HAMSTERS & HEROIN: Not all junkies are purse-snatching grandmother-killing psychos. I'm keeping this blog to bear witness to that fact.

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DIARY OF A SLOWLY RECOVERING HEROIN ADDICT

I used to take heroin at every opportunity, for over 10 years, now I just take methadone which supposedly "stabilizes" me though I feel more destabilized than ever before despite having been relatively well behaved since late November/early December 2010... and VERY ANGRY about this when I let it get to me so I try not to.

I was told by a mental health nurse that my heroin addiction was "self medication" for a mood disorder that has recently become severe enough to cause psychotic episodes. As well as methadone I take antipsychotics daily. Despite my problems I consider myself a very sane person. My priority is to attain stability. I go to Narcotics Anonymous because I "want what they have" ~ Serenity.

My old blog used to say "candid confessions of a heroin and crack cocaine addict" how come that one comes up when I google "heroin blog" and not this one. THIS IS MY BLOG. I don't flatter myself that every reader knows everything about me and follows closely every single word every day which is why I repeat myself. Most of that is for your benefit not mine.

This is my own private diary, my journal. It is aimed at impressing no-one. It is kept for my own benefit to show where I have been and hopefully to put off somebody somewhere from ever getting into the awful mess I did and still cannot crawl out of. Despite no drugs. I still drink, I'm currently working on reducing my alcohol intake to zero.

If you have something to say you are welcome to comment. Frankness I can handle. Timewasters should try their own suggestions on themselves before wasting time thinking of ME.

PS After years of waxing and waning "mental" symptoms that made me think I had depression and possibly mild bipolar I now have found out I'm schizoaffective. My mood has been constantly "cycling" since December 2010. Mostly towards mania (an excited non-druggy "high"). For me, schizoaffective means bipolar with (sometimes severe)
mania and flashes of depression (occasionally severe) with bits of schizophrenia chucked on top. You could see it as bipolar manic-depression with sparkly knobs on ... I'm on antipsychotic pills but currently no mood stabilizer. I quite enjoy being a bit manic it gives the feelings of confidence and excitement people say they use cocaine for. But this is natural and it's free, so I don't see my "illness" as a downer. It does, however, make life exceedingly hard to engage with...

PPS The "elevated mood" is long gone. Now I'm depressed. Forget any ideas of "happiness" I have given up heroin and want OFF methadone as quick as humanly possible. I'm fed up of being a drug addict. Sick to death of it. I wanna be CLEAN!!!

Attack of the Furry Entertainers!

Attack of the Furry Entertainers!

Sunday, January 28, 2007

Feeling Horrid

TO USE ENID BLYTON LANGUAGE yes I do feel "horrid". Have been feeling horrible all week. My mind feels at this moment like a pressurecooker about to explode. Went to my old blog thinking I'd cheapskate it and whack up one of my old postings. The slowness. And the eggtimer. All got to me. So bad. I just logged out.

I have spent years of my life on antidepressants. Then once they gave me this anticonvulsant (why?? I'm not epileptic.) Whenever I tell psychidoctors what actually happens to me I get the strong feeling they don't believe me. Which is all you need when depressed. Because you feel your feelings have no validity anyhow. And if, like me, you can convince yourself that what is happening is not real, you will see that it all turns into a hall-of-mirrors-type mindgame. Here's a quote:

Eccentric is one step before insanity.
StalkRaymi/Raymi.

If that's true then I'm done for. Eccentric - when have I not been. Insane? Well I can't hear through walls like I could this time last year.

One thing to be said for opiate addiction: it does calm down moodswings. But the upshot of all this is what Ivy calls a flatline. (Which is even worse on methadone as that has such a long "half-life".) At least a decade ago when I got depressed I'd flip up into a joy-to-be-alive state for a few days. Now when I do go down I just sink into the goo and stay there.

I'm afraid of telling my full mental states story to any doctor in case they start slapping words on me like paranoid or bipolar. Actually I did tell them when I was paranoid about the "bad energy" Nutnut was sending out to me. She was destroying me by the powers of her own sickness. And her own way of thinking was not one to inflict on someone drifting out of his own etre to another raison.

Normally when I feel like this I would tell myself I need a drink. But I don't need a drink. I don't really want one.

Even if the fairy godmother waved her wand over me right now, I reckon I could turn normality into its own madness. I'm one of these people that whatever advantages I get in life - they are still going to get peed away up that wall.

Now I'm going to bed.

13 comments:

Deb said...

keep treading water and try not to go under. you too brilliant for that!

Deb said...

*you're i mean. been a long hospital day today.

