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!

Saturday, March 05, 2011

Snobbery


OK YA GOT YA SHOT OF FURRINESS look one post lower. Hibernation. I haven't done very much today except hibernate. I wanted to sleep last night and was maniac instead, as soon as I hit a lull I chucked risperidone down my throat, still didn't sleep. Realized I'd forgotten methadone. Took that and Nytol. Slept. Slept all day till four pm.

Heroin is slipping down down down in my affections. I got a really cool message last night callling me a drug snob over H4, H3. That is, preferring the injectable hydrochloride salts of heroin over heroin base which is strictly for smoking but can be injected with the addition of vein-rotting fruit acids. If I'd used more H4 (instead of just TWO batches in ten years) my veins might be in better shape. But then again I'd still be using and would have gone even more insane when I stopped, as more time would have passed and everything would be worse worse worse so maybe I should be thankful for H3 the drug that made me stop it. My veins are so bad now I just skin pop, rather than go in the neck or the femoral. Skin pop WHEN I do it. Which is now never. If you follow me you'll have to excuse the constant lapses in time. Past, present and future all converge here.

Anyway, yes I am a drug snob and doncha just love it! I love being a snob. There are drugs snobs, fashion snobs, intellectual snobs and cultural snobs (not strictly the same thing as painting and opera are cultural but not intellectual); money snobs (big time) and here in Lovely Britain you still get Class Snobbery or more commonly Inverted Class Snobbery. Just about any aspect of human life is enshrined in snobbery of some sort. Even junkies are snobs. To do with how long you use. How much you use (the littlest the best; the most the best)... and so on.

Moulin Rouge is on as I felt musical. I like the music in Moulin Rouge. If I were in that film I'd want to play the conductor. I'm way thinner than the conductor they cast but I'd do a good job at King of the Crazies.

Outside it may be rainining
But in here it's entertaining!


Couldn't have written a better couplet meself.

Here's the conductor:



The Moulin Rouge must have been quite good on absynthe.

According to Wikipedia, "a critic" said (probably last year) that:

Absinthe makes you crazy and criminal, provokes epilepsy and tuberculosis, and has killed thousands of French people. It makes a ferocious beast of man, a martyr of woman, and a degenerate of the infant, it disorganizes and ruins the family and menaces the future of the country.

Vincent Van Gogh was said to have been a heavy drinker of absynthe. I spell it with a Y.

I'm so not into drugs I have a pack of unopened needles. Just lying there on the floor. I am throwing all dirty ones out. This one stays vigin and unpenetrated until the day comes when I chuck it out or use it. Possibly to squirt ink over canvas or for some artistic purpose. Didn't say I'd use 'em for heroin did i?!

Well this has gone on too long. I tried to watch Cleopatra last night but was semi-conscious by the end. See I told you it was a drain on the attention.

Do you know City Roads drug detox actually have a "no cutting" rule. So they expect you to take away the only thing that "makes life worth living" and not act at least pseudo-suicidal. That's what happens in drug detox. Most people are suicidal. If you don't know that you don't know about addiction! Why do you think I get offended when NA tell me to "detox". They haven't seen me do it! It makes me lose my marbles. I lost then every single time I tried to do it or even switched medication. I got hyper on Subutex. Never realized what was happening but music suddenly sounded incredibly lush. I was glued to the music channel for days on end. In the mornings I was so happy it was unreal. Made the 3 days of going from heroin/methadone to Subutex a doddle but looking back I know I wasn't right. The other times it was just horrible.

I was into doing that Waismann method anaesthetic detox and getting the druggieclinic to fund it. They might if I impressed them with my logic. But considering every other detox I have done has perturbed the balance of my mind very obviously (and not worth going into here) and that even switching heroin to methadone had the walls speaking to me, and that my mind is fractured enough to be labelled schizo... I cannot see that I would wake up exactly in one piece... Know what I mean?

PS Heather's Mom writes addiction book reviews
http://heathersmom1.blogspot.com/2011/02/book-reviews.html?showComment=1299375596672#c563837765930657841


Well I wanted to end this on a positive. See below for the entertaining furrybunnyhammywithatail sleeping. That is a dormous:~~

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

hi,i did that test you mentioned recently,i stumbled upon whilst "stumbling"and i came out highly schizoaffective (and other stuff) but i don't hallucinate,i do believe most humans are psychic,i 'm pretty anti social cos i can't do small talk but i do like people.I have a very mild mania,when i feel unusually happy i just know i'm gonna crash.....only when mostly detoxed.Ummm,i don't know where this is going.
Methadone is making me fat,will they ever give us an alternative that works with no rotten side effects?But no,we are BAD junkies and deserve to suffer.
You think your life is hard??my 3 yr old has these tantrums that leave me reeling hours later and i wonder what did i do wrong?can you spoil a child with love?sorry gledwood,thank you for your blog,its keeping me sane,ironically.....annie x

Gledwood said...

