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!

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Further to my Earlier Post

YES FURTHER TO MY EARLIER POST, Nicole commented that she didn't know how she could put up with Laundretta & Matran's daily (or more to the point, nightly) played-out soap opera woes, (see below) no matter how addicted she was to anything. Dan said why don't I move out... which I am on a waiting list to do so at some indeterminate future time. When it all started with Matran and Laundretta I was in such a mental state, I barely noticed there was anything unusual about their behaviour. Nowadays I do: however I simply sleep through their bang-crashing, wailing, shrieking and yodelling. None of this is "sexual", incidentally. It is all argument-oriented. Or more to the point Laundretta throwing a tantrum. Earlier on tonight I heard bang-crashes on their floor. Now she claims the man underneath Matran's room is obsessed with her (she seems to think all men are, but there you go). And has claimed he comes out of the bathroom in a shocking state of undress doing shocking things before her. I do not know what to make of this. But they both seem to delight in stomping on the poor guy's ceiling as often as they ... well, remember to ... I think he is mentally ill as much as the rest of us. So there were more bang-crashes on the floor and I hear her desperate voice (desperate she does really well, but she's told me herself she's a first-rate liar. So I watch her now like a poker player. I know her tics.) She was imploring Matran to "get off me; let me go" he must finally have lost patience with her and grabbed her. I smiled to myself and turned back to my reading book: Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It's actually a really good read, despite being "literature". I can kind of relate to the characters in an unusual way.

Sometimes I'm sceptical of "literature". A Midsummer Night's Dream for example: was Shakespeare paid by the schools curriculum authority to write something nonsensical to torment generations of schoolkids with its meaninglessness? And add in characters called Titania and Bottom just so at first glance it seems like it's going to be entertaining..? I love Shakespeare but I loathe that play. I like the big four tragedies and Romeo and Juliet. And I've never seen Cymbeline or The Tempest but would like to.

I saw Valium Marilyn earlier today, she's had bird flu. Well that's what she would have said if only it had come to mind. Common cold is my diagnosis. And hasn't left her couch for three days. "Well at least you've got cable TV (the full-on package as well)." That doesn't make any difference," she claimed. Well it does. Last time I was there for hours we watched Animal Planet practically the whole time. That's why I did without TV for so long by the way. The polar opposite of being sniffy and bourgeois about it, I'd let TV intrude into my every waking (and sleeping) hour. I never used to turn it off. I only had the ghetto version of digital, which in my old room used to work through a £1.99 set-top aerial (less than 30 channels) but you pay £20-£40 now for the box and there's no subscriptions for ever. My televisual fantasy is HD in every room (smallest possible screens for optimum picture quality), Sky satellite plus motorized multi-satellite for foreign plumbed into every room in my fantasy house including the bathroom. In fact in my old life television never got turned off unless there was a power-cut. That's why I threw the failing old telly out and did not replace it. And tried to live via books instead. Which is really hard for someone with no focus. The last novel I read cover to cover (a veritable achievement for me) was The Fingersmith by Sarah Walters. Set in Victorian/whatever London and Berkshire (or somewhere like that ...) well you really want to read it for yourself. Even though it was nominated for a major literary prize it's still a good read (it didn't win though, so they made a mistake nominating it in my view. Only boring books ever get nominated for those prizes.) I like the kind of books people actually read, not leave on glass coffee tables to impress guests...

Well this has tailed off the original point. What was that?? I'm musing on my next project in my mind. Then I will do it. Then I will tell you what it is. When I've finished it. And then life will go on precisely as it had before: because that's what my life always does!!

