The Brown County Training Coalition hosted their annual drug training event Friday at the Brownwood Coliseum and featured guest speaker Tiffany Eis who shared her story of drug addiction that almost cost her life.
Students from Brownwood, Early and Bangs schools were in attendance to hear her powerful story and ask questions about her experience.
Six years ago, Eis overdosed on a variety of drugs including methamphetamine and oxycontin on her 30th birthday. She suffered catastrophic side effects from the overdose and almost didn’t recover.
“I lost both of my legs, I had a heart valve replacement,” Eis said. She also described the effects to her memory as a result of several strokes she also suffered during her experience. “Not only did the strokes do memory damage, but all of the drugs that I had done prior to that as well.”
Eis said that she started using drugs at the age of 15 with marijuana which she considers a gateway drug.
“The reason why I call it a gateway drug is because I tried that one and nothing happened to me, quote, unquote, but it did kill my brain cells,” she said. “Then I thought it didn’t do anything so I might as well try cocaine, then I might as well try heroin, then I might as well try acid, then I might as well keep going with all of the drugs I can get my hands on.”
Eis said she ultimately got hooked on methamphetamine and oxycontin.
She described the events of her 30th birthday when she was sitting in the bathtub at home and overdosed on drugs. She was found two days later by a friend who broke open the door and found a horrifying sight.
“She found me with my eyes wide open, my hands and feet turning blue, and I wasn’t breathing,” Eis said.
She said that her friend and then-boyfriend dumped her off outside at the hospital and left her there without identification or any information about her condition. Doctors had to restart her heart and didn’t think she would survive at the time.
Eis showed some graphic photos of her hands and feet a few days after she was admitted to the hospital which had turned red and black and were excreting pus from infection in her body.
“I don’t wish this on my worst enemy,” she said. “That pain, that feeling, what I did to my parents, my true friends who weren’t addicts, I hurt every single one of them. I hurt them with my stupidity of drug addiction.”
She was in a coma for two months in the hospital while her body struggled to survive from the overdose.
“One hundred and eighty days I was in the hospital,” Eis said. “I don’t want you to feel sympathy for me; I want you to learn from me. I don’t want you to learn yourself; I want you to learn from me.”
Eventually during her hospital stay, doctors had to amputate her legs and replace the heart valve.
She said that her prosthetic legs work well for walking, but are painful to use.
“They hurt, they are functional, they work for the purpose of walking when I need them,” Eis said. “At night when I am home, I am in a wheelchair.”
Eis finished her program by taking questions from the students about her experience.
“I don’t want this to happen to anyone in here,” she said. “Whether it be you, your family, best friend; it is horrible, drugs just are the worst things.”
Eis has had three years experience speaking with middle school, high school and college students across the nation. This is the second year that Brownwood has hosted this drug training event with a keynote speaker talking about their experiences with drug addiction.
