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, March 12, 2009

Nourishment

I'VE HAD YUMMIE ROAST BEEF DINNERS three days in a row now. This is a great advantage of living in England among what the French call "les Roast Beefs" ~ you can get frozen ready boil-in-bag roast beef or lamb in gravy, along with ready-crisped roast potatoes, Yorkshire puddings (which I eat as snacks. They start off like a small cookie, rise and are done perfectly at 200C in 20 mins) or la crème de la crème: Iceland's own Crispy Potatoes, which are diddly roast potato bits "in a light batter" (which you'd never notice due to't immense crispiness) and... oh my Mamma Mia with broccoli-cauliflower-carrots selection frozen veg it's heavenly!

Is it true you Americans cannot buy add-hot-water gravy mix in your Walmart-type supermarkets?? If not then wow. I've eaten so well this weak ~ pub lunch every day ~ it's unbelievable.

Now while I'm ont subject I must apologize for't Northern Accent all't week long. I can't help it, me mind's bin brainwashed ter-wards it..

So from now on Majesterial Queen's English prevails...

Oh while we're on the subject (ON THE SUBJECT, note well, not "ONT SUBJECT"!) Iceland now do one of my all=time favourite bakery items (I can't call 'em cakes because they're not) ~ that is caramel chocolate shortbread slices... 7 for £1 yummMEE! Today I got on special offer for £1 2xpacks of Fox's Malted Milk Creams. I luurve malted milk, it goes ultra-well dipped into British Rail-style tea I like to make. Caramel Coloured drink so strong the spoon "stands up in it" as my mother used to say...

Now as for drug addiction "news" there is none. I keep fantasizing about taking a day off and making that the beginning of a life free totally of drugs... somehow somehow this just does not happen...

And I don't know why, because this never used to be the case, but I feel nervous and uptight before going to antidrug meetings and just want to get out as soon as possible.

I've yet to be tortured right through the end of this false memory therapy multiple personality psychotest I'm stuck into. I dread to consider the results... My poor little Trotters might have to go without an owner/ feeder/someone to poke them with a chopstick when I'm permanently sectioned and tied to a chair in a Victorian lunatic asylum on receipt of copper-plated Indian inked handwritten con-damnation!

I don't know what else to say except a caramel-dark shot of morphia is all that can soothe these itchy unpleasantnesses... the same unpleasantness from which I so long to be freed. But how can I ever enjoy a roast beef dinner again? or face a day? or force self under cold needle-sharp dawn shower? without hardcore opiates dulling my system? How am I ever to cope with life on its own short terms, let alone quirks I lob into the kettle of fish!? Of this I've no idea at all!

... As purloined from David Tellez's blog...

20 comments:

Dad and Mom said...

Hi,

I see you like your meals. That is good, food is a welcome distraction for anything. Now as far as getting meals and food from Walmart supermarkets, no self respecting cook in the US expects to get good freash food from Walmart.

But if you want something quick you can pick up, you have never had anything as good as Kansas City Bar-Be-Que. But if you want to fix your own there is nothing like 14 hours of smoking ribs and brisket over a low heat smokey real wood fire.

If you have the guts google Kansas City Bar-be-que and you will be planning your trip soon just for lunch.

Jeannie said...

I'm in Canada and we do get Bisto as well as some other similar gravy mixes if that's what you're talking about - and that is available even at our puny discount grocery that has little selection in general compared to the big superstores. I make yorkshires from scratch because it's simple - but it also makes quite a lot and takes 40 minutes so you are fortunate to have "instant" ones. There are many frozen heat and serve meats but I regret that lamb doesn't seem to be one of them. Not that I buy much processed food. My husband would. Lamb is very expensive here as it is not a common meat for most people and is almost always frozen. Pork, beef, and chicken are the main ones.

Gledwood said...

Dad&Mom: Thanks for that... When I DO go to the States I wanna experience how the REAL people live...

Jeannie: I wasn't sure they even HAD Yorkie pudz in Canada..! The beef I get is like school dinners or pub lunch ~ ie roast but ultra-thinly sliced like you'd never be able to do at home... They don't have (cheap) lamb in Canada? How odd. Pork's my "bete noir" ~~ I hate it!

