Pubdate: Thu, 30 Dec 2004
Source: Roanoke Times (VA)
Copyright: 2004 Roanoke Times
Contact:  http://www.roanoke.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/368
Author: Shay Barnhart, The New River Valley Current
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

HARD WORK IS PAYING OFF FOR RECOVERING METH ADDICT

Connie Pierce doesn't spend every day thinking about using
methamphetamine anymore.

The 41-year-old mother from Marion knows she will always remain
addicted to the powerful stimulant. But she's been clean for a year
and three months now, and she said her fight is slowly growing easier.

"I'll never get overconfident and say it's all behind me," Pierce
said. "I hope that it is, but, for now, it's going great."

Pierce's success story was featured in a series on Virginia's meth
problem that appeared in The Roanoke Times in July. Authorities say
meth, a powerful and highly addictive stimulant also known as crank or
speed, remains the drug of choice for many people in counties in
Southwest Virginia.

Until early 2002, Pierce considered herself a recreational drug user,
sampling cocaine and meth at parties or when friends gathered on
weekends. That changed when she started smoking crystal meth with a
boyfriend. Also called ice, it is a purer, more potent form of meth
that looks like clear crystals. She soon found herself addicted and
began selling the drug to support her habit.

On July 25, 2002, Pierce sold meth to an informant from the Smyth
County Sheriff's Office. She was eventually charged and pleaded guilty
to possession of meth and sale of meth, both felonies. Last January, a
judge suspended an 80-year prison sentence and put her on probation
for the next 10 years. She lost her driver's license for a year and
was ordered to complete 500 hours of community service.

She grabbed the chance to turn her life around.

"It's been kind of strange learning how to live a different kind of
life," Pierce said.

But her struggle has paid off. Pierce said her relationship with her
9-year-old daughter, whom she lost custody of, is better than it's
ever been. And her husband, Teddy, also a recovering meth addict,
returned home the week of Thanksgiving from a court-ordered drug
treatment facility.

Pierce has met with Del. Bill Carrico, R-Grayson County, as he and
other legislators seek to bring new meth-related laws to the state's
books, and she said she has been invited to speak to the General
Assembly about her personal struggles with the drug.

The state is still struggling with its meth problem.

The number of methamphetamine labs shut down in Virginia this year has
more than doubled last year's total, largely because of a cluster of
arrests along the Interstate 81 corridor between Tennessee and the New
River Valley.

As of Dec. 17, authorities had shut down 80 labs this year, according
to figures compiled by the Virginia State Police, a marked rise from
the 34 labs found in all of 2003.

Meth, a central nervous system stimulant similar to cocaine, first
appeared in the mid-1980s as a drug manufactured by the Hells Angels
biker gangs on the West Coast. By the '90s, new meth recipes emerged
that "cooked" the active ingredient in cold medicine with other
household chemicals.
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