DMX details the pain of being tricked into smoking crack after returning from juvenile detention centers when he was 14. He had a very tormented childhood and relationship with his mother who was disconnected from him as a child and she would abuse him and allow her boyfriends to do see the same. Feeling unloved and not wanted as a kid he often walked the streets late at night and would sleep in Salvation Army bins and befriend stray dogs to avoid being abused by his mother and her boyfriends.
He ended up in a juvenile detention center after a judge determined his mother was not qualified to raise him. Upon his return home to more abuse, he found what he thought was a mentor. A man that was twice his age who he looked up to introduced him to the best and the worst things in his life, rap, and drugs.
At the time, DMX didn’t smoke cigarettes or do any drugs. The man laced a blunt with crack and gave it to DMX to smoke when he was 14. A curious young DMX tried it and said his brain changed in that instant.
The angst in his expression over the situation that would follow him for the rest of his life is evident in this video where he explains what happened.
https://youtu.be/qwcbG1rIp8Y