Gledwood Vol 2 (Main blog): Church of the Poison Mind

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!!!

Saturday, July 21, 2007

Church of the Poison Mind

THE LOCAL CHURCH HAS JUST TRIED TO KILL ME, I think. As I strolled past, cyder in hand, I got pulled into their barbecue: "but I've got to go, I've gotta be home in five minutes!" I protested. "This will only take one minute," the man informed me. Gestured to their barbecue. "All free. Take some!" So I had a beefburger. In a bap. With tomato ketchup. Took to munching it on the way back and .. ukk!! Inside was sloppy and raw. And cold. Quite disgusting. I hope I do not get food poisoning from this. "Hygeine", in fact, was the very reason I did not choose anything from their chicken drumstick display. Then I thought back... realized they'd cooked the chicken before the burgers (I'd seen them do it as I passed by earlier) ... so hey-hum. The worst of both worlds. Raw beefburger cooked atop an already chicken-salmonella'd griddle!!

Click here and listen to this. My all time favourite hiphop track.
It is by Obi Trice - "Got Some Teeth" - yeah man. Love dem groovy flavas ...

And the track inspiring this title? By Culture Club from 1983 - click here to view ...

***

SAINSBURY'S ARE NOW DOING "VALUE" fresh mushroom tortelloni: £1.50 for 600g. So I got this and Red Leicester cheese for grating atop. And white cyder and lemonade to wash it down. Those Welshcakes are going to have to wait; I want to know they're going to come out properly or making them will be a waste of time. As I said, I don't have sugar in my kitchen (Matran once got really annoyed when I refused him a "loan" of sugar, disbelieving that anyone could not have it. Why would I? I never drink hot drinks now and don't do baking. So why would I need sugar? Also when I did used to buy it to put in my tea I was using nearly a kilo every week or two which I think is ridiculous (I was drinking a lot of tea and coffee ...)

OK wish me luck I'm off to cook pasta.

BTW international question: what cheese do people eat in North America? I've never in my life come across American cheese ... and seem to recall just once, in a totally isolated incident, coming across Canadian "cheddar" ... what cheeses do you have over there? Does America and Canada really do cheese? If so what is it like and what is it called? I'm fascinated to know ...

12 comments:

Oceanshaman said...: Ouch . . .

My heart goes out to your intestinal tract . . .; 21 July 2007 at 17:39
Anonymous said...: i've not got ill yet though ...; 21 July 2007 at 18:10
Akelamalu said...: After sitting next to someone with the trots on a five hour flight last night I hope the salmonella doesn't get you! :(; 21 July 2007 at 18:22
Empress Bee (of the high sea) said...: hope you are okay gled!

as to what cheese we eat? i love swiss, i hate american cheese, i think that is the only thing american i can say that about! i also like cheddar and brie. i don't usually eat very much cheese though.

smiles, bee; 21 July 2007 at 18:51
Crazed Nitwit said...: cheese: monterey jack(mild white cheese), asiago, parmesan, mozzerella, cheddar, blue cheese, all kinds of strinky french cheese, american cheese is really plastic(or so I tell my boys), swiss cheese,havarti, and on and on. Probably mostly the same as you except for plastic cheese. The state below Washington is Oregon and they are famous for their Tillamook cheese and ice cream. Wisconsin(middle north of country) is almost very famous for it's cheese.

Why did the church serve raw meat? ICK. Any meat I eat better be well done.

Pasta...YUMMERS; 21 July 2007 at 22:13
Anonymous said...: akelamalu: do you know what, the nearest i've come to horsetrots so far today is that sloppy white munched up fermenting grass flavoured Brie cheese. Ukk! It is the premium quality one (they even do "value" Brie now) ... it WAS half price, however. Maybe this means they knew it was going off ..?

Nothing, as I say, has given ME the horse-trots yet though ...; 22 July 2007 at 00:09
Anonymous said...: Empress: so do you mean most of the "speciality" cheese like Brie, Stilton, Double Gloucester, Cammembert, Jarlesberg, Danish Blue is imported from England, France and so on and the standard cheddary stuff is home made?

I agree with you about well-done meat. I've never been into pink steaks. I like my meat incinerated. ESPECIALLY when bbq'd - isn't that the point? Smoky incineration ...? Surely!; 22 July 2007 at 00:11
Audrey said...: Oh dear burger sounded yukk, hope your not ill after eating it.

Catching up as always,your description of the streets of London made me smile, have to say I never feel comfortable when I visit my daughter, she lives in the finsbury park area, but loved walking up Brick Lane all those curry houses lol As for cheeses I love all the smellies especially Gorgonzola.

Delighted and relieved you still have a roof over your head.. :); 22 July 2007 at 00:18
Bimbimbie said...: ugh! .... beware churchman bearing uncooked meat *!*; 22 July 2007 at 01:02
Liz Hinds said...: Welshcakes hot off the griddle are just the closest thing to heaven. Do make some. Shall I post you some sugar?

It was probably the cyder that did it. The church saw that as a sign that you were a needy person and dragged you in to save your body and then your soul. (No, that's unfair of me; they probably meant well.)

the tortellini sounds good.; 22 July 2007 at 21:20
Nicole said...: I am all curious about Welshcakes now... must look up a recipe. I plan on opening a cake shop one day and need good recipes that are somewhat traditional and that people have made at home or recipes that run in their family. If your Welshcakes turn out well mail me the recipe and they'll be Gledwood's Welshcakes in my shop one day.; 23 July 2007 at 12:54
Anonymous said...: Of course America does cheese, you goose! While undergoing chemo, I developed an aversion to cheese that I haven't gotten over (yet?). Before that, though--swiss, cheddar, mozzarella, cream cheese, edam, Monterrey Jack. Wait. This is making me nauseated.; 26 July 2007 at 18:01

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.

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!