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, May 08, 2007

Hair Cut!

PASCAL OWED ME £10 so I went to his parents' lovely carpeted, oriental be-rug'd driftwood, pot-pourri fine glassware bourgeois home where he inhabits an attic he says he converted himself into a wonderful room in just three months of fulltime labour. He didn't admittedly install the windows (who would? By themself??) or the radiators (trained plumber's job) or the bare pine floorboards (which had already been laid in anticipation of the space's use) but all else he did do; including the cupboardified walls, all the plastering, and every fitting. He did a wonderful job and I'm not surprised he doesn't want to move out. We sat there, got stoned watching Aljezeera TV on his new Sky system (so much better than cable!!)

Because we've had no hot water in my place for over a fortnight and because I've no washing machine chez moi, Pascal let me use his power shower plus washed all my clothes for me. I emerged feeling cleaner than I have done in weeks. Then he sat me down on a scarlet three-legged stool, and in seconds snipped my horribly overgrowing hair as short as I like it. I'm so grateful to Pascal for all he did. Don't know why I let my hair grow so much. With glasses on, I was getting to look like Weird Al. My hair can go horribly curly but it looks straight now. Once, some years ago, when I was at Nutnut's house, we did my hair with Sun-in. It looked a little like Madonna's in some of my vidblogclips. Artificially brightened. Nutnut knew of a place you can go where trainee "hair technicians" cut-colour-perm-relax-braid and otherwise treat in any way you like male and female hair of all descriptions. After my standard cut (which cost about £3!) they did a strand test for colouring it. Some minutes later a red-faced girl puffed back demanding "what have you put on your hair?" "Why?" I asked; "What do you mean?" "When we added a test drop of the chemicals to that sample of hair you gave us, it melted and smoke started coming out of it," she explained. "If we'd have put that straight on all your hair would have dissolved at the roots and turned to jelly and fallen off and you'd probably have a scalpfull of blisters. So whatever that product was you lightened it with before, it's badly damaged your hair. Don't use it ever again. Just let it grow out naturally." Which is what I did. And I have not touched "Sun In" (6% peroxide spray) ever since. Imagine if we had used some home product (as Nutnut was often wont to do ...) and my hair actually had melted and slid off my head. I'd have gone nuts ...

The Video Blog is coming along superbly. Presently it's nearly all musical "offerings" ... but I will get to posting other stuff up. Though presently it is following my own interests more (hornets-hamsters-Sinead O'Connor) some rare gems are up there already. Do drop by, please, inform me what you think of the new decor there...

... & I'm taking requests, please. Anything you wanna see -- just tell me ...

***

Someone from critiquemyblog.blogspot has promised me a critical write-up. Let's see what they say ...

2 comments:

Deb said...

Gled, this is so weird and no word of a lie here. I just returned home from Shopper's Drug Mart and when I was there I took my usually gander at the "clearance" table. I noticed a bottle of "Sun In" and considered buying it....I used to use it a lot when I was young. I didn't buy it though, thought I'd let the sun naturally lighten my hair (as it does). But, honestly, I haven't thought of Sun In in twenty years and now I see it in the store on the same night that you mention it!? I hear the Twilight Zone music now.

Also...for my request on your vidblog - Oasis. I know you like them and I do too...I'd like to see some of them on there.

Anonymous said...

Friends like that are worth more than rubies!

Interesting story about the hair stuff. I used that sun-in stuff back in the late '80s once and yes, it made my hair brittle and crack. That was when my hair was long, so it was a big deal. Last summer I had it dyed blond, professionally on a whim, and it was much better.

I like the Madonna link (although I have problems watching it -- my firewall again). Maybe some homemade vids? Can you get your hands on a camera for a day??

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