The Sober Raver: Dance music saved my life

Drug addiction is like being in love with the devil. It's a long, drawn-out romance that constantly betrays you, but which you always forgive because of its warm grasp and blanketing comfort. It's basically a deep, soulful yearning for something that will kill you.

For those of you who have also battled this rapacious, impatient disease, you’ve probably heard within the walls of a rehabilitation center that “by the end of this month, one out of three of you will have relapsed, be in jail or dead." For the lucky few who do make it, we’ve managed to shift our obsession to something else. It could be art, a new romance or the simple will to live and the prospect of a second chance. For me, it’s electronic music.

Despite this statement sometimes bringing out a brigade of dubious eye-rolls, the truth is: dance music saved my life. Take it from someone whose entire life revolved around drugs for years – if it wasn’t for this amazing sound, culture and energy, I would now be dead.

I am five years clean of drugs and alcohol but I started experimenting with drugs when I was 13 years old. Using mind-altering substances seemed like a no brainer. All you had to do was pop a pill and you would never feel angry, sad or hurt again. I wish I could say it was just for a bit of fun, that I was an average kid smoking weed on the weekends, but what started as mild emotional maintenance turned into a daily, sickening search for a numbed reality.

Through the years, I've eaten thousands of pills, cut up hundreds of lines and overdosed more times than I can count on my fingers and toes. I spent many mornings waking up in unfamiliar places: a stranger's bed, a random tiled floor, street curbs covered in blood or vomit. I did things that compromised my safety and dignity without hesitation, as long as it was for the goal of getting high.

I went on long car rides with strange men in unfamiliar cities for just one day's worth of pills. I stole money from my friends, family and even my friend’s families for my next pick-up. I smuggled drugs across the world. I even sold irreplaceable family heirlooms to a random pawn shop.

Nothing was too disgraceful, too unforgivable, so long as it was in the name of drugs. I glamorized my behavior as the price to pay for an excessive lifestyle and never took a second thought at the toll it took on myself or loved ones. Instead of being terrified by the inevitable near-death experiences I'd eventually find my way into, I laughed, entertained. On one occasion, after swallowing eight Xanax bars, 90mg of amphetamines and half an MDMA tablet, I flipped a brand new car and crushed it under a telephone pole. On another, I overdosed on ecstasy in Miami and after having a seizure and regaining consciousness, the first thing I did was swallow three more red presses.

My friends would beg me to slow down, but in my sick, delirious state, the prospect of death seemed romantic – like the end of a 90s teen cult film. If I was to die at the hands of these substances, I'd be so high that my departure might be one of pure bliss.

At the end of my run, there was nothing left. Standing at a gaunt 80 pounds with sullen eyes, I was consuming 40 times the recommended dosage of prescription medication everyday. I would eat handfuls just to vomit them up within a few hours, then impatiently pop more and repeat. Instead of living a regular teenage life, I spent hours alone, clawing at the imaginary insects running under my skin and frantically whispering at voices I heard after my week-long benders. I refused to leave my room unless I had a steady supply of drugs to face reality with.

What finally pushed me to consider cutting down was a serious run-in with the law that was set up by one of my best friends on the way home from a party. Three police vehicles and one undercover pulled me over, shining flashlights into my car before I even had a chance to speak. I remember my fear quickly transformed into disgust as three male police officers searched my body, sat me in a cell and joked how I would be raped in jail.

I checked into an eight-month rehabilitation program at just 19 years old, leaving behind my school, changing my phone number and cutting off contact with the outside world, isolating myself for a whole year. I relearned how to experience emotions, have active conversations and make decisions based on logic, rather than hunger and obsession.

With drugs being the core of my existence for so long, I feared that I wouldn't be myself anymore. I didn't understand how to interact with the real world without using. I still thought day in and day out about my love of the drugs: their smell, how they looked, the way they would slowly climb into my brain and behind my mind. The tension built within me, consuming my thoughts and dreams.

I had begun reintegrating into normal life for a few weeks – going outside, running a few daytime errands and the occasional lunch – when I decided to take a life-changing plunge.

Always a passionate dance music lover, I organized a plan to attend a two-day music festival with some friends, hoping that it would help push me out of my depressive state and welcome back some needed positivity to my new lifestyle. But, as you might guess, the plan backfired. Within minutes of being in the crowd, my eyes were darting towards the lines, pills and pipes being passed around the crowd. I was salivating. So I ran to a space, alone, pulling at my hair and shaking with frustration.

Then, there was a moment of clarity. I told myself that I was present, in the real world and alive. So I was going to make it work. I stood up and ran back to the crowd, this time focusing on the music in the air, feeling the sonic vibrations running through my muscles. Suddenly, I was dancing and laughing, smiling on my own accord. I felt a booming energy in my chest and my arms that made me want to jump and scream. It was so pure, so bright and overwhelming. With tears of joy on my face, I realized that this was all I needed. This was what I could chase endlessly, what I could live for. This was my new high.

Five years later, I'm still addicted to this unworldly sensation. A high that I can only find in the simultaneous gasp of a crowd, in the thick and heated energy bouncing through moving bodies, inside a deep, sharp pull I feel all the way from my spine to my brainstem.

It's not something that can be found in a baggie, a capsule or a pipe. It’s more potent and pure than the rush I used to desperately run after, and it’s what has kept me alive. Every time I think I might get tired of it, a DJ, a soundsystem or song brings me back. There's no place in the world that I am happier and more in tune with myself than in front of a blaring speaker, soaking in and feeling pitches and melodies surging through my veins.

So yes, I’ll defend the cliche. I’ll stand tall with all that I’ve been through, stand up to every one who has called me crazy and proclaim that this is the truth: dance music has saved my life.

Written anonymously by a member of the Mixmag staff