(bright music)
- [Narrator] If you were alone in a room
with someone addicted to hard drugs, what would you ask?
(soft music)
- I'm Chad, nice to meet you.
- Right on.
I'm a Riggy Marz.
♪ You ever been dope sick in the street ♪
♪ Yeah, you know the vibe ♪
- What drug or drugs are you addicted to?
- Opiates, but whatever you got.
- Did you start off with something small, like marijuana?
- It started for me just like already feeling really nervous
and like I don't fit in
mixed with a little bit of peer pressure.
Come on, man. It'll relax you.
Hit this.
And my curiosity, I picked it up.
- And you started off in high school?
- Eighth grade I would say.
My sophomore year is when my parents first put me in rehab.
- Oh.
- So I was 15.
- How old are you?
- I'm 35.
- How long have you been using?
- About 20 years.
- What other drugs were-
- [Riggy Marz] Everything.
- Everything?
- Ecstasy, ketamine, GHB, psychedelics, powdered cocaine,
crack cocaine, meth, heroin, and up until recently fentanyl.
- So I was wondering if you could just kind of walk me
through the first time that you took drugs.
- The first time I actually got high off something
was inhalants.
I was huffing WD40 out of a paper bag.
I wanna say I was 12.
I saw Leonardo de Caprio do it
in the movie, Basketball Diaries,
and I was like, that looks cool.
I'm gonna try that when I get home from school.
- What are some things that are currently in place
in our society that are enabling your addiction
or hindering your recovery?
- Criminalizing us.
Just taking advantage of a mentally ill person.
And then you have that title over you forever.
I've tried to apply for jobs recently
and they run my background and they won't hire me
because of some (beep) that I did seven or eight years ago.
So that's kind of enabling
because it's like, all right, (beep) it,
I'm just gonna use.
- I am a police sergeant
with the local law enforcement agency.
What were your thoughts when you were arrested?
- My thoughts were, I shouldn't be getting arrested
for this.
That happening repeatedly,
now I'm just like in and out of county jail, in and out.
And all I wanted to do was just get high
because I don't like how I feel.
I don't like myself.
- Right.
So is that one of the reasons why you did do heroin?
You didn't like yourself?
- Yeah. I've been doing it so long
I couldn't think of another solution.
- So because of those experiences
did you have a negative view of people like me?
- Oh yeah.
- Okay.
- Yeah.
Like you guys were the enemy,
but I've met a few really cool police officers though
that have talked to me, not at me or down on me.
Talked to me face to face like a human being.
Yeah, I grew to not like cops very much.
- Okay. That's fine.
And I understand that
because your experiences weren't all always great.
But just to let you know, we're not all like that.
So what could we do better for drug addicts?
- I can't say don't arrest them
if they get caught with something,
obviously you have to or whatever,
but maybe give them a little pep talk
on the drive to downtown.
Like it's nothing personal
but you should get some help, man.
- I'm the marketing director
for an addiction treatment and trauma center.
You said you're a chronic relapser.
So it sounds like you've tried to get clean sometimes.
Can you tell me about those experiences?
- Yeah, I would go to AA meetings
but just the meetings.
So I was dry.
Eventually you get to a point where your body
and your brain is just like screaming at you to use.
It comes down to your higher power,
it comes down to...
We use drugs to fill this God-sized hole
that only God or spirituality
or that a higher power can fill.
So I pray and meditate and stuff.
I'm not religious by any means,
but that's when I'm having a rough day or month,
that's usually what keeps me going smooth.
- When you think about treatment
or you think about the process of getting clean,
what feelings come up for you?
- Just utter hopelessness.
And when people look at recovery or the destination, right?
The mountain is so (beep) big,
it just seems impossible to ever get there.
- What do you think is the best and worst advice
that you've heard regarding addiction?
- The worst advice I've heard has gotta be relapse
is part of the process, because it doesn't have to be.
And I know people that were clean that used that excuse,
relapse it's part of the process, and never came back.
They're dead.
I've used that excuse before.
- Hi, I'm Jessica and I'm an alcoholic.
I'm three years sober.
- That is amazing.
- Was there anything in particular that happened
that made you use...
Are you using to-
- [Riggy Marz] I was born with the gene.
- You were born with the gene.
- [Riggy Marz] Yeah. - Okay.
And from the-
- I'm dual diagnosed.
So I can have the addiction part under control,
but I have mental health issues too.
So if I don't have that in check, I'm gonna get loaded.
- I was also dual diagnosed with anxiety,
depression and alcoholism.
So do you have a therapist now?
- I do.
- Okay, cool.
- Yeah, I need all that outside help too.
At one point I was against suboxone.
- [Jessica] Yeah.
- And methadone, saying that's not sober
but whatever keeps you from dying.
- [Jessica] Yeah.
- Recovery's not so black and white,
a lot of old timers in AA make it up to be.
When I learned that, it gave me a lot less anxiety
thinking about my own situation and my own path.
- So my mom is an addict
and also alcoholism has ran through my family.
Since I've grown up they've been like,
oh, you have the alcoholic gene,
you have the addictive gene.
So you need to be extra careful
especially when you go in college.
And with my mom, I've had to go between that back and forth
of just like that just hope.
It's like, oh, you're doing really good.
And I'm so proud of you and I love you.
And then it's just like, she relapses
and it just starts all over again.
And it's like every time it just makes me resent her more
because as a kid, it's like my love wasn't enough.
And it broke me down so much
because it was like I was just getting so hopeful
and then it would just be that cycle of just being scared,
like, oh, where is she?
Is she alive?
Am I gonna see her again?
I wish I said, I loved her.
- I have a son and oh man it would kill me if he hated me
because of that.
I told him, "Hey, you know all those times
that grandma told you that I was on tour?"
and he's like, "Yeah.
I told him I was in jail.
I was in jail and I'm an addict
and I'm a sick person, but right now I'm not so sick,
I'm getting better.
But with my son, I don't leave anything out.
Because I don't want him to go seek elder advice
from another kid in the neighborhood.
I want him to come to me.
You know what I mean?
So I can keep it real with him.
And the trust is there.
- What is your biggest fear in life?
- That is a really hard question.
My biggest fear in life is ending up alone.
Being old and living in regret.
- [Interviewer] Is that also how you found comfort in drugs?
- Yeah. I didn't care about any of that (beep).
- It was just like it was something
that was always kind of there for you.
- Yeah.
- [Interviewer] When no one else was.
- Yeah, yeah exactly.
- Yeah.
It was so nice meeting you.
- Pleasure.
- I'm so proud of you.
- Thank you. - Of what you've accomplished
and just where you have to go.
- Thank you.
- Nice to meet you, man. - Nice to meet you.
- What's up man?
- What's up. - How're you doing?
- Nice to meet you.
- Thank you so much.
- Yes, can I hug you?
Okay. Nice to meet you.
- Nice to meet you too.
Congrats on your three years.
- Thank you.
Thank you.
I hope that one day you'll also say
you have three years too.
- Thank you. - Yeah.