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!

Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Wordsmithing

MOTHER HUBBARD read three pages of my memoirs today and kept laughing. But she assured me they weren't written in that dreadful "I'm so witty" try-too-hard mode that certain writers adopt... you know ~ where every single sentence has to be side-splittingly hilarious or a masterpiece of wit or erudition... I'm really not into that... the style I'm into is what I called "rolling" where it just coasts on effortlessly. I did, of course, try to keep things "bouncy" but I have such horror of try-too-hard writing...

Best example I could give of this would be someone like Kathy Lette. Now don't get me wrong she's really witty, really funny. But I find page after page of her straining for this repeated effect pretty exhausting...

My horror of total "novelization" I don't think will have to be realized. "Novelization" is the hallmark especially of ghostwritten autobiographies where a stranger takes one's memories and bends, twists, grinds them mercilessly to fit the attention-grabbing form into which he shoves them. And they fit such a form because all extraneous facts have been sheared off, like crusts cut off a sandwich... I have compromised by including as much dialogue as I can, because this tends to power the narrative forward, but without dropping the artifice that this is me telling my memories in my own voice. So rather than flicking from scene to scene in a cinematic way, you flow from one to another as further memories are evoked ... I hope this makes some sense to someone!

I would print up an extract only time is low on my account... and e.g. the extract Mother Hubbs read was 1000 words long... it takes time to bang that into computer. And I've decided rather than to perfect as I go just to get the entire thing completed in 1st draft as quickly as possible, then to tinker with that at my leisure once I have a complete several hundred pages of manuscript to tinker with...

I've been given a tip for self-publishing a company called Lulu dot com that I'm looking into. I have to say really I want the biggest most powerful publishers to take on my work (because they can give it the strongest push)... if they didn't... then I have this alternative fantasy of printing out my own batch of fairly mini hardbacks and flogging them on myself... oftentimes the big publishers find these self-published books then want to buy out the author with an attractive contract... life is quite perverse in that way!

***

I hearkened to your complaints about too many youtube screens and have now dumped everything extraneous in the cyberbin!

These are today's vids:

1. Robocircus: I still have a Habitrail cage just like that, complete with spiral staircase and round running turret wheel!
2. Pinging Robbies: look how very fast they are!

11 comments:

Nicole said...

Hey! This less videos thing is totally refreshing! I think your writing is the real star anyway!

I'm still at work and counting the minutes before going home. Just half an hour to go!

Anonymous said...

Good on yer!
haha I updated my time
but still don't feel too inclined to tap out that gynormous extract...

jim dandy said...

If you ever (or never) get your novel written, you can follow (or replace) it with the writings from this blog on the making of (or unmaking of) your great novel!
By the way, loved the circus video today! Gotta get me some of them critters some day. I could watch them forever.
Tootles!

david mcmahon said...

It's great to hear that Mother Hubbard enjoyed reading your work.

I hope that means you'll keep going ....

Alexys Fairfield said...

Gleds,
Can't wait to see your novel. I have heard of Lulu. I don't think they can do as much as a big publishing house can do for you. Have you thought about getting a literary agent?

If you want to go global (and why not), it's the way to go.

Liz Hinds said...

Lulu seems to be good. I was interested to hear that Sabine had used it. I've sent my novel out to so many agents I've lost count. I've thought about Lulu but now I think I might try a major rewrite. I had an idea for it when I was on holiday. One day someone will recognise my work for the sheer genius it is ...

raffi said...

"bouncy" is cool. it's amazing how quick those robo's turn that wheel.

Gattina said...

They are really working hard ! And what a noise in that wheel ! I suppose they run in there especially during night ! Do you have dark rings under your eyes ?

I wish you good luck for publishing !

Gledwood said...

Jim: memoirs! Not novel! Though I have done a novel before, too...

David: Oh definitely I have to finish it even if I do nothing else...

Alexys: Oh yeah I definitely want a literary agent. They say big publishers won't even LOOK at your book unless it comes from an agent. It's the agent these days who are guardians of the infamous slushpile!

Gledwood said...

Liz: You have written a novel too! I lose track of how many people have written books... maybe it would be easier to keep a list of those who HAVEN'T written books !! ;->...

Raffi: Hey did you get your hands on them New York robohamsters?

Gattina: I always butter my hammies' wheel that way it is strictly silent. Yes I ALWAYS have dark shadows beneath the eyes. Sometimes people ask who hit me.. (seriously) Gotta finish the thing first... have only done 1.5 chapters of at least 20... wish me luck for when it IS done!

Gleds

Anonymous said...

I think your plan of writing it all first, then revising, is an excellent approach. Otherwise, you can get really bogged down.

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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