Diary of a meth dealer: The night I fired a sawn-off shotgun at a man in the grip of my massive meth addiction

Pat Smith was a massive meth user and dealer. Photo / Supplied

It was the height of his massive ice (P) addiction and Pat Smith, one of NSW's heaviest methamphetamine dealers, was at home in Grafton strung out on the drug.

What happened next was to be a life changing moment which should have ended with a murder and a prison sentence.

The 43-year-old, who concedes he "destroyed" many people's lives during a 20-year drug binge, said he just snapped.

It was late at night and people were arguing outside his house.

"I went out on veranda with a loaded cut-down shotgun," he told news.com.au.

"When they got loud I went off at them, so they came to the gate - Kooris - and [one man] said 'Think you're a goer ya white c***' and I said 'Yeah ya black c***' and pointed the gun about one metre from his face.

"He said 'Go on pull.....'. I did and it misfired. I wasn't supposed to go to jail and he wasn't supposed to die."

Mr Smith has decided to reveal some of the worst stories of violence and madness on ice as a lesson to others to get off the drug.

At its height, or at the lowest point of his addiction Mr Smith was earning $200,000 a year "selling ice, fuelling young people's addictions and turning their world into a miserable existence".

He often had no sleep for days and had gone for "17 days with only eight hours sleep, one lot of four hours and two lots of two".

"I'd just keep topping up and topping up," he said. "Not many ice addicts could take the amount I was taking."

Despite selling ice, Mr Smith said he was an emotional mess and often cried when young people became hooked on ice.

"I had a Koori lad at my flat on third floor scared to go downstairs because 'his cuz on the second floor was going to bash him'.

"He was 23 maybe. I didn't sell to him, he was too crazy. Paranoid.

"So I got his uncle and three mates to walk him to my car so we could drive him to one of my best mates' place to calm him down.

"We nearly had to drag him down. Then halfway there in the car, he starts saying 'please don't hurt me' and we're like 'WTF?'

"Going for so long without sleep nearly sent me insane." Pat says. Photo / Supplied

"He goes 'please, please' and starts opening the car door. I slowed down to about 20km an hour and he leaps out the door screaming 'Don't hurt me' and bolts into the bush.

"His uncle just looked at me and I said, 'it's ice bro. He's fried'.

Mr Smith said another young guy, aged 21, became so paranoid after three months on ice he began thinking Pat was an undercover narcotics agent.

"If he saw a hole in the roof or wall? It's a camera! He thought a van parked across the road was undercover cops. We dragged him across the road just to prove it wasn't.

"Sadly these guys are still on ice."

But for Pat Smith, it was the beginning of the end of his addiction, which he gave up in May last year and has now become an anti drug-campaigner. But he still struggles daily.

He had become a dealer during the final four years of his addiction to feed a poker machine addiction and his massive habit, which at its peak had him injecting a gram of meth a day.

Instead of costing $1000, it set him back only $400 because he was dealing, but the intensity of selling and using put his life on the edge.

At one point during the 17-day binge, he drove for 16 hours from his home town of Yamba to Sydney and back again.

Sleepless and "wired", he remembers swerving all over the roads.

The tattoo shows his determination. Photo / Supplied

But the incident with the shot gun and the fact that "the ice scene had become too violent" spurred him on to make the difficult decision to give up, but one which he believes saved his life.

He walked into a doctor's surgery and gave a detailed and "straight up" confession about what he'd been doing and how much of the drug he'd been taking.

The doctor was startled, but prescribed antidepressants to allow him to cope with withdrawal, urges and a predicted plunge in his mood and demeanour.

He suffered such bad nightmares and daily panic, he started taking Valium to cope.

"I used to think I wasn't violent. But, yes I was," he told news.com.au.

"Going for so long without sleep nearly sent me insane."

Not a dollar of his big drug dealing days remains and he is broke and has lived on and off with his mother.

"She didn't know much about [my ice addiction], but I'd go weeks without contacting her, I wouldn't answer the door. But now she's stoked."

Mr Smith went public last year about his drug past, standing up at a local meeting and describing his life as a dealer and ice user.

Now he is working to raise community awareness and help addicts get off ice.

"They'll be better off as a result. I am helping friends get off ice and I want to help anyone who needs it," he said.

His Facebook page, Patrick Smith Fighting Ice, is part of his campaign to make restitution for dealing the drug.

"I want to spend the next 20 years repairing the damage I have done. I want to get the message out to people taking ice," he said.

"If it's only a few months or less than a week you've been clean, it doesn't matter.

"Don't feel guilty. Every day clean is a good day, believe me."