Medical Certification Essay

Dear FAA Medical Certification Division,

1. A detailed statement from you detailing the frequency of your past and present substance and alcohol use/abuse.

I first smoked pot when I was 12 years old. My mother used marijuana, to relax and cope with the stresses of life. At first it was something to have fun and be social with my new peer group, but shortly into my freshman year it became a daily activity. It stole from my schooling and really crippled my education. Sadly this did not bother me. My marijuana use continued into my 20’s at a consumption rate of two to three grams daily with brief unwanted, periods of abstinence. Over the next few years I began to experiment with other drugs such as hash, psychedelic mushrooms, ecstasy, alcohol,

Mushrooms were consumed 8-10 times over my last year of high school. Each time being less than three grams with a group of similar aged peers. Ecstasy on two occasions, each being half a dose and never really having any effects, due to lack of experience I decided against further attempts. As for alcohol I would drink on the weekends when out with friends, but would always prefer marijuana throughout my using years. Then my last year of high school I got caught, I give more detail on my criminal charges listed further on, but here allow me to focus on the substance abuse. Getting in trouble with the law did scare me, but mostly made me angry. Angry that I couldn’t do what I wanted without consequence, that being said my use did not stop but rather changed, I now had to put effort into my addiction. Such as not using as often as I would have liked, going to the bars instead of smoking pot, hiding the truth, and being manipulative. This cycle was repetitive and slowing dragged me to a low I had never seen. Shortly after my 20th birthday I was offered cocaine at a bar after I tried it I was informed that it was methamphetamine. I always promised myself I would never use “hard drugs”, it was my way of

It never got to that point but I understand how it could and how bad it is for your body and especially the mind. This drug was the beginning of the end. I quickly stopped buying marijuana and stopped drinking on the weekends, and hid my new drug from everyone I knew. So instead of smoking marijuana, or drinking beers I would smoke meth in the bathroom of the party. Or alone in my bedroom. This time alone showed me how sick I had become over the years of use. Meth was in my life for 18 months with a six-month period of forced abstinence during treatment, I wanted sobriety but was not ready and this lead me to relapse. After my relapse I opened my eyes to who I had been, I was afraid and wanted change. I had hopes for good things in my future I knew I couldn’t obtain any of those hopes without changing everything in my life. This meant the people I knew, my work, how I viewed higher education, most importantly how I viewed myself as a member of society. I registered for school struggling to stop using I reached out to the school counselor for help. My counselor gave me a number of a man named Dave A. a member of Alcoholics Anonymous. He told me his story, it was much like the one I have shared with you, but he kept going deeper into the