Annie I know exactly how you feel! Thanks for the thanks, I appreciate them.

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

I never heard of drug snobbery before! I've decided I'm a punctuation snob.

Coke Addiction Kinda Sucks said...

Cheers! It's nice to know that SOMEONE still reads my blog, lol! No, Mr. X is this dude that I've been hooking up with for about 8 years now for coked up sex. I love it and hate it.

Gledwood said...

Coke Addiction: love and hate coked up sex? There aren't any really good sex drugs they make me want to dance far more than make luuuuurve ha ha ha

Welshcakes: oh you just made me paranoid how many errors are here? Probably far too many!

Cocaine Addiction: Is Cannabis a sex drug? I don't know. If I think up one (except heroin) I'll let you know

Syd said...

Gleds, thanks for your comment today. I am taking care of myself by getting away for a few hours each day. I don't like being a house husband much. Take care. Glad that you got some rest.

Dad and Mom said...

Gleds,

I read your comments to my post today and the post I made after speaking to the students at our high school.

I read your posts. Gleds, I don't understand and for a long while I would read and there was no way I could formulate a response. I didn't get it.

You have so much strength inside. You have such tenderness and the capability to care. Your drive to learn new languages, hell I only know english and barely get by on that at times. Gleds, you were such a huge question mark to me I didn't know how to respond, I only knew to think of you often and wish that you could look into the mirror and see in yourself what I read about you.

You know how to survive in a world in which I would be lost. Caring for your hammy's, an animal that is typically regarded over her in the states as an animal you get for your kids because you know they aren't too much trouble and they die quickly. We had them for our children when the kids were around 8 years old. You wrote about and demonstrated a tenderness that is uncommon.

You have the strength to fight any demon in front of you. What I read now is you have the determination and the will.

I want you to know that I think of you often and wonder often how are you doing. The only reason I can think of that I do that is because I care. Gledwood, I believe in you. I believe in the strength that you have inside.

I am no stronger or determined than you. You have different challenges than I but I know you have what I have. not every brick wall must be scaled or broken down. Sometimes it is OK to back away from that wall and find another route. I know you got that inside of you.

Be strong. I got your back here in the US.

Janice Seagraves said...

Hmm, never hear of a drug snob before.

I love to read, but I'm a hard back snob. I like how the hard back look in my bookcase and feel in my hands when I read.

Janice~

Gledwood said...

Syd: is some role reversal going on here! I hope you stay OK :-)

Dad: I appreciate your reply very much. As I said I wasn't asking for an answer, I know it must have been very difficult searching out what to say but you did it perfectly.

The last of my hamsters died a while ago but I still use them as a metaphor. I know I'm not well enough to take on pets at the moment which is why no new ones. I very nearly ended up in hospital not long ago and could easily still be in there if I had gone in, so I have to be very careful with what I do.

I decided if I ever get into Hospital Territor again I am going in: it was so difficult in essence looking after an adult 3 year old child. At least I know in hospital I dont have to constantly 2nd guess myself and that what I'm doing is OK in other peoples eyes; that gets exhausting (what I mean is I was manic/psychotic so it's very hard to know you're doing the right thing in that condition and my mind goes FAST so I just cannot keep up with my own train of thought).

I have the willpower but not the focus. I'm trying to get the focus back. I once had it.

My family thinks the same as me, that my condition is the upshot of years of drugtaking. What I have done is use heroin to shut down. On methadone I wake up again, but wake up too much, so psychosis comes out. I don't honestly believe "methadone drove me mad" I believe it doesn't stop me being crazy like heroin did. I've experimented with heroin a few times since December when I did go barmy and heroin just does not block it out any more. So heroin is redundant to me. If it's not going to block out my mood swings or madness then it's insanity to TAKE it. I'm not for one second implying heroin was "a good idea" it has left me in a huge mess and for years made diagnosis really difficult by clouding a clinical picture that would probably otherwise have been pretty clear.


