RECOVERING TEEN ADDICT'S MEMORY DESTROYED BY METH

Cletis has become a list-maker, a note-taker.

"If I say I'm going to meet somebody, I'll forget, unless I write it down,"
says the 18-year-old from Camrose, who asked that his real name not be
published.

Three years ago, he went from being a "rich boy" in a loving family, to a
desperate meth addict, to one of the top meth dealers in the city.

He has now been clean for about a year. But his memory is shot.

He used to play rugby, but his chest hurts when he runs.

"I've coughed up a chunk of my lung a couple times," Cletis says.

He has seen what addicts describe as "shadow people," lurking in the corner
of his bedroom, jumping in front of his car while he's driving.

And there were bugs, lots of bugs, always crawling on him. He would dig his
fingernails into his flesh, leaving behind deep craters.

"It's not worth it," says the teen, who now tries to talk other people out
of doing meth. "I make fun of 'em. I say, 'There you go, throwing your life
away.' "

When Vicki started losing weight, one of her girlfriends asked her what her
secret was.

It was a dirty, little secret called crystal meth.

"She wanted to do it, but I said, 'No. We'll go to the gym.'

"I wasn't a nice skinny at all. My cheeks were sunken in. My clothes were
hanging off me. I saw my face in the washroom one day and thought, 'oh, my
God.' "

Before Christmas, the 18-year-old overdosed on meth and spent three weeks
in the Camrose hospital.

"When they said I almost died, it scared the (expletive) out of me."

Vicki, not her real name, had already lost three part-time jobs because the
drug made her so paranoid she couldn't do her work. She had been selling
meth, too, and narrowly escaped a police bust that netted 15 meth
traffickers in Camrose.

She counted herself lucky and tried to quit, a few times. But friends
tempted her.

She ended up back in the hospital for another two weeks in February.

"A lot of people still come up to me and ask me to do it with them. I tell
them, 'No, I don't do it anymore.'

"Or 'No, I have plans.' That works easiest for me.' "