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GOLDEN, Colo. — The lives lost in Colorado to opioid abuse each year continues to increase. Some programs seem to be helping, but there’s not a one-size-fits-all approach.

Nowhere is that more apparent than in the story of two Colorado brothers who became addicted to opioids and sought help. Bu, only one lived to tell his story.

Dustin Miller of Golden said he always looked up to his older brother, Devon. He was a young man who had it all: Friends, good at sports and involved in music.

Devon even wore that love for music in a colorful tattoo with the lyrics from a Lynard Skynyrd song across his chest.

The boy’s mom, Jackie Friesen, describes Devon as somewhat of an adrenaline junkie. That energy eventually brought a knee injury. It was a meniscus tear that was surgically repaired. The pain medication he was prescribed was oxycontin.

But, Friesen said Devon was prescribed 180 of the 30mg pills a month.

It wasn’t long, she says, before the pain medication began to take over his life. An injury that would inadvertently change his life. He started using them recreationally.

“Then he started using his knee as an excuse for needing the pills,” Friesen said.

Devon told his brother he had the recreational use of opioids under control. Dustin said he tried it and grew to like it a lot.  And they weren’t hard to get.

“It was very easy,” Miller said. “I went to a doctor and said that my back hurt and they gave me Vicodin.”

Lying to get pain meds and no system in place to stop him. It wasn’t long before the use turned in to an addiction.

“It came to a point where it’s not that i was using them because I wanted to,” Miller said. “I was using them because I needed to get to work that day.”

Devon wasn’t doing well either and when a friend called his mom, Friesen picked him up and brought him to her home

She sent him to rehab. It was one of three that Devon went to. None of them had a lasting effect on breaking the addiction. By that time, Miller was in trouble too.

“I came to my mother and I told her that I needed some help,” Miller said. “And she helped me get into a rehab.”

Miller’s experience in rehab worked because he was committed while in the program and when he got out. That meant giving up friends he’d previously done drugs with.

But, when Devon came out of rehab, it wasn’t long before he was back with his friends doing drugs. Four days after his last rehab, a friend shot him up with heroin and it took his life.

The Lynyard Skynyrd lyrics from “Free Bird” tattooed on his chest were eerily prophetic.

“If I leave here tomorrow, will you still remember me.”

Devon Miller is remembered by his mom and friends and a brother who accomplished something his older sibling could not.

Dustin broke the cycle of opoid addiction and lived to tell about it.