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[00:00:00:00 – 00:00:22:04] Today I’m joined once again by Matthew Hopkins. The first time Matthew sat in the chair, he was eight months clean. Tonight he’s back. Two years clean, new house, new life, and a completely different mindset. I was very lost, created like an old ego, somebody that is nowhere near the person that I am today. Couldn’t help, held down a proper relationship, letting people down all the time.
[00:00:23:22 – 00:00:28:04] At that point, you’d use for what duration it’s like. 20 years of madness.
[00:00:29:09 – 00:00:40:15] I had my first line when I was 16. I went off the rails. When I come out of the army, I then went to prison for fighting because I was just an angry, lost, confused person. I was like a ticking time bomb.
[00:00:42:02 – 00:01:00:13] Paranoia to get so bad that I had to have a realization. It’s time to sort this shit out. How am I going to live a life without drinking drugs? Turned around and I was scratching my head and I just turned down my bump. Like I don’t do that. I’m always going to do it. Sobriety or recovery is not about putting the drink down and the drugs down. It’s about creating the best version of yourself.
[00:01:00:13 – 00:01:07:08] Elliot Ward, what? Addiction specialist, you’ve become a happy queen with me.
[00:01:09:17 – 00:01:54:03] I’m Elliott Ward Addiction Specialist and welcome to another episode of Coming Clean With Me. Today I’m joined once again by Matthew Hopkins. The first time Matthew sat in the chair, he was eight months clean. He told us about growing up in Felixstow, getting discharged from the army, prison, paranoia, knives, under the pillow, and the moment he finally reached out for help. Tonight he’s back, two years clean from you know what, new house, new life, and a completely different mindset. Matthew, welcome back. How you doing Matt? All good, you? Good, good, good to see you here. Yeah, you too. Just for those who haven’t seen your last podcast,
[00:01:55:15 – 00:02:00:13] let’s just give a recap of where you were two years ago. What the madness looked like.
[00:02:01:21 – 00:02:02:01] Chaos.
[00:02:03:03 – 00:02:05:10] I was very lost, very lost individual.
[00:02:07:19 – 00:02:14:10] Created like a, I call it like an old ego, somebody that is nowhere near the person that I am today.
[00:02:15:22 – 00:02:24:02] Couldn’t help out, held down a proper relationship, toxic relationships, letting people down all the time, not spending quality time with my family,
[00:02:25:24 – 00:02:42:18] financially, all over the place, living in rented properties. And at that point you’d used for what duration of time? 20 years. 20 years? Yeah, excuse me. Yeah, 20 years. Yeah, I’ve had my first line when I was 16.
[00:02:44:02 – 00:02:53:21] I’m now 38, so yeah, 20 years of madness. Tell me how that 20 years progressed and where it got to finally two years ago.
[00:02:55:00 – 00:02:59:17] It started off obviously just a casual, a few lines here and there.
[00:03:00:22 – 00:03:05:24] And then it’s, you sort of started seeing a pattern of going out and one goes with the other.
[00:03:07:07 – 00:03:11:04] I went off the rails. When I come out of the army, I then went to prison
[00:03:12:13 – 00:03:34:19] for fighting because I was just an angry, lost, confused person. And you were fighting, was that fueled by drink and usage or? I think it was a mixture of a lot. I was in the army and I always wanted to be a soldier. And then I got a medical discharge when I was 18. And I didn’t have a backup plan. I had no education. Like school for me was,
[00:03:36:09 – 00:03:48:02] it was non-existent. It was like a playground for me. I wasn’t interested in learning. All I wanted to do was be a soldier. And then when I got a medical discharge, there was no backup plan. What do I do now?
[00:03:49:06 – 00:03:55:02] So I was sort of angry at the world and just young man full of testosterone, confused.
[00:03:56:20 – 00:04:02:07] Yeah, that mixed with drinking drugs, it’s like a volcano ready to explode.
[00:04:04:21 – 00:04:30:00] And in your heyday at the worst time, I know that you’re working offshore. So people don’t know that, but explain that you work offshore, come back and your rotation system and then how you would use and the quantity you use in the town you live in. Just give some backstory. So, excuse me. I do offshore work where I do four weeks on, four weeks off or three and three or two and two.
[00:04:31:08 – 00:04:36:12] So I’d go away for work and obviously zero drinking drugs, nothing like that is allowed.