Gledwood said...

Thanks. I'm trying.

Deb said...

me too ;)

rowan said...

I know I know.. I like huge ups and downs better more exciting.. even the vomiting and being sick and cant raise my head cant drink a glass of water is worth the highs.. though those lows made me think "i'm going to wait a week before I do that again"!!

rowan said...

try to make yourself go out. One good thing about the clinic is first thing in the morning no matter how bad i feel I have to leave my apartment walk uphill five-six blocks to go get dosed.

rowan said...

i mean that i always feel better after doing that no matter how bad i felt in the first place or how hard it was to force myself to GO GO GO GO GO !!

rowan said...

(adrenaline helps depression.) stress isnt good but something that will make you work under the gun helps me sometimes.

Wayward Son said...

My Dear Friend,

One of the many things I think are true is that when one is so far down that there is no place further down to go, one can only go. Cold comfort in the privacy of ones own personal hell but if you click your heels three times while saying "I will be happy", you will, at worse, smile at the absurdidty of doing so. At best, you will revel in your ability to be eccentric. More on that further down. If, as I suspect, but cannot know given my Yank mentality about people not American (The U.S. variety), you are straight, there is the added bonus of super absurdity--ambi absurdity if you follow the latest paradigm of once uber superlatives. Super was of my generation and once comfortable with the fact that there are generations below mine I am glad to own the lingo I help put into circulation.

But I digress, which is also a good distraction from depression of any kind. Highly under-rated for its short longevity as a treatment, yet cheap enough to use as often as you want. Can be addictive but then what cannot.

Bi Polar? The poor man's manic depressive? Who isn't? Like Co-dependency, it's a matter of degree and malady shared universally by all. In the U.S., you can purchase Bi Polar on Amazon or place a bid for it on eBay. I don't know what restrictions the international coimmunity might place on selling bi polarism and the infringement on another's intellectual capital but like NTSC (our poorer quality analogue video format) no one ever went broke underestimating the taste level of the American (U.S.) public. Expensive high quality bi polarisam is a hard sell here and possibly like baccolyte plastic and marquisite jewelry, will one day be an expensive collectable.

As a person who hails from the Southern part of the U.S., both geographically AND culturally, I can attest the benefit of embodying, eccentricity. In that region of our country it a right of passage into old age that one can say, do, believe and behave in outlandish, eccentric ways, given infringement on the quality of life or the rights of others to do same is not imapaired (my personal philosophy if not that of those not yet enlightened). I am here to tell, much to the horror of the average poser who adheres to the "California lifestyle" it is a glorious feeling and our devine right to be and act eccentric.

If you feel eccentric and less than glorious, you must abandon all your attachments to London and come to San Francisco and study with me to know the joys of being so unique that others find you odd. BTW, thanks to our invading Afghanistan and failing to jump start the rebuilding of an infrastructure to support the needs of a people ravaged over and over and over and over, we have an almost an unending supply for your vice. For a crowd to run with (pun intended if you use the same term for Intraveinous use as we sometimes do) we have the happy-go-lucky kids nodding off on the Hayes 22 bus on their way to the Tenderloin from the Haight that will amaze and amuse you. An affable bunch, these kids, if you catch them before they go down completely only to miraculously awake at their destination. More proof that God does exist. As with all addictions the older the addict the less amazing and amusing we are--thus we tend to avoid mass anything much less mass-transit. You'll have to work that one out yourself as I am trading isolation for joy and still managing to get amazed and amused. But I digress again and I am not even feeling low today. Makes you think, no?

Back to the beloved eccentrics. We are our own religion of sorts that just might unite the world. If you don't want to up and move then embrace your God given right to be and enjoy your own eccentricity. It is a matter of Free Will and a precious gift from our Creator.

Since I have brought up religion, a fearful topic for most, I will leave you with a quote whose author escapes me at the moment. It is my fervent wish that upon reading it you will consider that being eccentric is not so bad after all. You, more so than many, can appreaciate the thought behind the words.

"Religion is the opiate of the masses"

Know that my blog will be short a few thoughts and words today as I have exhausted myself commenting. Another Yank propencity to offer up an opinion despite having no relevant qualification to do so. Why do you think we have a million and three chanels of television? The average citizen's ability to comment is far more than their ability to spend yet marketers and pundits remain ever hopeful that the reverse might be true.

Now one might think that this boondoogle of words is the consequence of someone on speed, it is not. If I were high the thought would still be there but in no certain order and the need to explain the explanantion more like a frightening ride on the segue than a simple digression. Also my vernacular would be totally unaccessible. I am merely using words like one who spends incessantly after having had no money for a long, long while.

