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, February 20, 2011

Clean Clothes

BY TOMORROW MORNING I shall have an entire set of clean dry clothes. The present ones I have on smell like they've been through a well seasoned sandwich toaster. I put a load of smalls through the sink with three doses of lemon washing up liquid. It's on the radiator as we speak. The other stuff was there anyhow; I just didn't know.

I get money tomorrow. I need to buy a charger and a chip to phone my Dad free of charge. I lost the old chip when I wasn't even on drugs (I remember that bit clearly; neither was I drunk but I spilled water on my phone and went so mental trying to dry it out that the SIM lept out and installed itself between a pane of glass and my seat on the bus. The pane of glass is there because the bus is British and they want to cause more serious injuries in the event of a crash. Well why else would glass be on a bus; not on a window?)

And I have to buy socks. Dark ones without heels and toes busted through.

I just spoke to my Dad and his side of the family. That worked better than antipsychotics. But I've taken the antipsychos again to be a good boy in time for Dr NutNut on Thursday. I need to look all responsible. I stopped taking them because I had side-effects that were drastically horrible. Something like a drowsy brain-fog where lights glared into my head making me want to lie in a darkened room (yet not sleepy-drowsy so you just suffer it out till the pill wears off). So I canned the pills and was so high (on "life", not any drug) by the time I had confirmation that I should take the entire dose at once, as in week one that I took no antipsychotics. Then I got tired but was still on a high. Then the high just wore off, just under a week ago, on Monday afternoon. And ever since then I've been pissed off. I'd rather say pissed off then depressed. I hate the word depression. I never know when I do or don't have it except afterwards (when I usually did have it) somehow some sort of denial confuses me. Henceforth I shall attempt not to be confused.

I'm not taking heroin because heroin stops me being high (might as well be frank). I'm dreading going to the doctor because the doctor will also want to stop me being high. Last time I really started going high on antipsychotics I felt really weird, so maybe I'd better get used to feeling weird (I got used to being weird long ago, I just didn't feel it).

I cured my depression with drink. It antidepressed me enough to pick the phone up for social reasons and to get clothes washed. I think my doctor should prescribe cherry flavour 4.7% ABV cyder for medicinal reasons (joke).

Meet the Fockers has been on at least four times today. They keep talking about something called a Jimmy Changa. What the hell is that? I thought it was a cocktail but it gives Bernie Focker (Dustin Hoffman) most terrible wind. Roz Focker (Barbra Streisand) said so by accident on their answerphone message.

And now I'm vanishing into the night like a tired moth that's just taken 2x2mgs of chemical cosh. Sleep well. Or GET OUT OF BED (if you're in Australia).


Illustrated: Indonesian owl moth

11 comments:

Naomi C. said...

I just got 3grand backdated and i put 2grand to natwest to pay off my student overdraft i spunked in about 3 weeks on heroin and my heroin pals. with the spare grand i am going to buy a washing machine for sure... i take my washing to my 85 y/o nanna at the moment and that makes me feel rotten as she washes, dries and irons it!!! im trying to find out what furniture to buy to do my house, i try and go with themes but it just ends up looking mismatched. im still cleaning it out, bathroom kitchen living room is needle free and perfect, just the bedroom to go. oh, and im chucking out the cooker because its so caked in fat i cant clean it. this is weird to have money and pay off an od (it was costing me up to 50quid a month interest) and have it sititng there and not using it. od od odd. im still not smoking, using and i have gone a full 30hours wihout alcohol- which is the worse, i have drunk so many teapots of tea i feel like im going to puke.

when i tried citalopram, for the first 2 or 3 days i had bad headaches so stopped. then a few weeks later took them again repeat, repeat. you have to go through the pain weird feelings before they really kick in but try doing that when you feel like shit!

night night, im watching wifeswap usa and grazing on anything + everything to cure my boardem

Anonymous said...

Hi Gled,

I came here through Shane's site and have been lurking and reading a while. Glad to hear of your recent success.

A Chimichanga is a Mexican deep fried burrito filled with meat or chicken, beans, cheese, etc. They are delicious, but one can see where they might give one the wind.

All the best from Canada.

-visi

Akelamalu said...

Sounds like you're getting yourself together Gleds. Can't you take your washing to the launderette? Glad to hear the call to your Dad went well.

Unknown said...

Gled? Question. you can email me back at fractalmom1@gmail.com or just comment.

Did you ever do speed? How did you feel when you did it? Did it inexplicably slow down your brain so that you felt somehow normal? Or was it just heroin that did that. I don't mean crystal meth or whatever it's called in the U.K., just plain old speed.

I am really wondering, because, well, you just don't FIT the typical thingys that all the psychiatrists are looking at, AND you don't react well to the meds they keep putting you on!! I hope you answer me. It could be important.

Much love, Dawn

Syd said...

I love that scene in Meet the Fockers when Roz is riding Jack like Sea Biscuit. That is one funny movie. Try a chimichanga some time. Pretty good stuff.

Gledwood said...

NAOMI: you sound way happier than you were back in the day when snowballing all the time. if you can stop at one grand binge wise you've done really well.

just in case you hadn't thought of this: premium bonds are a good way of tying up cash and of course you can win prizes, the post office also do other bonds where you get fixed interest rates and you can't get at your money without a month's notice, so they're a really good anti-binge device! i had just £10 worth which you can only have by buying £110, selling £100 back and keeping the £10 and I won £50 from £10 returns-wise, that's my best financial investment ever!

VISI: thanks for that i was puzzling over that one for a few days, in the end i thought they meant a chinese takeaway! (sounds ridiculous now, but that's what i thought...)

