I love the Duke City, I am the third generation to live here and proud of it! My father was raised primarily by his siblings in midtown Albuquerque. He was involved in car clubs and was featured on Lowrider magazine, puro Burque! His trade was fixing machines used in various technology organizations. My mother was also raised in midtown and is an angel of a woman. She has a caring heart of gold and does social work in our community. They did their best in raising me with the knowledge and skills they had.

At a young age I experienced some events that had a strong influence on my perspective of the world. This formed the ideas of abandonment and rejection that took the majority of my life to identify and overcome. From two to six years old because of uncontrollable events I spent the majority of time in the care of my mothers parents, traveling with them and being mentored.

From six to twelve I was primarily in the care of my parents, went to school and acquired a passion for the sport of wrestling. It was around this time that a traumatic experience occurred which increased the belief that I was an outsider in my own family. I had an understanding of the world that was skewed by the adverse childhood events I had lived through, so by the time I was fourteen I wanted to be and thought I was capable of living on my own. I was ready to drop out of school and join the workforce. Like a good parent, my mom exposed me to what I would be doing with a limited education. She had one of my Tio’s hire me as a laborer in his construction company. I was raised by hard workers so I excelled and began to learn the trades in construction. My parents reminded me that if I worked I wouldn’t be able to wrestle and that was the only reason I went back to school. My tio agreed to employ me in the summer, so I could have income.

Knowing the importance of an income drove me to create alternative ways to make money during the school year. I sold single prime times (Loosie cigarettes), then moved into selling cannabis. In 2007, as a junior in high school, with a wrestling scholarship, I saw the potential money that could be made with the new pills entering the market. Xanax, perc’s and OxyContin became my products. I saw the elation that it brought my customers and because the repressed adverse memories were now in my conscious mind I broke a major rule of business… got high on my own supply!

The ego and income I had gave me a false confidence that I would be successful without pursuing the scholarship or higher level of education. Boy was I wrong!

My dependence on OxyContin grew and the changes to its manufacturing and limited supply forced me to choose, quit or use heroin. Without the tools to cope through my emotions around abandonment and rejection or how to process the traumatic events I had experienced along with the new dramas and traumas tied to selling drugs I turned to heroin as my escape.

By the time I was 22 I found myself living out of my truck (by choice) and patching together schemes to make money. Refusing to seek help and relying on my own self, left me in a distress that I blamed the world, family and external events for. However this distress forced me to kick the opioid use because I was tired of the streets and associated life. I did not leverage professional help and left the underlying issues untreated. My family accepted me back home as long as I did not do drugs, so I drank alcohol to the point of excess.

This overdrinking caused my family to kick me out of their homes and the feeling of rejection was amplified. I found myself living in a building with no utilities, broken mentally, spiritually and physically. I knew there was a reason I had survived this long but did not want to go through the traditional methods of care. I choose a spiritual path of healing. I studied myself and learned how to address my thoughts, control my feelings which changed how I acted.

Actions have consequences and my body took a toll, at twenty-seven after the mental and spiritual healing was positively progressing I was diagnosed with a uncommon bone disease that caused both my hips to corrode and deteriorate to a point they were collapsing. At thirty one I had to replace both of them.

The spiritual shift and altered actions also drove an internal identity change which freed me from behaviors that were constricting to my life purpose. Which is to serve others while they learn about themselves. With this purpose in mind I wrote the book ‘Five Things to Know Before You Get Sober’. I completed a bachelor's degree with honors and I opened a business providing personal and professional development services called No Halo, because I believe no one was created to be an angel, but everyone was created to do better today than they did yesterday.

This is accomplished through setting specific and achievable commitment

-        December 2022

Check out Nico’s work at No Halo New Mexico