[00:04:37:20 – 00:05:41:07] Then I’d come back and it’s like every day is a Saturday. So I’d get back and I was in a relationship, which was a toxic relationship fueled by drinking drugs, where I’d come back and you’d go out for food, then have a couple of cocktails, then you’re calling it on. And then once I’d get one in me, I couldn’t stop. So I’d have a drink on a Thursday and I’d still be going on a Saturday, the paranoia, the just weird hallucinations, psychosis, the whole lot. I managed to develop such a thing in my brain whenever I started getting on it, it would just, like a switch would just go straight away. That’s called kindling. So what happens is once you damage the neuro pathways, you have kindling like a bonfire, like restarting a fire, just blowing it and it just starts smoking and igniting again. That’s what happened with the paranoia. Yeah. And what type of paranoia did you experience?
[00:05:42:16 – 00:05:43:12] I was seeing things.
[00:05:44:12 – 00:06:48:06] I always had this, like I find it fascinating and crazy the way that people talk about it, because we all sit around amongst blokes talking about curtain switching. And when you say curtain switching, everybody knows what you’re talking about. And we laugh and we joke about it, but it’s not normal behavior. Like I’d have knives under my pillow because I think somebody was coming through the door or I’d move my bed closer to the door and put my foot against the door just in case somebody come in or hang things on the door handle and stuff like that, like looking through my ring doorbell on my phone and constantly nonstop people in the house, like mates where I’d then think that they were plotting something against me. Like the most ridiculous things you think of, partners, I’d be sitting there thinking that they was checking out my mates or whatever. It was just everything all around it. But it got to the point where my brain was, I think, had that much damage from the drugs that as soon as I had a couple of drinks
[00:06:49:06 – 00:07:07:09] without the drugs, the little paranoia, the moments were sort of creeping in. And I think that I was, unless I’d got help, but I was like a ticking time bomb, I think, to be fair. And the relationship you’re in, I know you said it was toxic, but did she drink as well? Yeah, yeah.
[00:07:08:21 – 00:07:15:08] Very similar in our drinking and using. And obviously we met on a session.
[00:07:16:12 – 00:07:35:00] I was at one place, she was at the other. And then come to mine and then we had a sesh together. And then like why me or her ever thought that that was gonna be a good, happy relationship is beyond me. But it was three years of just madness, to say the least.
[00:07:36:13 – 00:07:42:15] Hmm, hmm. And when you look back now at that, what do you see differently?
[00:07:44:22 – 00:08:05:07] I think the biggest thing was, I’ve got an understanding, I understand myself a lot now. I have that as cheesy as it sounds. I love myself. I have that in our pride. I walk with my chest up, my chin up, and I’m proud of the man that I am.
[00:08:07:17 – 00:08:14:05] Looking back into relationships, not only that one, but previous ones, the way that I was, the way that I was as a person,
[00:08:15:17 – 00:09:07:22] I latched onto it because I didn’t wanna be on my own. And we’ve spoken about it before, but the whole roller coaster of drinking drugs. You’re on a session, you want people to be around you. It’s the most expensive drug which you share with everybody because you just want everyone to be on that level with you. And then wherever that person, we’d have mad toxic relationship arguments. And then the next day or the day after, let’s just forget about it and start again because you want that companion there. You need that because you’re feeling sorry for yourself. You’re feeling down, you’re feeling depressed. You wanna hold onto people and you want them to be close to you. So you never really get to the bottom of problems. Everything just gets brushed to one side. And yeah, it’s like a false sense of security.
[00:09:09:07 – 00:09:13:19] I think also when you’re with somebody and you both use and both drink,
[00:09:14:21 – 00:09:21:17] it makes you feel a little bit better. You don’t feel as bad. No, like the previous relationship before,
[00:09:23:17 – 00:09:35:24] I’d drink, get on it, but chew it a little bit. Nothing too mad, but then stop and be like, “Maddy, why are you continuing?” She’d go to bed and I’d still be downstairs like sniffing on my own.
[00:09:38:02 – 00:09:41:20] Or I’d go, “I’m gonna go to the pub.” And I’d turn up two days later.
[00:09:43:08 – 00:10:07:14] There was consequences there. It should chuck me out or whatever. When you’re doing it with somebody, there’s no consequences. So you’re drinking, you’re using, it’s just gonna progress and progress and progress because there’s no consequences for your actions. One person that you’ve got closest to you is doing exactly what you’re doing. So it’s just gonna get worse and worse. I think that’s what sometimes makes people feel more comfortable in their usage. Yeah, most definitely.
[00:10:10:01 – 00:10:38:03] And tell me about, so you reached a point where you decided enough was enough. You tried various methods and then two years ago, taught me through the decision that you did and what you did and how that occurred. There was a lot. I do go back to that relationship because I am a strong believer that people come into your life for lessons or blessings. And although it was a toxic relationship and a lot of shit went on,
[00:10:39:10 – 00:10:56:23] I feel like we were putting each other’s paths. I don’t know the life she’s living now, but she was putting my path for me to really smash myself to pieces, my paranoia to get so bad that I had to have a realization, a wake up call of going, like it’s time to sort your shit out.
