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!

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

A Short Post

YES, this is going to be very short because I'm singularly uninspired. Or to put it another way, yes I did (some of) my "proactive" day. Then fell into a deep sleep. O hang on there was MY DREAM!!

Gotta tell yous all my dream. When I was little we used to go to this huge swimming pool on a weekly basis. My Mum forced me into swimming lessons. I think this was bc my Dad always hated swimming due to a childhood getting pushed into pool experience. And she was determined that I should not be like this. So I spent (what felt like) hours in this pool weeping in the water. Of course, in chlorinated water no-one can see your tears. Oddly after these traumatic swimming lessons I did get to enjoy swimming. But I never ever did the proper strokes as taught.

Anyhow, this pool had a 12.5' deep end with three diving boards. The top one being merely a platform. Only once do I remember jumping off the top. It was like a suicide leap. I went so far down in the water.

The other thing dreamlike about the swimming pool was that if you had goggles on and dove down under the water in the 6' deep area there was this shelf going down to the 12'6" area. I remember trying to swim down it like a shark but obviously I couldn't hold my breath THAT long so had to come up. And nobody hit me on the head, I didn't venture into the middle of the diving area. I wasn't that stupid.

Anyway my dream was very simple, I was trying to climb the ladders to the top board (okay, platform) at this swimming pool and could not quite make it. I trod on something that felt like a cricket ball. And woke up with agonizing cramp in the middle of my foot. As if I'd been trying to pick up said ball in my sleep and my foot had frozen.

Well I'm not sure what this is relevant to really... but there you have it. The only people who've been disturbing my sleep lately are drug dealers. But they don't bother me because I don't pick up the phone. (Usually I couldn't find it in time anyway.)

So I'm saved!

On a temporary basis.

From them? Or from myself.

5 comments:

RUTH said...

You really are having some dreams aren't you.......and remembering them!! ...dream me up the lottery numbers if you can...winning ones that is;
Sleep tight, hope the bees don't bite
Rx

Gledwood said...

Yeah, I'm one of those people who either dreams vividly or barely at all. I don't believe those psychologists & sleep experts who say we dream every night. They mean we go through periods of REM and if awoken can recount some manner of dream. I believe many of these "dreams" are merely us thinking in our sleep. Not really the same thing at all.

& re the bees... There's enough Bumblies buzzing about this time of year. I told you about them, didn't I..?..

Thankfully the weather HAS been cold enough to kill off the nest of wasps that seemed to be situated right next to my eves window. They used to wake up at 4am, get attracted to my light (which was nearly always on) get in through the join in the sash window (a really ancient ricketty one that won't even close properly) and dive-bomb around the lightbulb. I took to keeping maximum-strength cockroach spray out to slay them.

Anonymous said...

I remember reading about dreams of water meaning renewal, new life, change. Especially if the shores can all be seen (which would be the case for a swimming pool!)

Wow, a 12.5 foot deep end! That must have been a great pool. I learned to swim in a pool with a 9' deep end -- and I thought that was deep. I too remember trying to swim down that shelf, and finally losing oxygen and darting upward to the surface. That was so much fun ...

Gledwood said...

Yeah it was a great pool. Guess that's why I still dream about it ...

Is it just me? said...

Hey..you were hanging around my blog the other day for a while and I became inquisitive and came over here for a look.I'll be honest with ya.I didn't think it was for me..until I started to read.You'll probably see loads of comments popping up on old posts and sorry about that.I don't really understand what life is like for you but I think If I keep reading this excellent prose I might, a little.Keep writing

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

Copyright 2011 by Gledwood