AKH! ALCOHOL. Alcohol alcohol. I've drunk past a week's worth of alcoholic units in the past 24 hours. Her Majesty's Chief Medical Officer suggests I may safely drink 28 units, that's 280mls neat alcohol, in the course of a week. (Never a day.) Today I've had past 30, that's 300mls neat alcohol. 4 litres of white cyder. Akh. I am not proud.In my youth drink was the most boring drug known to man. (That is: known to me.) Never in a million years was I tempted to knock back spirits (or even beer) in the day. Even down the bar I was as happy with lemonade as beer. Alcohol-free beer was good for me. Strangely, the student bar didn't stock that one...
My point being: I was never much of a drinker. Yeah: I got drunk a couple of times. Cross-eyed and unable to walk drunk. Stomach scrubbed out with a Brillo pad because you haven't eaten all day and don't know how to take care of yourself drunk.
The worst hangover I ever had didn't correct itself for three days. I drank a lot of cyder that night.
(Cyder becomes a recurring theme.)
I only got into drink because I thought I needed Dutch courage to beg passers-by for money. My sign said "HUNGRY PLEASE HELP." I made sure I never ate before I went begging, so my sign was in every way true. I never ate in those days until last thing at night. One meal a day. I thought skeletal looked good. Looking back at nasty snapshots I looked like crap.
Of course I was begging because I was broke. I was broke because I was on heroin. Drink and heroin made ready partners. Right from the beginning my Big Complaint about gear was that it was no longer doing it for me.
That was a big reason I put myself into rehab. I didn't appreciate just how much gear actually did until I took it away. Then I started to fall apart in an ugly way. Then I ran screaming back to the gear and all its fluffy cosiness.
And that was why I could never tolerate methadone. A friend once told me 60mg was equivalent to a £10 bag IV. At the time I thought: Nah, 60mg's worth way more than that. The druggieclinic give out 10mg to equate £10 gear (0.2g) as standard. But that's ridiculous. All these years later I can accept: my friend was right. When the gear was good, I could barely hold myself on 100mg. That was without a script ie I had no double habit. I would sweat heavily, even go into cramps on methadone at "high doses".
The methadone I bought came in the form of Physeptone pills. There was no question of anybody interfering with it. (Street-bought "juice" is very often watered, if only slightly.)
It wasn't until this Great Heroin Drought that methadone ever held me properly. Certainly better than the crap-arse gear going around a few weeks ago. Way better.
So as heroin's hold has faded, alcohol's has tightened. And I want out. I need out. I've had enough of intoxicating substances. It's time to go it alone.
I don't know how I'll do it, but it's time.
18 comments:
The big part is admitting you want to reduce your intake, wishing you lots of willpower for 2011 Gleds*!*
I'm also not a drinker. Since i became addicted to opiates, i couldn't stand alcohol anymore. I have no idea why, but i almost throw up if i try to drink. I'm only able to drink something alcoholic when it tastes good. If it tastes too much like alcohol, i can't drink it. It has to really taste good. I also don't like the way alcohol makes you feel and i absolutely hate the hang over the next day.
I have no idea why so many people feel so bad on methadone. Or why i feel so good on it. But it just love it. It totally gave me my life back. No depressions, no anxiety, no weight gain, no sweating, no laziness and no dope sickness. In fact, it makes me feel happy and cozy. I'm able to do everything i want.
Working is no problem at all. Of course, i have not a physically demanding job. I'm only sitting in front of the computer, doing graphics, flash movies and other flash content and things like that. Also, i'm working at home. I work for the same company since 2004 now. My bf works there also, but he works all day and at the company, not at home. It's a completely normal job though, only that i work from at home mostly. I'm only at the company for meetings, or when i get a new project. But the main work is done from at home.
I'm able to fully concentrate all day long, without a problem. At the end of a project, it's pretty stressful. Before the holidays, on December 22, i worked from 9am until midnight. I only stopped to go dosing. I worked that long because i had to be done before the holidays. Normally i'm working from 9am to 1pm or 2pm.
Since i'm on methadone, it's gotten a lot easier to work. When i was still shooting up morphine, my work performance suffered. Because i was getting sick so fast and was feeling bad most of the time. That totally changed since i'm on methadone.
What can i say, it just works for me. I know that i doesn't work for many. A lot of people say that methadone sucks for them. I was feeling like shit on morphine instead. I'm so much more happy now.
Sorry for the long comment. I'll answer all your questions on my blog. But i didn't manage to get it all done today. I noticed that i will need more time for it. So don't be mad please?
In case we don't "see" each other anymore today online, i wish you a great 2011!