[00:10:58:00 – 00:11:02:22] And I think I wanted to buy my own house. Working offshore, I earn good money,
[00:11:04:06 – 00:11:38:09] but something was holding me back. I was just not getting my full potential out of life. It was like, and I say this cheesy saying, it’s like, you’re either living or you’re just existing. And I wasn’t living, I was just existing. I was going on around America, around of life. And yeah, I just wanted more. I wanted more from my career, my relationships. I was sick and tired of people sort of looking down on me and then I came across your podcast with Dapper.
[00:11:39:22 – 00:11:42:15] And that was a turning point of there was actually
[00:11:44:05 – 00:11:45:23] another avenue for me to try.
[00:11:48:16 – 00:11:51:08] And what was the loudest thoughts in your head back then?
[00:11:55:18 – 00:12:00:19] It was just something was just telling me enough’s enough. I’ve been in a lot of situations,
[00:12:01:21 – 00:12:03:12] like I’d mentioned in my last podcast,
[00:12:04:12 – 00:12:09:08] the trip to America, obviously I’d lied about my,
[00:12:10:12 – 00:12:15:18] to get my visa because of my record. I managed to get a five year visa and failed a drug test.
[00:12:17:19 – 00:12:51:15] That can chop a lot of people down. And that was probably my point in my life where I’d had suicidal thoughts. And instead of going back to what I knew and going to my mom’s house, I knew, like I mentioned in my last podcast, to take myself out of what I know, my comfortable zone and put myself somewhere else, which I went to the Thai boxing camp to switch off from the outside world and to get a one with myself and to make them like the right decisions, which is why I’m now offshore.
[00:12:53:23 – 00:12:57:23] So I think I’ve always been strong-minded with that, of knowing that I can do something.
[00:12:59:11 – 00:13:37:03] But the position that I was in with trying different methods, it just wasn’t working. I was always going back to the drinking drugs. There’s a lot of, with recovery, you have to understand that it’s a whole change of life. It’s not just about putting down the drinking drugs. Your whole life has to change because you’re drinking and using for a reason. Nobody drinks or uses drugs to excess and smash themselves to pieces if they’re truly happy within themselves. So it’s just getting at peace with yourself, really.
[00:13:38:07 – 00:13:40:15] And then you came to see me, that was two years ago.
[00:13:42:15 – 00:13:58:17] We went through the program, I did a case history, went through the whole therapy, and here we are two years clean on. But talk to me about the first three months. What did the first three months look like for you? The first three months was full of a lot of anxiety,
[00:14:00:12 – 00:14:01:13] second guessing everything.
[00:14:04:18 – 00:14:20:11] How am I going to live a life without drinking drugs? Because we live in a society where we do drinking drugs goes with everything. You go to a wedding, everyone’s getting pissed up. You’re at a funeral, the same thing.
[00:14:21:15 – 00:14:46:14] Birthdays, Christmas, just to go and watch the football, to go watch the boxing, everything is surrounded by drinking drugs. So you have a lot of questions, “I’m going to kick the drugs, but can I still drink? Can I do this? Can I do that? Is this the best thing for me? I’ve had like a month off now, can I go back to it?”
[00:14:47:15 – 00:15:14:15] You know, going into different surroundings. (Coughs) Excuse me. Going into different surroundings, or different places where you’d usually go. Like you have to have that break away from it, because it’s like I mentioned in my podcast before, my sobriety, my recovery, is like if you’ve got your closest, most dearest loved person that you’ve got close to you, that dies.
[00:15:15:21 – 00:16:09:14] And your recovery process is the grievance process, which you would if you’d lost somebody. So you lost somebody close to you, let’s say a partner or something, you go to the same restaurants, you’re going to avoid that restaurant, because it’s going to bring back memories. You’re not going to do certain things, listen to certain music, do that kind of stuff, because it’s going to bring back their memories. And that’s it with the recovery. You can’t go to the same pubs that you’d usually go to. You can’t speak to the same sort of people that you would. You can’t even drive down the road, rave into some drum and bass music, because you’re like, “Right, I want to get on a session.” Do you know what I mean? So there’s a lot of questions that go through your mind of whether you’re doing the right thing, or whether you’re going to be able to cope, whether this new you is going to be able to cope without drinking and taking drugs. And what were the first signs that things are going to be okay?
[00:16:12:19 – 00:16:23:04] After our sessions, I think like when I went to the bar and somebody offered me some drugs, and I said no.
