I vividly remember every detail of that life-changing night three years ago—the night my boyfriend told me he was an opioid addict, a secret he’d been hiding from me for months.
I felt blindsided; the moment was surreal. Shock and devastation overwhelmed me. Who was this person before me, the person I loved? What else was he hiding from me?
I had met him four months earlier at a bar in Petaluma. We were both a little tipsy, but there was something different about this drunk guy than others I’d met before him. We had our first official date a week later. “Love at first date” is how we’d later describe it.
While four months may not seem long, it felt that way. It wasn’t like in the past, when I’d meet a guy and think, “He’s cool. I’m down to see him again.” This time, I loved him almost instantly; however corny that sounds, it was true. He felt the same. It was as if neither of us had a choice in the matter. There was no other way to go forward but together.
Like any relationship, however, the blinding part of our honeymoon phase started to fade a few months in. We were getting to know each other better and spending more time together. He saw my flaws and I his.
I started to notice things about him that felt off. He’d be distant yet tell me nothing was wrong and that he loved me. He’d be emotionally inconsistent: some days, incredibly loving; other times, it felt like he didn’t see me at all. Our mornings together often hurt me the most. After an intimate night — the kind that makes you love your partner even more — he’d be quiet and cold the next morning, wanting to leave shortly after he woke up. I struggled with it, though I reasoned that, like a lot of men, he had intimacy issues.
But after he revealed his secret, everything made sense. Looking back, it was ludicrous that I never suspected anything, clearly blinded by love. I found out that on those mornings when I’d feel crushed from his coldness, he was having withdrawals and was preoccupied thinking about when and how he’d get high again. Most nights when I saw him, his eyes were bloodshot, he’d pass out hard, and he’d have mood swings.
He ended up revealing his addiction to me in a text after I had kicked him out during a dramatic fight about keeping secrets. He told me there was something he needed to tell me, but that it wasn’t the right time. My mind immediately thought of all the worst-case scenarios. Was he seeing someone else?
Five minutes after he left, I got a text. His shame and guilt prevented him from being able to tell me to my face. There’s nothing like the gut-wrenching feeling of being deeply deceived by the person you trusted and loved.
For the first time in a long time, my boyfriend was forced to face his emotions. For the entirety of his twenties, every emotion he had was numbed and suppressed by drugs.
We didn’t speak that night. It was the longest we’d gone without speaking since we met. When we talked the next day, he told me everything: that he’d been suffering from the addiction for five years. That his opioid use started out as something he did with friends on the weekends while partying and slowly turned into a daily habit that trapped him, ruled every decision he made, got him into serious debt, ruined relationships, and stole the light of who he was.
The first couple weeks, I struggled with feeling both deeply sorry for him and angry: He lied to me. I started to question everything about him. Was he keeping other secrets? Was he a cheater, too? Was he a criminal? Was he a good person?
The thing about stigma is you don’t know it’s inside you until a situation presents itself that directly and closely affects your life. I was a journalist and had written stories about addiction. I understood it was a disease and something that could happen to anyone. But when I found out the person I was considering spending the rest of my life with smoked oxycodone (that he got from one of his multiple drug dealers) several times a day, hung out in sketchy places with people wrapped up in criminal behavior, had done other serious drugs, and lied about it all, the stigma hit me hard. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to be his girlfriend anymore. I looked at him differently, like he was morally a bad person or someone very dark. The idea of other people knowing my boyfriend was a drug addict also started to affect me.
Not long after my boyfriend told me his secret, he checked into an outpatient rehab facility on his own will in Vallejo. He was there eight hours a day for three weeks. This was the first time he received professional help, though he’d attempted to quit on his own multiple times. In addiction recovery, it’s often said that programs don’t work unless someone has a complete desire to get sober. For a long time in the past, my boyfriend admits, he didn’t want to get sober. It wasn’t until he was in a relationship with someone he loved and his life had hit rock bottom that he truly wanted to live a better life — a life he saw as purposeful.
Unlike many others suffering from addiction, he was fortunate enough to have insurance that covered mental health care. This saved his life. Somehow, he was able to keep a job (after being fired from a previous one due to an incident related to his addiction).
His time in rehab was hard but incredibly positive. Coming off opioids is a serious experience. He was prescribed Suboxone, or buprenorphine, to lessen the withdrawal symptoms and gradually wean him off opioids. This is a medication-assisted treatment and something almost all recovering opioid addicts need to mitigate symptoms. Physically, his eyes started to become clearer, his face less pale. He started to get back to a normal weight.
Emotionally, however, he was all over the place, and so was I. Our relationship was hanging by a thread. We fought constantly. For the first time in a long time, my boyfriend was forced to face his emotions. For the entirety of his twenties, every emotion he had was numbed and suppressed by drugs.
For me, it was a torturous time. I felt conflicted, unsure if I should stay with him even though the thought of losing him was devastating. I didn’t know who he was going to be as a sober person, or if, one day, he would realize that the sober him didn’t love me. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to deal with everything that came with dating a recovering addict. I knew I’d live the rest of my life in fear of a relapse.
I started to understand that I saw his drug use (his disease) as morally and ethically who he was. This couldn’t have been further from the truth.
I started to have a recurring dream that my boyfriend would cheat, lie, tell me he didn’t love me, and abandon me. I knew he would never do these things in reality, but I was reliving the emotions from the night he told me he was an addict.
I had that dream for more than a year.
Today, my boyfriend and I have been together almost three years. He’s been sober since the day he entered rehab, almost two years ago. He continues to attend Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings and, since his first stint in rehab, has completed two other recovery programs.
To this day, we suffer from the effects of his addiction. It took me more than a year to trust my boyfriend again and accept that he isn’t hiding things from me, that he is an honest person, and that he is still the person I fell in love with.
There was a defining moment, during a fight, when I told him, “You hid who you were from me.” He replied, “My addiction does not define who I am.”
Sometimes the most simple statements are the most profound. I started to understand that I saw his drug use (his disease) as morally and ethically who he was. This couldn’t have been further from the truth.
My boyfriend is one of the most caring, kind, intelligent, and hardest-working people I’ve ever met. He is like the millions of other good people who have fallen victim to the opioid epidemic.
In our society, we talk openly about cancer and diabetes and have sympathy for people suffering from them, but we don’t talk about mental health and addiction the same way. Addiction doesn’t have a face and can affect anyone regardless of where they come from, how much money they have, or who they are.
From our experience, I have become a better person—more accepting, less judgmental—and I’ve gained profound respect for people who have overcome addiction.
Yes, I still fear my boyfriend will relapse. But our love has continued to keep us together through our challenges and has given him the hope he needed to live sober.
If you’re struggling with addiction or know someone who is, visit SFNA.org for information on how to join the community of Narcotics Anonymous.