Even my Mum (who doesn't know me as well as my Dad (divorce)) even she said to me "you took heroin because the antidepressants didn't work" and that's essentially true. I was using it as an antidepressant/mood stabilizer. Which just seems ridiculous now that my doctor is talking about prescribing a mood stabilizer ANYHOW...

I hope I've explained myself clearly. I don't mind blogging about my "illness" or anything... as I said, it's done in the hope that another person might gain something from my mistakes. And I've come thus far: why not carry on?

Thanks again for your message of support it means a great deal to me.

Gledwood said...

Janice: how strange you say that, me too! I want the AA Big Book but it MUST be hardback. Knowing it's available in both formats now makes me want it more in hardback! My NA one is hardback... I just love hardback books y'know!

Sid said...

Addicts are the worst snobs!

Ever noticed in rehab the pecking order, with coke-heads at the top then the alcoholics look down at the heroin addicts ant the heroin addicts do the same to the alkies?!
Madness eh.. as you know though in rehab, people that have used drugs for a long time tend to revert to vase personality traits, I found I felt like a teenager my first detox, and the people around me were bahaving like kids, I was bullyed and attacked verbally for being gay in every rehab ive been in! It' like being at school again!

Re cutting, clouds gave me a warning the first time I cut and I was told i would be thrown out of i did it again! I was like, wtf, im going through some serious mental trauma and your going to punish me for it, inevitably i started stubbing fags out on me and they did throw me out... nice eh..

City roads did the same thing, but that place is blody awful anyway, been there twice and it was horrendous both times..

bugerlugs63 said...

anonymous/ANNIE
not sure if its the "done thing" to comment to a commenter, prob not, but i hope Gledwood wont mind, or indeed, you.
was just to tell u i sympathize totally with the 3 year old tantrums affecting you for hours. chances are u r doing nothing wrong. its just that "battle of the wills " phase (endless phase). mine is usually sorry wthin half hour but, like you say, you cant just flip back to how u were before it happened.and because they can, they expect you to. if only it were that easy. i got the 3 yr old doing it and 16 yr old lad having adolescent tantrums, a lot more scary. all that testosterone and anger. if it aint one its the other. luckily the middle one is in between tantrums 4 now. anyway sorry i getting carried away. was just trying to re-assure you that its normal, very frustrating but "normal" and dont reckon any amount of love for a child is too much. they will be fine. love is all
take care
x

bugerlugs63 said...

hi
i hope u dont mind me writing that to annie, real sorry if u did.
just wondered if i could reassure her a little.
it can be quite frightening with kids. anyway its done now.
just a quick hammy up date. when i put them (mum & dad)back together, they both brought their old beds with them and i gave them 2 tanks (joined by tunnel) so they could still have their own space if they were'nt in the "mood" for each other.
then i made them the love nest and am pleased to say that each a
fternoon they have both crawled, bleary eyed and spiky furred out of the love nest;-) they look so different when their fur is ruffled dont they? they kinda beigy-ginger when smooth, then dark fur from underneath shows when they r scruffy. i could sit up and watch them all night. luckily was watching the other day when reggie the lunar dad, decided he could still fit down a foil roll, bad idea. he got proper jammed with his feet ,tail and fat arse all wiggling out the end. they are slim rolls but all the others have no trouble running through. I picked up the roll and tried to kinda shake him out, but he dint budge, so i had to grab what was hanging out (without sending him further inside the roll) and pull him out . it was a very tight fit i tell yer. dont think he will do it again.
ok i off to bed.
take care,
hope you feeling good monday
with love
x

Gledwood said...

Syd: I was going to say all sorts of things but they probaby arent "appropriate". If there ever was a next time, come up with some ripostes in advance. Yes they are like overgrown kids. City Roads is the pits. All that shit about herbal tea etc. If I do rehab again I think I'd just cheat and bring in sleepers. I'm sure everyone else did. I only didn't last time because I had no access to them. Yes I was a heroin addict and scored HEROIN, never benzos. I only took benzos when they came my way. What gets me about City Roads is the idiotic insistence on herba tea. As if that's going to do anything more than a glass of hot water. Yeah no caffeine makes a difference, but the herbs add nothing but flavouring.

Buggerlugz/Annie: you have to win that battle of wills by not turning or changing your mind. Then the child can trust you. Easier said than done, I know.


Buggalugz: I think you did it exactly right with the tunnel. Did the female hammy go into the male's nest? I heard that's the most likely way round...

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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