Take care,
Mina ;)
I want to cut it out altogether. I think it would be easier to just stop drinking now than to try and drink a little bit. I used to be able to drink as little or as much as I liked. However much I drank it felt like my own decision. Now I feel like it's going out of control. That's why I so much want to stop. Also that doctor told me to stop ALL drink, ALL drugs. He did say I don't have to stop drinking for good. It's a diagnostic thing.
The fact that you actually WANT to stop Gleds cheers me. You will do it I know it.
Wishing you Good Health and Happiness for 2011 and the strength to get clean.
Much love and Reiki blessings to you. x
You've been given good advice, love. I drink quite as much as is good for me but I proved to myself that I can both cut down and stop, a year ago. Having proved it for a month, I started again.
Cheap booze is less satisfying as well as being full of additives and nastiness. If it's too hard to stop, buy less, but better. But I reckon you're at the stage you can quit.
You seem to be finding a truth that many of us have.
It's my experience that once I've broken the lines of addiction, and become an alcoholic (addict), no chemical substance (alcohol or drug) is safe in any quantity as either will set off the terrible land slide.
If you do, get some blues or something.. don't just stop!
You know the score with alcohol wd's
Hope your ok otherwise..
I love Mina's comment because it's so positive hopeful and true. Four litres of cider is one huge headache Gleds. Baby steps, just reduce it a little and you won't feel the guilt or feel so bad.
I'm echoing the thoughts of the above readers.
I was a major boozer in my younger days, always passed out some dance floor & pretty anorectic.My friends got me into cocaine and at that time I loved it,but I was already a noisy guy that talked too much.
Your determination is inspiring, we support you, Gledwood.
j.
I'm sure you can o it Gledwood. Would AA or another support group help?
cyder?? i thought u drank the cheap white "cider"? sorry to be a bore but i've got an ocd thing about spellings. i'm not far off carrying a red pen in my pocket and correcting it haha x
Mina: Your comment crossed my answer which is why I haven't answered you till now... so methadone suits you far more. I HAVE met other people like you but they seem to be in the minority. As I say I always used to find heroin FAR stronger. E.g. a tiny bit on top of 100mg methadone went WHOOSH straight in to fill the gaps methadone left empty and I felt it all day. Even though the "experts" thought I shouldn't feel anything much, I felt a LOT. I'm OK with metadone now but still want to get OFF it ASAP!
Akelamalu: thank you. I cannot go on drinking I really will turn into a rusty old alcoholic.
Z: I hink I'm going to have to switch brands. At the moment I make alcopops, mixing White Star/White Ace with Sun Exotic Tropical Fruit. The mix is TOO NICE to stop!! Barcardi Breezer standard, yet way cheaper. Maybe I'll switch to premixed Smirnoff
Jess: Alcohol actually has long given me more than a buzz than heroin ever did. Heroin was NICER, alcohol has more dopamine rush when you knock it back and that's the feeling I like, the buzz you get from more more more. I used to be able to moderate my drinking even though I WANTED to drink as much as I did, now I don't WANT to drink as much as I do, yet I drink MORE!
Sid: you know what I hadn't considered doing it that way. Switching to Valium and rapid (1-week) taper... I was going to do an alcohol taper. Maybe Valium would be better. It is after all what clinics use (OK it's often another benzo but Valium would definitely do the trick.
I've had enough bad experience cutting out substances cold turkey. If doing that is going to send me through the roof and have drs asking me if I want to be in hospital, it's not worth it!!
Baino: I only drank about 1.5 litres today. On 4 I start feeling ill at the end and beginning of the day. On 1.5 I'm alright. So I can drop to 1.5 in one go, then I have to take it steady from there...
Taffeta: cocaine! I was never into snorty coke it didn't do it for me. For what they got compared to the money I thought people were being ripped off.
Jams: I got advised to go to AA but have only been to 2 meetings about 5 years ago. I should try it again. NA I know more about and always felt more one of the group. Whereas AA-drinkers had taken their addiction further than me, at NA I was as bad as everyone else, so I preferred NA. I've got the AA Big Book in e-form (which I don't like but it's better than nothing). There HAS to be a meeting near me. I'll google it in a sec
Anon: "cyder" is an affectation of mine. Like spelling "connexion" with an X; they're spellings listed in my old Chambers dictionary as variants and I thought "why not..?"
A FANTASTIC 2011 TO YOU ALL!!!
Good luck with coming off all the stuff this year. Just you without anything that alters who you are.
Howdy Gleds.
Booze and speed was my favourite combo by far. I loved shrooms, LSD and the few times I had E but drinking for 3 days straight while blasting speed every few hours was the ultimate drug experience.
BTW, you mentioned £10 for 0.2g.
