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As a 7 year old girl I had dreams of being a nurse now I’m laying on the bathroom floor lifeless for a heroin overdose.
My addiction to drugs started when I was 12 years old as I grew up in a broken home in Carbon County. It started with Alcohol then went to smoking weed and gradually got worse. I never stopped using as we fast forward 14 years. I experimented with anything and everything I could get my hands on until I found “the one” at age 26 after herniated discs in my back due to childbirth. Opiates, not only was I out of physical pain but I was escaping reality. For 15 years I numbed the pain of my reality never believing I was addicted until I started running out sooner than I was supposed to and started buying them off the streets
so I could function and take care of the kids that needed my attention.
After my 20 year marriage fell apart I decided to move back to Price with my 3 small children,
where I met a man and fell in love. At first I thought it was true love but when the domestic
violence left me without my children and a battered face that’s when I turned to heroin. Once the metal bat connected with the left side of my face and shattered my cheek bone I knew I couldn’t go to the emergency room but I could go down the street and get the one thing I needed to take ALL the pain away…. Heroin.
For the next year I suffered with this horrible addiction. Without heroin I couldn’t move because my body hurt so bad. I couldn’t eat because I would just throw up. I couldn’t shower or bath because I was too weak. It had its claws in me and I had no way out. Homeless and without family I couch surfed looking for different ways to get the drugs I needed.
This particular morning I woke up feeling great. Got together with some friends to hang out and the next thing I know BAM dead on the bathroom floor. Not breathing, no heartbeat, lips blue and the life I once lived draining from my body. 6 minutes it took for my friends to get the Narcan in my system and for my heart to start again. The 4 shots of Narcan they just gave me threw me into withdrawal right away. Vomiting and soiling myself all I wanted was a shower to clean myself off. Unaware that Narcan is short acting 45 minutes after my first shot I was dead again because the heroin was stronger than the Narcan. 2 more shots of Narcan and I was breathing again but honestly I just wanted to die. Hopeless in life and with no reason to live why am I still alive.
I am Heather Barker, I am a mother of 5, a full time student, a domestic violence survivor and
strong willed woman in long term recovery from the thing that almost took my life permanently…. Heroin! . Now I am now trying to become a Certified Peer Support Specialist so I can help other that struggle with addiction also.
I enjoy fishing trips with my three youngest children, swimming at the lake and gaming on my PC. We take trips to Salt Lake whenever possible to spend time with my 16 yr old daughter and other family members.
Someone once told me I would never change and that I’m not worth wasting the resources to get me help, I have proven that person wrong as I stand strong in my recovery and my life!
