It was a tough reality to come to terms with: now I had an opioid addiction ​and ​a global pandemic on top of that to worry about. I was

She named me Bradley Currie Jenkins, giving me her last name because her boyfriend, my dad, wasn’t interested with me...

My parents waited anxiously for my birth as I was their first child. They loved me like no other and dotted over me, but our poverty...

My parents married really young and had a total of 12 kids. Sadly, eight died in infancy, leaving them only four to raise...

Addiction isn’t picky. Trust me. You can come from family dinners and a good education and still fall into dependence. I sure as hell did...

More to get him to shut up than anything else, I walked to the sliding glass doors. I’ll be damned. Two dudes were climbing the fence...

People used to look at me and see nothing more than an addict who couldn’t keep a needle out of her arm long enough to...

My mom gave birth to me in...Lagos State, Nigeria...but I should say, I come from a polygamous background. My dad had two wives...

But what I wish I didn’t remember— what I wish I forgot so completely—was my father’s drinking. My father’s hands as they beat me...

Teaching, preaching, writing, and interacting with students of all ages gave me a sense of satisfaction, and I was happy...

Those early years were rough on my mother as she was battling demons in the early stages of her alcoholism and drug addiction...

It often feels like an unbearable privilege to write and make a simple living from taking all those wonderful and horrible patterns...

Good, no one had robbed me of my pain pills. I pulled out my trusty relievers and tossed a handful back. I could be without a home...

I shouldn’t have taken all those pills, I didn’t want to die. I needed to get to a phone to call 911, but it was so hard to move...

We had many adventures and shenanigans together. Unfortunately, both Stephen and I were influenced easily by peers...

I grew up on a large council estate with high-rise flats as far as the eye could see. It was full of crime, poverty, and drug addicts...

Together, they built a family. I had an unusual childhood as my siblings and I were the only mixed-race children in the town...

...I always said the same thing—I wanted to go to the zoo. Once there, I would head straight for the tiger enclosure...

I mean things started out pretty normal I guess, but at the age of three, my mom committed suicide due to drugs and alcohol...

Coming from a conservative town, no one cared to learn why I didn’t have a dad. They just judged my siblings and me for it...