There is nothing quite like agonising withdrawal from months smashed to the gills on an extremely potent opioid derivative to turn to ashes one’s fire for recreational drugs. Intravenous hydromorphone had been my neurosurgeon’s weapon of choice for the last four months – a necessary remedy after a spectacular lifelong, out-of-control, self-medicating, self-destructive vortex had culminated in me being stranded in the City of Angels with a broken back. What a wild ride it had been. The kind of adventures where one lives decades in only weeks. My obsession with venom had taken me across the globe to seek out the world’s most dangerous animals in the world’s most inhospitable places, including conflict zones. I had been in and out of hospitals throughout these adventures. While there had been bodies on the floor along the way, I was still alive. For now. There was, however, the small matter of my paralysed legs.