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!

Sunday, May 17, 2009

And Now There's Only One!

BASHFUL TROTTERDONKEY ROBOROVSKI IS DEAD! The virus finally got her. She died on Friday but I wasn't around to post it. Spherical alerted me to the strangeness by determinedly moving nest from under the cod-in-parsley-sauce box under their wheel to under the chewed out chocolate fingers box. It is quite odd to see such a tiny creature behaving so purposefully. Grabbing mouthfuls of self-chewed bedding material and scampering to a new nest that's getting more and more luxuriously padded by the minute. Something suspiciously two-toned harvesty-coloured and white caught my eye and then I realized it was Bashful looking very dead and very bashed up. Imagine a dead cat that's been through a washing machine spin cycle and you're on the right track. I was wondering what on earth had prompted her into that corner when Spherical very officiously grabbed her dead housemate by the scruff and dragged her bodily halfway across the tank and into the her new bedding, where she took to preening her fur (not too successfully it has to be said as poor dead Bashful still looks like she's been dragged through several hedges backwards).

I was wondering whether this is some sort of strange roborovski death ritual, keeping the late cagemate in bed. So I did an experiment and moved Bashful back to where I'd found her only for Spherical to grab her once again and determinedly drag her back ~ within a few minutes.

Last night, Spherical was moving nest yet again. Sure enough poor Bashful had vanished from under the chocolate fingers box, round several very inconvenient (by roborovski standards) cage obstacles and into the cod in parsley sauce box. I took Bashful out yet again and hid her in the furthest corner. This just so happened to be at the far entrance to a very long and narrow tube that originally held a roll of clingwrap. Imagine my shock to witness Spherical grabbing poor Bashful by the back leg and hauling her right through this long, thin tube right back to the new nest again!

I didn't have the heart to remove the body when Spherical seems to enjoy "looking after it" so. I was thinking maybe in the wild, because they do of course live in burrows, they do make a special nest for dead housemates and let them rot into the ground right there.

Tomorrow I'm having the official funeral, next to Itchy in Mother Hubbard's strawberry patch. My Mum says Spherical, who came out on cue and started rambling ostentatiously on her wheel, is very pretty. She even let me stroke her without feigning horrific shock, pinging away and hiding under the cardboard sill of a box from where, when she's so inclined, she would glare at me with the most baleful black beady eyes I've ever seen.

One left! Poor Spherical ~ all on her own. I hope yous all had a good weekend... Evening all!!

15 comments:

Akelamalu said...

I'm so sorry to hear about bashful Gleds. :(

Naomi C. said...

:( all i can do it offer a typical internet *hugs* i am casting my mind back to 2004 when my sister was 19 and we buried her hamster "hammy" at a very moving funeral service which 5 of us attended; her, me, her social worker, her partner and her best friend. we actually had a short service planned out and even sung all things bright and beautiful... she was crying (she was so attached to this hamster) and while her partner and social worker were supporting her, i had to lead the song with my dreadful voice. urgh. the embarrasment, being watched by mr cook next door as he attended his veg patch. anyway, my sister has never been able to have a hamster since that devestated her so much.

i meant to reply to you before but yes, I have been diagnosed as manic depressive. overall, i am very unsatisfied with my diagnosis. it took years of being a junkie (i was in psychiatric care from 13-15 before i became a heroin user) to get them to relook at my existing problems. I was diagnosed as having PTSD (finding my dads decomposing corpse) and chronic depression then when I was 15, they called me manic depressive instead of CD. When I turned junkie, I was discharged from therapy for using drugs and they kept the PTSD label but were unable to determin anything else because I used heroin. So really, I was just an apathetic junkie in their eyes. God, some of them don't realise you take drugs because of your mental illnesses, not you have a mental illness because you are using drugs. Do i make sense? prob not!

i am so wondering what you look like. i am trying to picture this ultra intelligent, hamster-loving, clued-up, streetwise london-dwelling geeza!

Jeannie said...

Ahhh. How sad. How long are they expected to live? Are they dying too soon?

Nicole said...

So sorry Gled! Two in such a short time is awful.

Baino said...

Sad news Gleds. Maybe you should get another as company for Spherical?

Queenneenee said...

Sorry about your lil furry friend. I hope you are doing ok, keep your chin up!

Lone Grey Squirrel said...

Sorry about Bashful. Still, it is not good for Spherical to be alone. Will you be getting some new Robos?

Gledwood said...

Thanks for the messages; I have to get back later before THIS COMPUTER TERMINATES ME!!

WAT said...

AW! BASHFUL is gone! :(

Janice Seagraves said...

I'm sorry to hear about Bashful, it's hard to loose a pet.

Janice~

kellylebelly said...

Sorry to hear the news. Can't believe it. Are you going to get Spherical any more pals to keep company?
Do you know if it was the same thing that killed her?
What animals do with their dead can be very moving.

I hope you are ok. You did all you could for them.
big hug, take care
xx Kelly xx

Naomi I totally agree with your comment 'some of them don't realise you take drugs because of your mental illnesses, not you have a mental illness because you are using drugs.' I'm afraid I'm finding I hate feeling 'normal'. It's scary and vulnerable. I like my warm cocoon, then I feel I can deal with just about anything.
you take care too x

Vincent said...

I'm sorry to read about your loss Gled. It's sad. Now there is only one left :-/

Will you get another one for company?

All the best,

V.

Syd said...

Oh no, not another death. I had hoped Bashful would recover. So sorry...

Sarcastic Bastard said...

Gleddy,
I am catching up on some blog reading today, and what baleful news! This makes my sad day EVEN SADDER.

Much love and sympathy to you and poor little Spherical!

Death is cruel.

Love,

SB

Sweden said...

sorry to hear about yer lovely pets dying, and yeah maybe u should get the remaining cutie a friend..??

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