I was a party girl who loved a ‘wine and a line’. Then I tried the drug everyone says they’ll never do and my world fell apart

Sitting at my desk, I tapped my foot impatiently, my agitation rising. 

The clock on my computer was telling me it was late morning, but I felt like time was standing still. I couldn’t wait a moment longer to take my lunch break.

Dashing to the bathrooms, I locked myself in a cubicle, before reaching inside the secret compartment in the lining of my handbag. 

My fingers closed around the item I was looking for. I put it to my lips, inhaled deeply and… oblivion. 

I know what you’re thinking: that I was one of the many young adults now so addicted to vaping that I had to sneak off to the toilets at work for a few puffs.

If only that had been the worst of my problems. 

The truth is, I was inhaling from a pipe that contained crystal meth, also known as ice, and for almost a decade I’d been hopelessly hooked. As my life spiralled into chaos, I had somehow clung on to my job in financial services by the tips of my fingers.

How on Earth had it come to this?

Mother-of-two Tahlia Isaac was living life on the edge, balancing a career with her dependency on a drug everyone is warned against taking: crystal meth

As a teenager, I’d been a bit of a misfit. I was a straight-A student who loved to read. While my peers played outside, I would spend my breaks in the school library. 

The other kids could be cruel and I never found a group of friends who I fit in with.

That all changed when I turned 18 and moved from the small Queensland town where I’d grown up to Brisbane, where I began to study for business degree. 

To support myself, I got a part-time job working behind the bar in a nightclub – and that was where I was first introduced to the party scene. At first it was a few drinks knocked back in secret during my shift with the encouragement of my colleagues.

But soon, I was being invited into the VIP area for a quick line of cocaine in between pouring drinks.

I was soon an enthusiastic member of the party crowd, heading to festivals, bars and clubs. As we dropped pills, snorted lines and downed shots until the early hours, I felt for the first time in my life like I was part of something. I started dating a guy I really liked and had plenty of friends on speed dial for when I felt like getting ‘mangled’.

The drugs and alcohol lowered my inhibitions and, because I was so young, I always bounced back the next day, attending my lectures and getting good grades.

But about a year later, my boyfriend ended things out of the blue and the rejection hit me like a ton of bricks.

I didn’t know how to cope with it emotionally, so instead I numbed the pain with more drugs, and more alcohol. 

As a child, Tahlia felt like she never fit in. Then she got a job in a nightclub and joined the party scene. To begin with, she was drinking and taking cocaine. But her drug use soon escalated

One night not long after the split, my friend took me to a party where everyone was drinking fantasy (GHB) and smoking speed.

I’d never tried either of those drugs before, but I was so used to taking risks by now that it didn’t seem like too much of a leap. When I was offered a hit of speed, I took it. 

The rush was incredible, like nothing I’d ever felt. I wanted – and needed – more.

I began missing lectures to hang with this new crowd and I fell in love with the ‘enchanting’ ritual of smoking speed, taking a hit, passing it around and watching the smoke swirl around me.

For a couple of years, speed was my drug of choice, but when it got harder to obtain, something new arrived to take its place. 

Crystal meth – or ‘ice’ as everyone was calling it. To me, it wasn’t any different from taking speed, so I started taking it without a second thought.

I didn’t know at the time it was the drug even veterans of the party scene warn you should never take. One that ruins lives, turns you into a shuffling, twitching monster.

At the time, the high felt remarkably similar to speed, only more intense. So I’d smoke it whenever it was available. 

The rush didn’t last as long either. Thirty minutes after smoking ice, I’d be looking for next hit.

Meth wasn’t just a ‘party drug’ for long. Within months, it had taken over all aspects of my life and I dropped out of university.

Tahlia hit rock bottom when she was arrested for commercial supply of a class A drug after she turned to dealing to support her own drug use

Ice isn’t an expensive drug, but I was using so much I realised I needed to work if I was to keep buying more. Somehow I managed to maintain some semblance of a professional life, even though some of my roles were short-lived.

I got fired from my position on the council after police raided my house and caught me with a meth pipe. I was dating a dealer by then, so was on the radar of the drugs squad. Word soon got back to my bosses at the council, who let me go. 

At my next job in financial services, I managed to hide it better.

God knows how, though. By then, I was smoking ice while getting ready for work, before getting behind the wheel to drive to the office. And if I could manage it, I’d have a few tokes in the work toilets during morning tea break, then rush back again for a longer smoke at lunch. 

During the evenings, it took every ounce of willpower to make sure I ate and got some sleep so I could turn up looking presentable and awake at work the next day.

I was actually good at my job, so as I white-knuckled my way through client calls and meetings, no one noticed I was desperately waiting for my next fix.

Somehow, I was getting away with it. Until, I wasn’t…

By the time I turned 27, my drug use had become so extreme that I was struggling to get myself out the door in the morning. I started to call in sick more and more, until one day, I just stopped showing up altogether. 

By then, I felt so disconnected from the ‘normal’ world that getting another 9-5 job just seemed unfathomable to me. I had totally abandoned myself to meth.

Tahlia now does advocacy work for women impacted by the justice system

With hindsight, I can now see I had a million other options, but I was completely blind. The only thing I felt qualified to do to make money was to sell drugs. 

The jump from user to dealer may seem significant, but in reality it wasn’t that big of a deal for me. I had plenty of connections by then, and knew plenty of users.

So for a few months, I drove around in a haze, dealing out of my car, high myself half the time. 

Then the cops pulled me over. They tested me for drugs and found amphetamines in my system, then after a full-body search at the station, discovered the large quantity of meth I’d been concealing in my pants. 

I was charged with commercial supply of a class A drug and was jailed for two years. 

It was my rock bottom – but also the wake-up call I needed.  

While incarcerated, I kept my head down. I read books, journalled and saw a counsellor. 

We started to get to the root of my drug use. The fact that I’d never learned to sit with my emotions, that I always chose to numb myself or run away. It was eye-opening.

By the time of my release, I had a plan to change my life. Prison is a cesspool of drugs, but I’d managed to stay clean behind bars and started going to meetings. 

It was terrifying at first. I had absolutely no idea how to navigate the outside world sober and there wasn’t much support for people like me.

But slowly, I started to find myself. I returned to my studies, finishing my business degree, then studying criminology and criminal justice.

I also went on a road trip up the east coast, where I met my now husband. He took me fishing, camping and hiking – simple, wholesome activities I never thought I’d be able to enjoy, especially not sober. 

We had our two children and soon after, I started my own organisation, doing advocacy work for women impacted by the justice system.

I tell my story in the hope that it helps someone else going through the same thing. We are more than our mistakes, we are more than our labels.

And to those reading this that think their ‘wine and a line’ habit is harmless, I’m here to warn you that it could lead you down a very dark path. 

Tahlia Isaac is a criminologist and speaker represented by Challenge the Label, who advocates for the systematic removal of barriers for women as they reintegrate into society after serving time in prison.

•  As told to Polly Taylor

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