[00:16:24:07 – 00:16:42:23] How did that make you feel? Weird. I was like, I’ve just turned down like a bumper, had a key in a bag. And he said, “Do you want one of these?” And I was like, “No, I don’t do it anymore.” And I turned around and I was scratching my head and sat down and was like, “What the fuck? “I’ve just turned down a bump.” Like, I don’t do that. Like, I’m always going to do it.
[00:16:45:00 – 00:16:52:02] So yeah, it was that moment that I knew, like I actually don’t need it.
[00:16:53:24 – 00:16:55:18] And different, I think as well,
[00:16:57:03 – 00:17:08:23] you start making them steps, people then start reaching out and saying, like, “I’ve not seen you about what you’re doing.” And you start speaking about it, and you start feeling a bit more positive because you’re speaking positively, you know?
[00:17:10:16 – 00:17:19:02] And in those early times when you first stopped, did you feel anxiety or depression or anything like that? Yeah, waves.
[00:17:21:00 – 00:17:23:21] Like, some days you’d feel depressed, feel down.
[00:17:26:04 – 00:17:32:20] My first six months of my using, I was still in a toxic relationship. So because I’d stopped,
[00:17:34:07 – 00:17:35:18] but didn’t mean that she was going to stop.
[00:17:36:21 – 00:17:57:20] So there was a lot of, you know, she’d go out and then you’d have that FOMO, the fear of missing out. So you’d sit there and you’d feel shit and, “I’ve got to go, I’m going to go out for something to eat “as opposed to going to the pub. “She’s in the pub, she’s doing this, she’s doing that.” And you start thinking, “Fuck, I’m missing out on this shit.”
[00:17:58:22 – 00:18:22:20] So you get down, depressed, anxious, all that sorts of feelings. But then on a Sunday morning, when you know everybody’s nursing a hangover or still in the kitchen somewhere talking shit and you’re up and you’re bouncing, you’re going to the gym, you just feel great. It’s the best feeling in the world. And there was a point where you moved out of that house you were renting with, moved back to your mum’s, right? Yeah.
[00:18:24:00 – 00:18:35:18] What was that like moving back to mum’s? You get, that’s a big step, right? Even though you know you’re doing it to buy your own house because now you’re not using, you have an opportunity to save and put some money by. What did that feel like for you?
[00:18:37:04 – 00:18:43:21] It’s like that thing I was saying about that having that inner strength and that,
[00:18:46:17 – 00:18:49:15] like you have to have that goal.
[00:18:50:21 – 00:19:12:19] And it’s a moment of shit for a lifetime of good. And you’ve just got to keep that in mind. And there was times where, you know, my mum’s and I’m laying there in bed at nighttime and like, I’d feel like a spare part sometimes where I’d go downstairs and my mum and stepdad would be having dinner. And I’m like, in my late firties,
[00:19:13:19 – 00:19:41:00] like just sitting there on the sofa like, I actually shouldn’t be here. So I’d book into a hotel sometimes just to get that space. Really? Yeah. And how did that, I mean, that’s a big thing when you say that because booking into a hotel with someone that stopped using only six months ago to not have that thought to go into a hotel because listen, for me back in the day, a hotel meant only one thing. Yeah. So how did you deal with that?
[00:19:43:21 – 00:19:59:23] Do you know what? Like, and I’m not saying it because obviously you went through the hypnosis with me, but I just generally think all of this is down to the hypnosis because I’d tried different methods of stopping drinking and taking drugs before.
[00:20:01:11 – 00:20:25:23] And a couple of months went by and you’d always go back to it or it was, the thoughts were always there, but my hypnosis had finished and the thought has never been there. Like it, I do not have them thoughts. It doesn’t cross my mind. I know that drinking drugs is bad for me. I say like alcohol, not so much drugs. I don’t think anyone should take drugs. I don’t think anyone should drink alcohol, but it serves certain people.
[00:20:27:00 – 00:20:45:13] Alcohol has never served me. Drugs has never served me. And when I got to that point where I’d done the hypnosis and I had my visions of buying a house and I was determined, like when you leave a toxic relationship, you, unless you’re the problem, in my opinion, unless you’re the problem,
[00:20:46:16 – 00:21:05:04] if you leave, you want to then elevate and you want to elevate as much as you can. So for me to go back to it, that was just, it wasn’t in my mind, it wasn’t. So the moment you left my office. Yeah, that was it. I was like, this is it now. This is time to like really get your shit together.
[00:21:07:04 – 00:21:15:05] So we get to over six months and you start to get some firsts. Your first property, your first sober wedding.
[00:21:16:06 – 00:21:17:14] What was that like for you?
[00:21:19:17 – 00:21:26:00] Still to this day, like I bought, I got into, obviously I left my ex partner in July last year.
[00:21:27:19 – 00:21:43:08] The house was going through whilst I was off shore in the December and I’ve got the keys in the February. So five months of me leaving a rented property to then sign in for my own house that I’d always wanted.
