that it was a disease passed down genetically from my parents. In my head, that thought condemned me. I thought I was predestined to live the life of a loser junkie and that I had no control over it whatsoever. I now believe that to be a cop-out.

After living like that for 10yrs,I landed back in prison. It was the best thing that ever happened to me. At first I wallowed in self-pity, feeling sorry for myself, but after a few months my head became clear and I found some ambition to exercise my free will and change my life. I went to the school department and took the Accuplacer test to see if I was smart enough to go to college. I had never looked at myself as a college prospect but figured it would be my best chance at making the life transformation. I ended up scoring surprisingly high on the test and the teacher at the prison coached me and got me a scholarship to begin taking classes while incarcerated. I took a 100 level Psychology class and received a 98 in it. This gave me the courage and ambition to apply and begin school at SMCC after my release.

It has been 2yrs since I was released from prison and things have gone amazingly well. I have my own small painting company, and I’m a full time student with a 3.7 GPA. I have an amazing relationship with my family, and it is all because I am sober and making my way through life with good decisions. Life has proven to me that we get what we put into it. If we want to be successful it does not matter what we come from. If we work hard enough and make the right choiceswe can control our own destiny.

The part of this story that keeps me on the fence is that I have seen so many people fail, people who have truly wanted to overcome drugs and alcohol. I tell myself that they just didn’t want it bad enough, or that their will wasn’t strong enough.

There will always be a voice in the back of my head telling me that I did not change my life because of free will. I sometimes think that I was chosen to be an example of a success story for those who feel as hopeless as I once did. Perhaps this was my destiny all along and my early struggles in life were just part of the “plan” to make me the man and success story that I have become.

The reason that is even a question to me is because I cannot figure out why it was so easy for me. Everything just kept falling into place once I made up my mind to live a healthy life. Almost like someone, or something was doing it for me.

The Beacon would like to thank Dennis for submitting the above column to the Beacon. The original piece was written for Ethical Dilemmas and appears here in the Beacon with modest edits. The Beacon would like to wish Dennis the best with his educational endeavors.