Episode 13: Straight A’s in College to Drug-Running for the Cartel, Addiction, Prison, and the Road to Recovery with Megan Racer

by Peter Meyerhoff

Peter “Chappy” Meyerhoff sits down with Megan Racer. As Megan tells her story, she paints a picture of a girl, barely an adult, who relied on others—particularly the men she dated—for validation and a sense of identity. She entered relationships for the type of lifestyle they could afford her, not for the love she could share with her partner.

She continued to struggle with addiction even after finding out that she was pregnant and, two months after her daughter was born, she picked up a heroin habit. Eventually, her parents discovered all this, in spite of Megan’s efforts to conceal her addictions, and Child Protective Services entered the picture. In a fateful turn of events, she hooked up with her daughter’s father and had a second child—a son.

Having finally made a commitment to stay sober, Megan now had the challenge of raising two small children with a father who was continuously absent. She began prostituting herself, and before long was tempted by her children’s father to start using again. Soon, Megan was hooked on heroin, meth, and drinking a gallon of fireball a day.

Finally unable to keep up appearances, Megan quit her job and, with no options left, jumped on an opportunity offered by her dope dealer, which involved her driving to and from Mexico to do odd jobs for the cartel—with her two kids in the backseat on each and every single trip.

It was a short-lived gig. Megan was finally arrested at the border with 89 pounds of methamphetamine in the back of her truck, and she was separated from her children. She was able to sign a plea and took a lesser charge of distribution.

Megan spent 14 months in prison—living out those months on the same grounds she toured when she was in college—and spent the next year in a drug program, where she was completely determined to change for the better.

Today, Megan works in recovery, and she loves every second of it. Megan closes the conversation this way:

“Can you go through the worst situation of your life and become a better person? If you can, you’ll find the most success in the world, and it might not be monetary, but it will be internal, and you will spread it to other people. I 100% believe that.”

Topics Discussed:

  • [01:38] Megan’s backstory and when she began experimenting with drugs
  • [11:40] Living with addiction while pregnant
  • [15:35] Becoming sober and having her second child with the same man
  • [19:35] Quitting her job amid her renewed drug addiction
  • [25:27] Working with the cartel
  • [30:35] Getting arrested at the border
  • [37:27] The days leading up to prison
  • [51:29] Life in prison
  • [1:00:48] Working in recovery after prison
  • [1:06:35] Megan’s words of hope for those in prison today

Connect with Megan Racer:

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Key Quotes:

  • My relationships were always about getting the lifestyle I want. It was never, “What kind of love can this person give me?” It was more about, “What empty feelings could I fulfill?”
  • After they interrogated me, put me back in the cell and closed the door, I never felt more free in my life. Seriously. It was done. The madness—the chaos—was done.
  • We have such an advantage. We know the depths of hell, and we know the peaks of what it could look like. There’s nothing we have not seen. There’s nothing we cannot go through. We’ve already experienced something we didn’t think we could go through and made it out as better people.
  • Can you go through the worst situation of your life and become a better person? If you can, you’ll find the most success in the world, and it might not be monetary, but it will be internal, and you will spread it to other people. I 100% believe that.
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