Anger, Guilt, & Cross-Addiction: Turning Rock Bottom into Purpose

Foreign welcome back to mindset for recovery, the show where we go beyond just getting sober and focus on building the mindset that makes recovery last. I am your host and coach demarcus morton. Let's get into today's episode. On today's show, you'll hear from a man who calls himself pretty. Someone who's been through it all. He left to Florida thinking he could help his family escape addiction. But instead, he found himself pulled right back into the same situation himself. What started as an act of service quickly turned into relapse, shame, and a rock bottom moment in a Dominican jail cell. But what makes this session powerful isn't just the chaos. It's his vulnerability. Pre opens up about anger, guilt, and the part of recovery that isn't often talked about. Those moments when you realize you've hurt some people and you still need to find a way to forgive yourself and move forward. And somewhere in all of it, he starts to see his purpose. Not just to get sober, but to make things right. Let's listen in.

I was in a hard place back in Miami. I went over there to help my cousin remodel his mom's house so that he could sell it so he could get his sister and his niece away from drugs so they could prosper because they were struggling really hard. They were strong. So I went over there trying to help my cousin with his purpose, which I felt was a good family purpose. When I got there, it was a lot going on that wasn't okay with me. I was like, listen, you each come up with a hundred dollars. I'm going to come up with the third hundred dol just so we could get these lights back on. How y' all live in here with no lights? And they were smoking crack as well. It was a tough situation for me, you know what I'm saying? One thing led to another. I started to do things that I would never do. You know what I'm saying? I was smoking with my cousin and niece's boyfriends. I started stealing from stores. The whole month I was over there. It just kept getting worse for me and worse for me. Like, I can't do it no more. I'm going to California and get sober. I was there for 45 days in the program. Then I did about a month in sober living. It was my sister's 19th birthday. We went to the Dominican Republic, you know, on a trip. I stayed sober for the first two days. The third day, I was like, man, I'm in Dominican republic. I'm going to take a drink, see What I can make happen seemed like a good idea. You know, all inclusive, hotel for three days. Once I took that first drink. Yeah, it's like that switches flake. Then I was like, I'm not trying to get tipsy. I'm not trying to get a little drunk. You know what I'm saying? We went to go ride some, like, some buggies, and they seen that I was drunk. So the guy. The guy was like, oh, I gotta drive you. I was like, I did not pay for you to drive me in the buggies. The whole point was for me to drive like, I want my money back. And they never gave me my money back. And it was a package deal that I had got at the airport. I'm like, these people ripping me off. They owe me money. I'm riding in a car on my way home to go to the airport, and I start breaking the lights in his car, tearing up the guy's car, talking about they owe me money, that I'm not getting a refund. I kind of blacked out at that point. I wake up at like three in the morning. I'm in a holding cell in Dominican Republic. I'm like, f. I can't believe this shit happened. I was like, fuck it. I already used alcohol, so I might as well smoke some crack.

I want to pause right here because this matters. You'll notice pre didn't just slip back into one thing. It was a domino effect. Alcohol was just a reminder to the network, that reward system that's wired to escape pain. Once that light switch flipped, everything else followed. That's how cross addiction works. Let me take a quick moment to explain what that actually means. When someone becomes addicted to a substance like alcohol or pills, the brain starts building a strong connection in what's called the reward system. This system involves areas like the nucleus incumbent and. And prefrontal cortex. And it's responsible for motivation, cravings, and how we experience pleasure over time. Repeated use of substances trains the brain to expect and seek out that same high. It builds deeply wired patterns, almost like carving a groove in a record. The more it's used, the deeper the groove gets and the more likely the brain is to play that same track over and over again. Now, here's where cross addiction comes in. When someone in recovery starts using a different substance, even one they've never had an issue with, it still activates the same reward system. It lights up the same circuitry that was originally trained by the first drug. And because those pathways are already well worn, it can quickly lead the person Back to their original substance, the one their brain already knows how to use for maximum effect. That's why cross addiction is so dangerous. It's not about what you use. It's that anything activating that old wiring can restart the cycle. Even if you've done the work to manage cravings, switching to another mind altering substance can still pull you back into the same loop. And that's how you end up jumping from one high to another, even in sobriety. And that's why this part of Pre story is important to highlight. Because it's not just about relapse. It's about what happens when you try to substitute instead of surrender. So after that night in the Dominican Republic, Pre's uncle gave him a wake up call. He told him that he had to go back to treatment. And he did. And that's where this next part picks up. Pre is sober now. But that doesn't mean it's easy. Because what came up after the drugs were gone was anger. Not the kind of anger you explode with once. The kind that lives under the surface. The kind that shows up when you're sober but still hurting. And that's what we start to unpack here.

And I'm angry all day because I'm.

Not high, which I'm glad you mentioned because you've mentioned a couple things. As far as tearing things up in one occasion and tearing things up in another occasion. Is there a history of anger?

Alcohol and me equal violence? I don't know why. I'm not necessarily an angry person. I'm usually a very happy person. But for some reason when I drink alcohol, I get violent.

That reason is because there's something that tends to come to the surface when the inhibitions are lessened. So when you say I'm a happy go, lucky guy, I believe that. But there has to be something that.

It's the self guilt, the misery. Make it look like everything's okay. But inside you're not okay. I introduced a lot of people to doing the wrong thing for what I thought were good reasons. The body felt good, like I wanted to feel good, you know, like, you know, I never meant to harm people. It was more of relating. Cause I've been there. That's what helped me at that moment. The drugs and alcohol, Even though it turned out to be worse the remedy than the sickness, you know what I'm saying? That anger is from that self judgment. So I feel like this is my chance to make up for that bad karma. To kind of clean up, you know?

Yeah, yeah. Okay.

Momentarily. I Do want to. I feel like this is my calling for the moment, and I'm grateful for it because I get to help other addicts eventually find a way.

Purpose will always be in service to other people. Now, that doesn't mean you have to stay the same way in service to other people. How I've been of service and operating in my purpose has changed over the years. I used to work in a justice system. I've done drug court. I've done residential counseling. Now I'm doing coaching. But the purpose has remained the same, to help people. So I always say, passion and purpose, they're different. Passions will serve us. Purpose will always serve someone else. Now, if your passion and purpose align, great, but they don't have to. I think you're spot on when you say for right now, the purpose is because it could change in a few years.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Since you've been here, what improvements are you starting to notice?

I've came a long way, definitely a lot with my anger. The way I was brought up with the machismo. It's like, you're not supposed to let the first time slide because then it becomes, you know, like, do it again. People get used to it. Like, they think it's okay. Today, I try to mind my business. I'm a very outgoing person, and I don't need anything, like, outside of me to keep me happy, to allow me to have fun. Like, yeah, I genuinely love to laugh, and I love people that are fun, and they. They like me.

What do you want as a result of your sobriety?

I just want my family. You know what I'm saying? I just want to make the family proud. I want to make myself proud. It's hard now because back then it was like, more like convince myself I wasn't an addict.

Yeah.

And now I'm convinced I'm an addict, and I'm grateful for it because I get to help.

What I love about pre story is that it shows you what happens when you stop trying to escape the pain and start giving it direction. Yeah. He felt anger, guilt, withdrawal. But instead of staying stuck in that, he made a decision to turn that discomfort into fuel and to use what he's been through to serve someone else. That's a mindset shift. You see, you don't need to be fully healed to have purpose. You just need to stop hiding from what you already know and start using it. Because when you take ownership of your own story, even the parts that hurt, you stop reacting and you start leading. That's the work that's a mindset for recovery, Sam.