PS... Except one day it really won't. If I got money behind me the first thing I would do is put myself in private treatment. I'd arrange an anaesthetic detox (which, last time I looked into it, involved flying out to Spain, being put under for three days and waking up with a naltrexone implant that fully blockades all heroin's effects for at least six weeks. Knowing myself well enough and having smoked the stuff while blockaded on Subutex -- no way on earth would I smoke crack in these circumstances. The comedown was horrendous. So that's two drugs dealt with. The last one is alcohol and that's down to me. But then again, on Subutex even that lost most of its appeal. I did still drink, but only one or two cans a day. And I shared my last mouthful with the pavement rather than swallow the liquid Brillo Pads stuff. (Cheap cyder is 49p-59p a can. 500mls at 7.5% ABV. The very cheapest form of alcohol you can get in this country. Without opitates dulling it, the body suddenly becomes prone to hangovers again... no thanks.) So I'd do this private detox. Get the naltrexone implant and use naltrexone pills as follow-up meds in the weeks when the implant has worn off, thus completely blockading myself against heroin for as long as I want. Further to this, part two would already be instigated: I would have left London behind and all the users and dealers I know and I would live somewhere I've always wanted to go. My top three choices in descending order are Berlin, Amsterdam or Paris. People associate Amsterdam particularly with drugs. But if I can't take the drugs I used to like I would be straight. And not everyone in Amsterdam is a junkie. Nicole isn't. All cities have their druggie sides. I would not let that put me off living somewhere I've always always wanted to go. So that's what I would do... or maybe to put it another way. That is what I will do -- soon as I get the chance.

8 comments:

Deb said...

your next project should be to write a book. Cable's highly overrated - we have close to 100 channels - still nothing on. I don't even watch it, I just pay for it.

I find it very amusing that while all this insanity is going on around you, you are reading a book. You deserve to be somewhere better.

Anonymous said...

I might very well write a book...

RUTH said...

A poetry book
Rx

Gledwood said...

A string of novels!

And international bestselling ones at that.

Poetry I would put up for free on the internet...

Deb said...

i'll buy them.

Anonymous said...

Good that's one copy of ea. sold ... OK now roll up roll up a small deposit of £20 secures a signed hardback now, c'mon folks ...

Nicole said...

The stereotype about drugs and Amsterdam exists because of the tourists. You can smoke weed here pretty much anywhere you want but hard drugs are just as frowned upon and this city has the same problems as anywhere else. I'd say they take better care of their junkies here than in most other places.

A lot of people who have come to visit have always asked about the drugs and the hookers, after a walk around town with us they've quickly realised that the hookers are just as ugly here and the only difference is that they stand in tiny windows with a red light above, the red light area is just as gross and seedy as anywhere.

The drugs... same thing. Most of the coffee shop crowds are the tourists who've come here and like it because it's legal, so they're here for the weekend and it's odd that they can light up a joint in a public place. The locals don't bother much with it and if they do, they'll smoke it at home.

Apart from that Amsterdam has beautiful architecture, many little places to discover, a lot of art, everything is walking distance and the summer time is brilliant with everyone spending time outside and sitting around having drinks, dinner and meeting friends.

I still like Australia better because I have issues with the Dutch "culture", I've been here 6 years and find them to be rough, uncouth and at times really rude and egotistical. But your experience of everything is what you make it.

You would do just fine in Amsterdam Gled... If I win the Lotto before you get into the money I'm sending you to Spain immediately.

Kernel said...

---(off topic)--

Friendly hello:
He gives birth that you have become a muddle of languages.
in effect, the language that I use for my personal blog is the Catalan.
but jars he writes-re me in English without problem.
I have visited your block. It is a lot of interessant.Bé, I now go to test the translator Catalan-English of the catalonian government
By the way, the Catalan word for "shit" is "merda".
Saying "a lot of shit" is to wish luck good.
-----------------

Hola amic:
Pareix que t'has fet un lío d'idiomes.
en efecte, la llengua que utilitzo per al meu bloc personal és el català.
però pots escriu-re'm en anglès sense problema.
He visitat el teu bloc. És molt interessant.Bueno, ara vaig a provar el traductor català-anglès del gencat.
Per cert, la paraula catalana per a "merde" és "merda".
Dir "molta merda" és desitjar bona sort.
-----------------

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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