[00:21:44:12 – 00:21:51:19] I’ll be honest, still to this day, I sit there last night going over a few different things about this podcast today
[00:21:53:02 – 00:22:10:15] and I’m looking around in my house. Like I spent a fortune on it, a nice big media wall, all that sorts of stuff. And it still doesn’t hit home. It’s still like a bit surreal because I’d lived so long of just shit. Even through my childhood, I was a very troubled young man,
[00:22:11:16 – 00:22:20:18] all through my teens, in trouble with the police all the time, bringing drama to my front door, drugs, alcohol, the whole side of it.
[00:22:22:02 – 00:22:41:10] The first time when I got my keys to my house and I lay there, I called my mum. I was like, it’s too quiet. And she was like, what do you mean? Like, enjoy it. I was like, nah, like it’s too quiet. My head is quiet. And you hear people talking about on podcasts and stuff of they can’t turn the traffic off in their heads. Mine was gone.
[00:22:42:12 – 00:23:06:11] And that for me was a scary place because I’m not used to having drama with somebody or sorry, not having drama with somebody or not having some sort of court case going on or somebody pissed off or me owing somebody money or this happening and that happening. And so later in my house at nighttime, it was like, whoa, this is fucking crazy.
[00:23:07:13 – 00:23:10:15] And then going from that, like I went to my mates wedding.
[00:23:12:09 – 00:23:19:00] I was an usher at his wedding, but that was before. That was before I’d even left my ex partner. So that was in the June.
[00:23:20:06 – 00:23:39:09] And that I was nothing more than just full of anxiety. I was an usher and had to usher people to their seats and I couldn’t even talk. Everyone was dancing about when I was sitting there in a chair, like just to duck out of water. But then I went to my sister’s wedding, which was within that July,
[00:23:41:21 – 00:23:45:17] or it was like May or May, May the first wedding was or something like that, a couple of months apart.
[00:23:47:03 – 00:24:01:06] And I think it was because I was around with my family, my nieces and that, and I’m dancing with them, I’m dancing with my mom and I had the time of my life. So it’s like the first year you’ve got waves, you know, like we’ve spoken about before.
[00:24:04:02 – 00:24:11:10] Sobriety or recovery is not about putting the drink down and the drugs down. It’s about creating the best version of yourself you can do.
[00:24:12:18 – 00:24:16:19] So within the first year, there’s a lot of work to do. Definitely.
[00:24:17:19 – 00:24:23:00] And do you see it on a regular basis, the changes? All the time, yeah, all the time.
[00:24:24:13 – 00:24:36:19] I get like, I’m quite an emotional person and I get waves of you just wanna cry, but not because you feel like shit, because you feel so good, you know?
[00:24:38:18 – 00:25:03:03] I get waves of happiness of just, I just feel on top of the world. I don’t stand for no bullshit. I don’t do anything I don’t wanna do anymore. I don’t put myself in situations. If I’m in a pub or a bar and it’s getting too much, I’m gone and I don’t care if– But you can put yourself in the environment. Yeah, oh, definitely, yeah, yeah, yeah. I was out Saturday night watching the U Bank and Ben fight
[00:25:04:13 – 00:25:16:06] and I was out and this girl I know and she’s been a bit facetious and she come and sat down next to me and I’m sitting there and I’m chilling and I’m like, fucking hell, she’s having a conversation and she spilt a drink down my leg and I was like, Jesus, this is a bit mad.
[00:25:17:13 – 00:25:25:16] And then it got to a certain point at night where everybody started to leave and there was me and a couple of my mates there at the bar. I had a drink and I was like,
[00:25:26:19 – 00:25:56:21] a non-alcoholic drink on my head and then I was standing there at the bar and I was like, I gotta get out of here. Like, it’s too much now. Everybody’s starting dancing and going mad and I’m out, I’ve gotta go. But now to go into a bar or whatever, doesn’t faze me anymore. I’ve been with friends that you can clearly see, they’ve been on the packet. My mate asked for a key. He said to me, if you’ve got keys, I ain’t got my keys and he’s like, I know you don’t do it, but and I’m like, yeah, sweet, go on, knock yourself out. And I’ll say to him, like, what’s it like? Is it any good? Do you know what I mean?
[00:25:58:00 – 00:26:14:00] Doesn’t bother me in the slides. I remember not long ago, maybe five, six months ago, I was out somewhere and I was with a couple of guys and they were twisted and I racked up their gear before I left the moment and went, see you later. I agree, it doesn’t bother me.
[00:26:15:15 – 00:26:23:00] But what’s interesting is, you spent 20 years of using and that, as you said, was your identity.
