Tonight’s episode is a gritty, unfiltered ride through the early chaos and hard-won clarity of Derrick’s story—a friend from my past whose journey through addiction, love, loss, and survival hits deep.
We talk about how it all started: smoking weed young, chasing older girls, and trying to “look big” in a world that rewarded recklessness. Derrick opens up about stealing Oxy pills from his grandfather to impress a girl, how that spiraled into full-blown addiction, and how love—twisted up with pain—kept pulling him deeper. From pill parties to heroin, from our small-town streets to city trap houses, Derrick shares the raw truth of what it looked like to lose everything, including his mother, right under our noses.
We lived some of this together—same house, same hustle, same heartbreak. He talks about the criminal fallout, the desperation, and the moment he knew something had to change. We ran out of time before diving into the full redemption arc, but we do get a glimpse: Derrick today is a father, a fiancé, and a man in recovery with a solid career and a fierce commitment to doing better.
He’ll be back for Part 2—but for now, this one’s a heavy, honest look at what it means to fall hard and still find your way back