Trying to Stay Clean in a Dirty System

 

-by Ryan 

Let’s talk about what it really means to be a recovering addict inside a prison system that runs on contradiction, corruption, and control.

You’d think this would be the safest place to get clean, right?
No drugs. No temptation. No street.
Just time to think, get right, and prepare for something better.

Wrong.

Let me break it to you straight:
Prison is one of the worst places to try to get clean.
Because in here, drugs don’t just exist—they thrive.
And 9 times outta 10? They’re not coming in through inmates.
They’re coming in through the people wearing the keys.

Yep. The officers.
The ones paid to protect and rehabilitate? They’re the ones flooding these yards with poison.
Daily.

I'm not talking once a week or a rare drop here and there.
I'm talking daily drops, daily sales, and drugs flying off the shelves like it's a damn commissary item.
Crank, K2, strips, pills—you name it, someone’s pushing it, and someone’s profiting off it.
And those “someones” ain’t always wearing state blues.
They’re wearing badges.

Meanwhile, I’m over here white-knuckling it through every damn day.
Holding on to sobriety with both hands.
Not because I’m scared of using.
But because I remember who I was when I did.

I remember the chaos.
The lies.
The pain I caused people who loved me.
The wreckage I left behind every time I said, “I got this,” when I damn sure didn’t.

And now, I’m trying to be better.
I am being better.
But this place? It don’t make it easy.

How do you focus on recovery when your cellie is getting high right next to you?
How do you stay clean when your neighbor is overdosing two doors down?
How do you fight to be different in a place that wants you to stay the same?

You can’t sign up for an NA meeting without a CO making a joke about how “you’ll be high again by next week.”
You can’t request therapy without being labeled soft, or a liability.
You can’t protect your sobriety without them twisting it into suspicion, like you’re the problem.

Let me be clear:
Addiction is a disease, not a moral failure.
But the way this system works? It punishes you for trying to heal.

They don’t want us clean.
They want us compliant.
They want us strung out, docile, easy to control.
Because a man in recovery? He sees clearly.
And clear eyes see the game.

But I'm not going back.
I’ve been that man. The one crawling through withdrawal. The one lying, stealing, manipulating—whatever it took to get the next fix.

Not anymore.

Now I’m the one who wakes up every day and chooses something better—even when everything around me is broken.
Even when the smell of smoke is in the air and the whispers of “it’s good sh*t” creep under the door.
Even when no one claps for me.
Even when nobody believes I’ll make it.

Because I believe it.
And because she believes it—my wife, my angel, my reason.
She’s seen me at my lowest. And she still looks at me like I’m worth something more.
So now I fight. For her. For me. For the version of myself I almost never became.

If you’re reading this and you’re struggling with addiction—inside or out—let me say this:

You’re not weak for wanting to change.
You’re not crazy for wanting something better.
And you’re not alone in feeling like the world is built to keep you stuck.

But even in here, where the air’s thick with corruption and temptation, I’m still clean.
Still choosing life.
Still walking through hell with my head up.

Because recovery is rebellion in a place that profits off your destruction.

And I’ve never been more ready to fight back.

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#BehindBarsUnfiltered #RecoveryInPrison #AddictionAwareness #CorruptButClean #StillFighting #PrisonReformNow