[00:26:24:02 – 00:26:36:15] And then to have life without using, when you’ve had 20 years of doing it, you have to find yourself, right? Yeah, most definitely. It’s not, it’s your environment, it’s the people around you.
[00:26:38:04 – 00:26:40:00] It’s the way you talk to people, it’s the way you react.
[00:26:41:03 – 00:27:07:24] And like, because, and I still do, I think the only struggle you deal with now is if times get hard or you feel lonely, like I’m single, single man, and I feel lonely sometimes. But whenever I felt lonely before, I go to the pub. And because of my job, you know, I don’t live a normal lifestyle. I’m away for a couple of weeks, I’m back for a couple of weeks, I’ve got all the time in the world.
[00:27:09:03 – 00:27:19:19] And when times get hard, I’ve 20 years of my life, I’ve gone to the pub and I’ve got fucked up. And I wouldn’t stop because I didn’t wanna face reality.
[00:27:20:24 – 00:27:30:22] So now it’s, yeah, it’s facing everything head on. It gets easier, for sure, definitely gets easier. And you learn how to deal with things,
[00:27:32:06 – 00:28:07:00] but it’s just being comfortable, comfortable with yourself. And you gotta find that inner peace with yourself. Because when you’re drinking and you’re using, you’re researching for something else, you’re not happy. You know, I wouldn’t look in the mirror and think, fucking hell, I’m the bollocks, I’ve done this, I’ve done that. You’d think you’re the bollocks when you’ve had a couple of lines because it’s a false sense of security. But now I can look in the mirror, I look after myself, I’ve gotta go to the gym, you know, I’ll give it a little pose in the mirror, and I’m like, yeah, I’m the bollocks, I feel good. Do you know what I mean? Because you’ve got everything that’s created this, like, this bubble around you.
[00:28:08:04 – 00:28:14:09] If you look back at that interview we did eight months ago, what do you think that Matthew didn’t understand
[00:28:15:09 – 00:28:22:04] that you understand now about recovery or being an ex-user? How do you think you’ve grown since that eight months?
[00:28:24:00 – 00:28:53:21] I think there’s a difference between living and existing. And when you drink and take drugs, you’re existing and you’re not, you’re settling. You’re settling to just be the same as everybody else. You’re going to the pub surrounded by the same people, talking bollocks, you know, none of it makes any sense of what you’re talking about.
[00:28:56:06 – 00:29:00:10] Doing drugs, getting in trouble, doing all that sorts of stuff, there’s no,
[00:29:02:03 – 00:29:14:22] you can’t be happy, that’s not happiness. There’s no part of that, it’s fucking, you cannot sit there and go, I’m a happy person. If you sit there and you say, oh, I go and get on it on a Saturday night, but that’s all I do.
[00:29:15:24 – 00:29:23:21] But if you need that escape, like, you need to understand the reasons as to why, like, my relationship with myself now,
[00:29:25:06 – 00:29:28:18] I think people, I speak to people now that just have a few drinks, yeah, and they don’t do drugs.
[00:29:29:21 – 00:29:54:03] And I’m like, yeah, but why’d you drink? Well, because I’ve had a hard day at work and I need to drink to take the edge off. So you can’t deal with your emotions from that day that you’ve had. If you go to a wedding, I like to let my hair down so I can dance, blah, blah, blah, so you’ve got some insecurities then. So that’s how I sort of look back at the person that I was, that there was so many underlying issues as to why I was drinking and using.
[00:29:55:04 – 00:30:00:07] And the differences now is all in, well, majority of them issues have gone.
[00:30:01:11 – 00:30:13:21] And you met someone after your first year of being sober, being clean and not using, but you realized quite early on that the relationship wasn’t right. And what’s interesting about that
[00:30:15:00 – 00:30:17:03] is that you were able to see that. Tell me about that.
[00:30:18:03 – 00:30:22:06] I think from like a troubled sort of childhood,
[00:30:25:03 – 00:30:27:19] relationships filled with drinking drugs,
[00:30:29:15 – 00:30:34:15] I’ve got abandonment issues, so I want to hold people close to me, you know,
[00:30:35:22 – 00:30:38:22] even a three year relationship which was toxic as hell and horrible.
[00:30:40:11 – 00:30:41:20] And I was holding onto that
[00:30:42:23 – 00:30:44:09] because I didn’t want to be on my own.
[00:30:45:19 – 00:31:06:13] Now I met somebody and she is an amazing, beautiful girl, like honestly, I could not fault her, like such a great person, been through a lot, but we just didn’t align. And I think that life’s too short for you to waste time. Like we both had the discussion and we wasn’t aligning properly.