It's about $50 a point here or the bulk rate of $150 for 0.4gm.
The exchange rate puts your currency at about 1.52: £1.00 = $AUD 1.52. Heroin is very expensive here!
From 1996-1999, tens of thousands took up heroin because of the price and it was trendy at the time. This is also when I started. Then, at the end of 2000, it all dried up for a year or so but eventually went back to 1995 levels. The "new" addicts kicked the habit and the hard core junkies remained doing what they always did.
Before the so called "drought" or during the good times(1996-2000), it was $160-$250 for 0.5gm. Usually it was $200 for 0.5gm if the quality was good otherwise a bit cheaper. From 1996-2000, the quality was excellent but it is now about half or a third of what it once was. Back then, 0.5gm gave me 2-3 shots but now my usual dose is 0.4gm. So a $200 a day habit would now be about $450. No wonder so many people quit or went on methadone!
BTW, I have never seen brown heroin!
Yeah, imn rehab they use diazepam, lorazepam, chlordiazepoxide and librium.
Although any benzo will do!
Just be careful, dont do it too fast, if your serious then an alcohol taper whilst titrating with a benzo is probably the best idea.
Remember acute alcohol wd can cause grand mal seizures and even death in sever cases...
Get some high dose vitamins too, they give IV vitamins in rehab to alcoholics!
Carbamazapine is also good, you can use clonodine if you can get hold of any to reduce wd symtoms and get soem folic acid/thiamin
Also I read somewhere about reducing the possibility of brain damage in really sever cases they use NMDA antagonists or calcium antagonists
Hope your ok, thinking of u
Syd: ... but you know what the problem was? The drugs, esp. heroin made me feel more together and more "me"... without drugs I go spinning all over the place and nothing adds up as if a single person had done it all. Which I find confusing. I don't know why, I don't know what it is, I cannot explain it
Terry: that's REALLY expensive. I heard Aussie gear was average 60% or even 70% purity in the late 90s. Here it was average 40% or slightly higher, but a weighed gram was £30 up until about a couple of years ago, when £30 started getting 0.8g but it's still called a "gram". Despite the supposed Afghan heroin glut prices rose here in the last few years. Probably because gear was flooding more heavily into other Asian countries. It could be that 2/3 Afghan gear is used in Asia, 1/3 in Europe. They do make H4 in Afghanistan but you hardly ever find it here. In early 2009 reports of it showing up increased but for some reason it fizzled out. Anyone who knows their stuff would prefer H4 over H3. But H3 is the norm here. Very irritating, but that's the case. I resented having no choice in the end, when I realized how badly the acidification had damaged my veins. I used to do 2 or more usually 3 shots to a half gram so the same as you but yours would have been on average 50% stronger and SO much more expensive! I was using an average 0.6 to 1.2g a day for years. Cutting below 0.6 I found difficult, except when I was set on going to rehab. I was given extra meds in both cases which certainly isn't standard. Unlike the other "clients" I was on principally heroin, then drink... crack came in only once or twice a month in little bits. I only got into crack about 4 years into my habit, because I was living with crackheads. I'd get offers of pipes out of the blue. Of course I took them but crack is not good!
Thanks for that info. It's quite hard to find information like that online, especially as Bluelight seem to have a thing against naming prices... I've no idea why, when they're published in newspapers! The papers, of course, seem to exaggerate... But you know what the media's like. On the one hand working girls on the street get "a pittance"... on the other they're doing £100+ on gear and crack every day. Hardly a pittance!
How much methadone are they into giving then? Here they gave 40-60mg, but would up it past 70,80,90, 100 or higher. But they liked to say 10mg was worth £10 heroin 0.2g... they never seemed to take into account the method of ingestion. Smoking from foil is just over half as strong as injecting, smoking heroin on a crack pipe is piteously weak. But the clinic don't seem to know or at least care. They were massively overprescribing to my crackhead housemates who I never ever saw (except one, once) look intoxicated on heroin. Far as I could tell their crack pipe smoking just puts the taste of brown in your mouth, that's it!
Sid: you know I was drinking 10 years but I cut it down a lot. Before I came off the gear I was using within normal people's levels, ie about 2 cans a day 7.5 units. Which is about double the recommended max but not really bad. Since the gear got weak and I gave up the level crept up as high as it's ever been. I hate drinking that much. When it gets really high I get blackouts which is not waht I want at all. today I got Librium but only enough for 12 hours. I'm supposed to redose every 4 hours. I can barely feel anythig off it, which would imply it's certainly not too much!
I heard Marmite's good as it's full of B-vitamins. I'd rather eat Marmite than pop yet more pills, even if they are just B-complex.
Thanks for all those details :-)
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