“I sliced the tendons in my finger while trying to cut away some...

“I sliced the tendons in my finger while trying to cut away some waterproofing. I’d taken a few pain pills before, but I’d never been handed hundreds of them. Eventually I was taking twenty pills a day. I was going through a divorce at the time so I was pretty unstable. Back then you could ‘doctor shop:’ run one prescription through insurance, pay cash for two more. After three years I went to a treatment center and they put me on something called Suboxone. It took me four years to get off that stuff. The withdrawals were terrible. It’s almost as bad as the pain pills. And get this—the same people making the pain pills are making Suboxone. They sell you drugs to get off their drugs. It’s all a money game. Listen, it was my choice to take the pills. I know it was my fault. But somebody out there made a lot of money off my weakness.”