I guess I'm really writing this so maybe other people will read my story and not make the same mistakes.

I have. I am a 16 year old sophomore and until about a year ago I was very smart and had a lot of friends. One day I was a normal teen with a normal family and the next my world was being torn apart. My family started having a lot of problems I feared my parents getting a divorce and I was living with a suicidal sister.

I started spending less and less time at home and more time with the people that I called my friends. They all were into drugs and the stealing and violence that goes with them.

At the time I thought they were my friends and the only people who cared about me. And because of this I started to lose the people I now realize are my true friends. I ended up almost getting raped by one of those guys and to this day no one really knows how bad it was. I felt like no one was on my side, like the world had turned against me. And that's when I turned away from everyone and everything except drugs.

I was drinking or getting high all the time. I had to be because a fix doesn't last forever and I just wanted out of my pain the easy way. I had no friends, no life, and my grades were dropping. I was never home and when I was, I was sleeping off a buzz. This went on for a long time.

One day, I realized I really loved one of the guys I had been hanging with. He was the only one that stuck by me and believed me when that other guy tried to rape me. I lay awake in bed that night and thought about everything, about how I had kicked God out of my life and everything else I had messed up.

It wasn't easy, believe me, its not easy just to stop doing drugs, to rebuild friendships, or to bring up fallen grades. I still struggle with these things, especially working my grades up and not doing drugs. But I have the support of great friends and a wonderful boyfriend and of course God my creator and friend.

I still have nightmares about being raped and things aren't great at home, but I also have hope and love, and best of all, I don't have drugs and never will again.

Please print this. I want to share my story with as many people possible.