Oh geez, digression therapy in all its splendor.

Head up my friend. Clearly you are a graceful beacon in a world of clumsy sheep.

WS

Wayward Son said...

Post edit edit.... "... go up." Not just "go" An important distinction to make.

junky said...

The anticonvulsite is probably for manic depression/bi-polar disorder,
they just happen to work for both

Anonymous said...

That's because I was getting depressed on a week in week out basis ie I was okay one week then down for a week... I see...

I stopped taking those pills then took 1 or 2 when I could not sleep. Brought me out in a SERIOUS rash. Carbamazepine. Can't take it now.

Anonymous said...

Wow, so opiate addiction causes a "flatline" condition ... I saw that too on Ivy's blog. Does alcoholosm cause it too? I think it might.

Feeling horrid ... wow, I wish I could take it all away ffrom you. I don't want you to feel horrid. It's not much comfort, yes, but it is true.

I WANT OFF METHADONE AS QUICK AS HUMANLY POSSIBLE!

METHADONE ~ A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH







Heroin Shortage: News

If you are looking for the British Heroin Drought post, click here; the latest word is in the comments.







Christiane F

"Wir, Kinder vom Bahnhoff Zoo" by "Christiane F", memoir of a teenage heroin addict and prostitute, was a massive bestseller in Europe and is now a set text in German schools. Bahnhoff Zoo was, until recently, Berlin's central railway station. A kind of equivalent (in more ways than one) to London's King's Cross... Of course my local library doesn't have it. So I'm going to have to order it through a bookshop and plough through the text in German. I asked my druggieworker Maple Syrup, who is Italiana how she learned English and she said reading books is the best way. CHRISTIANE F: TRAILER You can watch the entire 120-min movie in 12 parts at my Random blog. Every section EXCEPT part one is subtitled in English (sorry: but if you skip past you still get the gist) ~ to watch it all click HERE.

To See Gledwood's Entire Blog...

DID you find my blog via a Google or other search? Are you stuck on a post dated some time ago? Do you want to read Gledwood Volume 2 right from "the top" ~ ie from today?
If so click here and you'll get to the most recent post immediately!

Drugs Videos

Most of these come from my Random blog, which is an electronic scrapbook of stuff I thought I might like to view at some time or other. For those who want to view stuff on drugs I've collected the very best links here. Unless otherwise stated these are full-length features, usually an hour or more.

If you have a slow connexion and are unused to viewing multiscreen films on Youtube here's what to do: click the first one and play on mute, stopping and starting as it does. Then, when it's done, click on Repeat Play and you get the full entertainment without interruption. While you watch screen one, do the same to screens 2, 3 and so on. So as each bit finishes, the next part's ready and waiting.

Mexican Black Tar Heroin: "Dark End"

Khun Sa, whose name meant Prince Prosperous, had been, before his death in the mid 2000s, the world's biggest dealer in China White Heroin: "Lord of the Golden Triangle"

In-depth portrait of the Afghan heroin trade at its very height. Includes heroin-lab bust. "Afghanistan's Fateful Harvest"

Classic miniseries whose title became a catchphrase for the misery of life in East Asian prison. Nicole Kidman plays a privileged middle-class girl set up to mule heroin through Thai customs with the inevitable consequences. This is so long it had to be posted in two parts. "Bangkok Hilton 1" (first 2 hours or so); "Bangkok Hilton 2" (last couple of hours).

Short film: from tapwater-clear H4 in the USA to murky black Afghan brown in Norway: "Heroin Addicts Speak"

Before his untimely death this guy kept a video diary. Here's the hour-long highlights as broadcast on BBC TV: "Ben: Diary of a Heroin Addict". Thanks to Noah for the original link.

Some of the most entertaining scenes from Britain's top soap (as much for the poor research as anything else). Not even Phil Mitchell would go from nought to multi-hundred pound binges this fast: "Phil Mitchell on Crack" (just over 5 minutes).

Scientist lady shows us how to cook up gear: "How Much Citric?" Lucky cow: her brown is 70% purity! Oddly we never see her actually do her hit... maybe she got camera shy...

And lastly:

German documentary following a life from teenage addiction to untimely death before the age of 30. The decline in this girl's appearance is truly shocking. "Süchtig: Protokoll einer Hilflosigkeit". Sorry no subtitles; this is here for anyone learning German who's after practice material a little more gripping than Lindenstraße!































Nosey Quiz! Have you ever heard voices when you weren't high on drugs?

Manic Magic

Manic Magic

Gledwood Volume 2: A Heroin Addict's Blog

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