[00:31:07:18 – 00:31:22:21] And we spoke and I still speak to her now and there’s no drama between us or anything like that. No one done anything to upset each other, but it’s just the recognizing that you don’t align and you don’t want to waste the time, you know?
[00:31:24:14 – 00:31:27:22] Do you think if you were still using, you wouldn’t have seen that? Definitely not.
[00:31:28:22 – 00:31:59:14] I would have stayed and made it work. And you know, I’ve still had since breaking away from it, I’ve still had the moments where I would go, like I’ve spoke to her and be like, I don’t know if that’s the right thing, blah, blah, blah. But that’s not because you think that it was the, whether or not it is the right thing or not, it’s because the inner you that you’ve been used to is holding onto somebody because you don’t want to be on your own, which is not always the right thing.
[00:32:00:14 – 00:32:34:13] Sometimes it’s to be with the wrong person than be on your own. Yeah, yeah. You started playing football, I know you’ve always been trained, but you started playing football. Yeah. Your football teams. Yeah. What does that look like? It’s difficult being, yeah, it’s difficult. I’m playing football with lads in their early twenties. It’s very difficult. I actually get quite passionate and like, if I don’t get a start and I only get 20 minutes, I start moaning, do you know what I mean? Makes a little difference to waking up on a Sunday morning with the hangover. Oh, most definitely. I was only talking to my mate earlier on the way because I’m playing football tonight.
[00:32:35:16 – 00:32:59:13] And yeah, it’s mad on a Sunday morning that I would be in a kitchen, off my head, knives in my pockets, paranoid, arguing, whatever it may be, or in some random flat or something somewhere, to standing there on a sideline, freezing my bollocks off, moaning, because I’m only getting 20 minutes. It’s just like two worlds apart.
[00:33:01:06 – 00:33:09:06] Your social circles have changed massively now, right? That tribe that you used to use with has disappeared.
[00:33:10:15 – 00:33:18:00] What about, do you feel like you’re missing anybody from that? How do you deal with that? How do you make peace with those that you’ve cut away?
[00:33:19:06 – 00:33:25:22] It’s not so much you miss them. You want them to get what I’ve got.
[00:33:29:18 – 00:33:35:11] It’s difficult to see people waste their potential,
[00:33:36:16 – 00:34:12:03] when you’re from the outside looking in and you see the damage they’re doing to themselves, the emotion that’s completely fucked up in their brain or them letting people down or upsetting people and things that you know, they’re good people, so you want them to really, really get it. But equally on the flip side, you gotta look after number one, and it’s attraction. If you all continue to do good, people will hopefully see that and they want a piece of that, which I get now, I get people phoning me up.
[00:34:13:06 – 00:34:18:11] I’m only mentoring a lad at the moment. I spoke to him on the way up here. I don’t know, he’s coming to see you.
[00:34:19:11 – 00:34:35:07] And yeah, I get random people just reach out because– Nice. Yeah, they want, and I enjoy it. I really, really do enjoy helping people and taking myself out of self. And what difference have you seen between being a year clean and now being two years clean?
[00:34:36:23 – 00:35:04:04] The first year, there was a lot of goals that I needed to achieve with my house, you know, getting my house, because although I got the keys in February, and it’s a new build and beautiful house, there’s so much stuff I wanted to do to it. So I had that focus of doing that, and I wanted to meet somebody in which I met someone, which didn’t work out.
[00:35:05:04 – 00:35:10:01] And it’s repairing a lot of damage that you’ve done as well the first year.
[00:35:11:19 – 00:35:24:05] Although you’re cleaning the sober, everybody thinks it’s just a piss in the wind thing. Everybody wants you to fail. Well, not everybody wants you to fail. A lot of people want you to fail. I still get people now.
[00:35:26:04 – 00:35:40:09] There was a lad I was talking to, and he said he saw me on the place that was at, the bar that was at, and it was switched on Saturday. I was just checking to see if you had a beer in your hand. I’m like, why? Why do you want to check? And the reason is, it’s because you want to see me fail.
[00:35:41:11 – 00:35:52:05] Why do you think that is? Because they are doing the same thing themselves. And it makes them feel better. Exactly, 100%. And like, there’s an ex of mine that I’ve managed to,
[00:35:53:23 – 00:35:57:20] like we met up, the one before my toxic ex,
[00:35:59:00 – 00:36:10:09] and we’ve managed to like, we’re good friends. I speak to her regular, met up with, she come to Ikea with me to help me get some stuff from my house, which is insane, that I can even do that with an ex.
