Sky Chaser

Marc Schroeder had it all – a highpaying finance job, a luxury car, and a spacious home. He also had a crippling drug addiction. His choice: give up everything he knew – or find himself in an early grave.

- Kieran Legg

He wakes up blurry-eyed, from another drug binge. His dogs are waiting for him, begging for breakfast. He eats two cheeseburgers and downs a cup of black coffee. He walks into work – late. He leaves – early. He scores two grams of cocaine. He takes a hit in the car, picks up a bottle of whisky from the bottle store on the way home. He walks through the front door and breathes a sigh of relief. No more pretending.

Weed. Cocaine. Pills. Alcohol. Repeat. He is stuck in a never-ending loop of addiction.

Before he found solace trekking through India, before he started his own travel company, before he discovered meaning beyond living between the last fix and the next one, Marc Schroeder’s life was spiralling out of control.

On the surface, the East London native had made it. Straight out of university he had been scooped up by a finance firm, and was being paid R150 000 per month to come in, handle admin, crack a few jokes, and clock out.

But after finishing university, the once optimistic student had plunged into a deep depression.

“I felt so disappointed in myself, and with life in general,” he says. “I was asking: is this really it? Am I going to grow old working between four walls, dealing with people’s money fears?”

He battled through. He hung onto the empty promise that if he just carried on, the money would take care of all of his problems. But the feeling of emptiness persisted; and desperate for an emotional escape, he turned to drugs.