Hooked on Spice

By Matt Coutu, Contributor

“All the cool kids are doing it,” they said. “You’ll be one of us.”

This was what my parents had warned me about. I had seen my fair share of after school specials to know that I was headed down the wrong path. “I’ll just try it once,” I thought, but boy, was I wrong.

Within two months, I couldn’t go for more than a couple of hours without attempting to re-up; in my car, under bridges, behind the local Wal-Mart. I would go anywhere that I could get my fix.

I started Pumpkin Spice when I was fifteen. It was a rough time in my life. “Parents just don’t get it,” I would say to my friends. I thought I was the coolest kid in school, and it wasn’t just because of my Tap-Out shirt. The skinny jeans and beanie I wore gave off the impression that I was bad to the bone. Nobody wanted to mess with me.

It wasn’t until my grades started to slip that I knew I had a problem. “Is there something going on at home?” my teacher asked one day. I just shrugged it off. She would never understand.

At night I would dream of the cinnamon rushing through my body. It was all I could think about. My family soon noticed that I had a problem. The day they took away my Starbucks Rewards Card was only the beginning. Soon after, my driving privileges were revoked. I couldn’t go a day without bumming an Über so I could get to a drive-thru.

I began to lose friends. Money was never paid back, and the benefits of living a spice-free life were not things that interested me. I began to watch Pretty Little Liars and my scarf collection only got bigger by the day.

It was a Friday when I came home from school and went straight to my room as I normally did. After sitting down at the desk, I knew something didn’t feel right. Where were my Lana Del Rey posters? I opened the desk drawer where I kept my Pumpkin-Spice flavored gum and it was gone. I darted to the closet and there were no leggings in sight. I was furious. After running down the stairs to the living room, all hell broke loose. “WHAT DID YOU DO WITH MY STUFF!?” I began to shout.

Then I saw it. My family and friends were sitting in a circle. They asked me to take a seat and immediately, all of my emotions were released. I cried. What had I done with my life? I had such a bright future. It was that day that I vowed to be spice-free. And I was. For a few months.

On Sept. 12, 2014, I attended an Ed Sheeran concert. The atmosphere was breath taking but something inside had made me feel uneasy. I needed it. For the first time in months, my body yearned for the warm feeling of pumpkin. I’m not sure whether it was the amount of flower crowns or the Uggs, but it all came rushing back to me. I left my friends and sprinted to the nearest Starbucks. After getting my remedy, I ran as fast as I could to a scenic pasture. It was there that I took a selfie and added an elaborate Instagram filter, finally fulfilling what I had wanted so badly for the months that my therapist made me switch to Caribou Coffee. I finally had it back in my life. My friends discovered me a few hours later passed out next to a dream catcher waiting for Victoria’s Secret to open.

I’ve been clean now for 12 months, and my therapist told me I’m making tremendous progress. Yet, I still ache for it every day.