[00:36:11:23 – 00:37:18:10] And she’s even said to me, she had mentioned to her friends, she’s been speaking to me, and things are good. And they’re like, oh yeah, apparently it’s still sober. Yeah, right. And it’s just like, why are you doubting me? You don’t know me, but you just want me to fail. I call that the lobster pot. I don’t know how true this is, if there’s any fishermen listening, but somebody once told me this many years ago, and I love the analogy. And what they said is the way they catch lobsters is they use a lobster pot that apparently has this strange shape, and they put a bit of bait in, and the lobster goes in to get the bait, and then other lobsters come in. But when one lobster tries to get out, the other lobsters will claw them back, pull them back, pull them back, almost ripping their legs off. And I kind of think that’s like people who use. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Because it makes them feel more comfortable if you go back, it’s like, oh, Matty didn’t succeed. Matty failed, that’s all right, I’ll carry on. Yeah, yeah. Well, it’s like the first time I ever went sober. I was given an ultimatum by the girl that I was with, and three months into it, she said I was boring.
[00:37:19:16 – 00:37:30:12] So she told me to leave, she was gonna leave me, sorry, if I didn’t stop taking drugs and drinking, but then three months down into it, you’re boring because I can’t drink with you, you know?
[00:37:31:24 – 00:37:42:01] I know you have a very close family, you have ten nieces. What’s your relationship, two years clean and sober now, I know you’re close to your family, but what’s it like now?
[00:37:43:05 – 00:37:57:23] Oh, amazing, yeah, amazing. I love spending time with my family, like my mom, I’ll pick her up, take her for roast dinner, just me and her, I speak to her pretty much every day.
[00:37:59:04 – 00:38:01:07] Like my mom is my queen, my rock.
[00:38:04:07 – 00:38:09:17] And I think that she’s given me a lot of strength to do the things that I’ve done.
[00:38:10:19 – 00:38:15:12] My sisters, I’ve got a great relationship with them, I was always letting them down.
[00:38:16:19 – 00:38:20:10] I’d always say to my eldest sister, Stacy, I spend a lot of time with her,
[00:38:21:23 – 00:38:32:13] and because she’s a mum of five girls, my other sister Charlotte, she works quite a high job, so I don’t get to see her as much.
[00:38:33:18 – 00:38:38:22] And same with my other sister, Adrianne, I’ve got another brother, and I spend a lot of time with, like, there’s seven of us.
[00:38:40:21 – 00:38:54:10] And yeah, I would always let them down. I’d always say, “Oh, we could do this on Saturday, “we’ll do that on Sunday, blah, blah,” and I’d never be there, because I’d be in the kitchen somewhere. There was a couple of boxing days ago
[00:38:55:16 – 00:39:02:23] where I’d planned to do something, and instead I’d gotten it on the Christmas day, and I didn’t even turn up to see my family on boxing day.
[00:39:04:00 – 00:39:15:11] Now I’m there, like, every Thursday without fail, when I’m home, and I’m not offshore, I go and pick my little niece up, take her first swimming lessons, we go from McDonald’s, my other nieces come with me, we do some colouring.
[00:39:16:20 – 00:39:20:20] Yeah, whenever I can, I’ll spend time with them. Life looks very different.
[00:39:22:14 – 00:39:39:07] Last time you were here, I asked you what advice you’d give to anyone struggling with addiction. Tonight’s something slightly different. If someone’s watching this full of fear about life without drink and without using, what’s one tiny first step they can take in the next 24 hours?
[00:39:42:23 – 00:40:05:00] One step. Reach out. Like, you’ve got nothing to lose. If you’re sitting there and you’re thinking, “I’m drinking too much, I’m doing too many drugs, “my life’s gone to shit, blah, blah,” reach out, like, you’ve got, you literally have nothing to lose. It’s only gonna get worse before it gets better, so just change the whole path of your life.
[00:40:07:08 – 00:40:20:24] One last question to finish. What would you say to the guy who was you at 35 to 37, knives, paranoia, in and out of prison, telling yourself, “I’m just the lad “who likes a drink and a line?”
[00:40:23:04 – 00:40:24:03] It’s gonna be okay.
[00:40:25:06 – 00:40:27:02] It’s making me feel emotional thinking about it.
[00:40:28:04 – 00:40:29:20] Yeah, it’s all gonna be good.
[00:40:32:04 – 00:40:37:05] I’ve done a lot of shit in my time, a lot of shit. I’ve hurt a lot of people, upset a lot of people.
[00:40:38:07 – 00:40:53:24] I’ve not been a good person, but I’m a good person now, definitely. And I would always just look back at that person and say, “You’re making the right decision, “putting down the drink and putting down the drugs “is gonna be the best thing that you ever do.” And it’s just uphill from here.
[00:40:55:09 – 00:41:03:11] Matthew Hopkins, two years clean. Thank you for coming clean with me. I appreciate your time. Thanks for being here, mate. Thanks a lot, mate. Thank you.