AKELAMALU: i'm feeling way better than I was last week i was in a real sourpuss mood! i know i have problems i'm trying to keep a handle on things so nothing goes too crazy these days, that's all i can do

DAWN: I answered you above and am asking him on thursday what words to write on official forms as i NEED a diagnonsense, also i can't even get self-help without one i'm lost in an "it could be this it could be that" bullshit zone and i'm really really sick and tired of bullshit i tell this dr exactly how it is, i think he understands i'm being bang-on straight with him i'm just too confused about everything not to be bc i don't know what he needs to see i just have to tell everything and be blatantly honest and frank and i veer completely away from any mind games territory where you make a joke or be sarcastic i am not up for that in our meetings

SYD: this is another thing i don't know: what is a sea biscuit!??!

A biscuit here means a cookie, whereas a cookie is something home made looking with chocolate chips in it...(!)

2 nations divided by a common language ~~ well said, winston churchill

Unknown said...
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Unknown said...
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Gledwood said...

FRACTALMOM: I have to come back to this; what you say is very interesting. Come Thursday I have to ask this dr what he thinks is wrong. I have a paper diary now, a tiny week-to-view one, that I can record my "biorhythms" on. I found a website that told me what to record: sleep, appetite, physical energy, mental energy, mental speed, physical speed (restlessness), mood level etc etc. I've noticed they don't always peak and trough simultaneously which has confused me as the crap people publish online about moods and attention deficits nearly always attempts to define the problems in an over-precise way that I take literally and then get confused over. For example there are times when my sleep has gone down to an average 2.5-4 hours per night ON sleep meds and I feel hyped up. But I can, in the middle of this, sleep perhaps for 8 or 9 hours one day. Then I feel REALLY hyped up with energy to spare... do you see what I mean. They complain that bipolar takes so long to diagnose and then merely fuel the situation by giving caricatured case studies etc when what people need to read is how and why people took so long to get diagnosed, what the diagnosis is and why. My friend Anna at ppfaceannagrace.blogspot.com had childhood ADHD and is now diagnosed bipolar. But they're giving her Adderall and I can't see how that's helping. Fair dos I'm not a doctor but it doesn't seem right...

Anyway I'll get back to you I have to rush out the door to get to this meeting which I'm already late for...

Gledwood said...

FRACTALMOM: Hi I just read back through what you put. I definitely have a lot of what you're describing; it does seem to come in phases then go.

I was musing over what you said on the way to NA and remembered a book I used to have years ago called A Mood Apart by a Dr Whybrow. I bought it thinking it was about depression, because I had been diagnosed with depression twice, and felt the need of a good self help book...

I got the book home and found it was about more than depression but was a v early work on the "bipolar spectrum". I realized as soon as I read it that I was on this spectrum. I also saw straight away from reading the examples of type 1 bipolar that I certainly wasn't clinically bipolar (or so I thought, now I don't know what to think).

My point is this: Dr Whybrow outlines 3 thymic temperaments.

Dysthymia is the shrinks' word for persistent subclinical depression.
Hyperthymia is one notch below hypomania and if you're hyperthymic you might well have a lot of ADHD/ADD symptoms. Hyperthymic people tend to have a lot of energy, be outgoing and into trying new things etc etc.
Lastly there was cyclothymis and that sounded most like me. Cyclothymic people alternate between phases of optimism and pessimism, high and low energy etc etc.

Then I realized from reading further that if you've ever been diagnosed with "major depression" and are also "cyclothymic" you automatically "qualify" as type 2 bipolar, the milder more difficult to diagnose type.

Like your daughter I had a terrible time on antidepressants, they basically brought on bipolar symptoms.

Then I checked more carefully and saw that hypomania brought on by antidepressants doesn't "count" towards a diagnosis of bipolar.

As I said I did have mild mood swings anyhow, but wasn't sure what a shrink would make of these.

The whole issue did my head in so badly that I just hid it from the doctors. When you're mildly hyper it's pretty easy to hide it, it's only when I really "went off on one" that I genuinely could NOT stay still...

Now whatever's happening really does go flat-out when it goes.

You know they are now theorizing that ADD/ADHD, borderline personality disorder and bipolar disorder all lie on one and the same spectrum which may account for while your experience and mine sounds so similar.

One major difference: pot disagrees with me so vehemently I just cannot touch it. I get ultra paranoid and hallucinate on a tiny dose it also brings on some of the racing thoughts I can get. It really does nothing to calm my head and produces no "mellowness" at all. It seemed to do this years ago but as time went by I got a stronger and stronger aversion to it and just wouldn't touch it.

I caught a common cold some time ago and felt stoned on cannabis. Kind of like my thoughts went really loud and voices of memories were talking in my head (not "hearing voices" literally, just in my head... and I was so annoyed because by this time I'd given up crack, had long given up cannabis and yet this crap that they promised me was all drug related just happened anyhow!

I'll tell him what you said. This doctor is very cautious and working at a drugs place probably used to hearing people exaggerate their experience. I made it very clear I was being 100% on the line, neither exaggerating nor covering up and when I tell him about my extremes I make it very clear how much of a day that extreme lasts and how often it happens. I think as far as I can tell he's a good doctor.

I have to go now it's late and I have to write this stuff in my little black book so i don't forget it. Thanks v much for the information :-)

Unknown said...

let me know. I deleted my long comment, there was just a little too much personal stuff in there to leave it up, but you know how to get in touch with me anytime LOL. i will keep in touch through your blog anyway to see how you are doing!! I sure hope for you they can figure this shit out, it has to be absolute HELL for you to go through. GAK! I would be insane.

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