Liz Hinds said...

That poor dog! Doesn't he look embarrassed?


Packet gravy. My work colleagues tease me about that because I'm a gravy-snob. They were discussing packet mixes and I said, in my best Queen Victoria voice, 'Packet gravy?!'

Lone Grey Squirrel said...

I never understood the popularity of Yorkshire puddings but perhaps I never ate anything but cafeteria and British Rail type fare.

Reeny's Ramblin' said...

Nuthin compares to homemade gravy NUTHIN. However, when in doubt there is Bisto. When I was over there last year I had the best roast dinner ever known to man and it was in a pub. WHODATHUNKIT. I guess that's how ya'll roll over yonder, two thumbs up you guys are rad ;)

Gledwood said...

Liz: aye he does that! Talking of Queen Victoria have you seen't new film yet?

LoneGrey: industrial Yorkshire puddings aren't much good really; it's only int' last 20 years anyone but chavs would've bothered wi' 'em. You're sporst to mek own int' bowl and pour int tut moulds then (way I mek 'em any road) they bluster up into nuclear mushroom cloud shape (and sized) explosions...

Reeny/Eileeen: rad, aye!

Whitenoise said...

Gled- don't try to start a life free of drugs. Try to have ONE day free of drugs. Then, maybe try to make it TWO days. The drugs will always be there to go back to. Even after 20 years clean and sober- you can go back to your current life ANYTIME.

Reeny's Ramblin' said...

R-A-D-I-C-A-L ;) Aye.

Crushed said...

I think I'll do a post in Brummie one day, that'll really annoy people...

I dow think yis should beat yisself up about the scary ass shit these scary psychodudes is putting in yis head. It's early dies, dudes, and yis ownly jus beginin.

Akelamalu said...

Good to hear you're still eating well Gleds.

Our dog used to run in his sleep, though he never actually got up and ran into a wall! I suppose it proves that dogs dream. :)

Syd said...

We have gravy mix stuff over here. I'd rather make gravy from the pan juice though. Too much instant this and that IMO. Le bouef is okay by me.

Lou said...

Wow, what was wrong with that dog?
Nightmares??

Memoirs of a Heroinhead said...

Instant solution for a drug free life: hold your breath for 4 minutes.

Another great post Gledwood... you make food seem so appetizing. God, what the french are missing out on!

Take care & if you survive
4 minutes try 5.

Anonymous said...

WHITENOISE: that's right!

REENY: aye, yer not wrong!

CRUSHED: gor on then, lad!

AKELAMALU: definitely they do, cat's too...

Anonymous said...

SYD: I wonder why somene got back to me months ago totally bemused by my talk of packet gravy?... I thought "poor Americans, do they have fresh potatoes there too?!" (for you can take nothing for granted...)

LOU: for sure!

HEROINHEAD: cheers, but surely French cooking trumps hell out of British...

Memoirs of a Heroinhead said...

French cooking trumps british... that all depends on who's cooking it.

Actually, outside of restaurants we eat pretty much the same. Frozen food is international. For a working french family the kids will come home to burger and chips or pasta with a shit sauce... ok, theres no yorkshire puds... so we have snails. It's almost the same. ;)

Gledwood said...

a myth exploded! no way! i'm white in the face and fainting as we speak...

Baino said...

I'm with Liz, packet gravy indeed! Awful stuff and frozen dinners? Get some fresh into you! And yes, try a day at a time. I thought you were going a couple of days on meth and rationing the smack . . are you using every day? Maybe you should get out more . . distractions et al.

Gledwood said...

JACK: thanks for saying hi yer welcome any time ;->...

BAINO: frozen's far better than canned. think of those frozen paeleolithic gentlemen in near perfect condition, now imagine a man tinned in 3500BC ~ which would be better preserved? hence I go for frozen every time... aye I know I'm meant to get out more but it only throws me into a world full of addicts and dealers, know what I mean..?

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?

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