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, April 14, 2011

We've all got bipolar


CATHERINE ZETA JONES has just been released from a Connecticut mental clinic suffering from type 2 bipolar disorder. Type 2 bipolar is the milder form of the illness where severe depression alternates with mild mania and there are no "psychotic features". The illness is said to have been broughton by the stress of her husband, Michael Douglas's throat cancer. Get well soon, Zeta!

8 comments:

Sweden said...

i got diagnosed with bi-polar 2 like 5 years ago, originally and for a few years my doctor thought i was just depressed but after carefully looking at all the symptoms realizsed im actually bipolar, my meds (zyprexa) anti psychotic meds work wonder for me, im so glad i can most of the time feel normal, the best part is that when i get depressed i dont get suicidal, or have manic episodes where i want to stab people in the face.

i hope all is well with you gleds, and that the meds will help you!!!!!

kiss kiss hugs hugs

ps loves the rabbit eating a carrot, it made me laugh

Liz Hinds said...

ooh, her parents live just down the road from us. Sort of.

Can it be brought on by stress? Maybe it's just brought out.

Akelamalu said...

I heard this about KZJ this morning on the news. Just goes to show even the rich and famous aren't immune eh?

Sarcastic Bastard said...

My doctor told me I likely am bipolar. You're right, we've all got that shit.

Love you!

Gledwood said...

Sweden: I know I remember you posting when you felt shit. You spend a lot of money on meds don't you. I hope you're all right now

Liz: stress is the trigger not the cause. Only one person in a hundred or so ever becomes truly manic and a bigger percentage become hypomanic (mildly manic). Hypomania is the signature symptom of bipolar II disorder. Everything I've read on the subject says that this is a genetically transmitted disorder; in identical twins the chance of one twin having bipolar and the other twin having it too is 50%. Same goes for schizoaffective. I'm really not sure I am actually schizoaffective. If I'm not then I'm type 1 bipolar. Bipolar 1 and schizoaffective have nearly identical symptoms and the treatments are exactly the same so it doesn't really matter what it's called

Akelamalu: absolutely!

SB: if you're bipolar you need to be careful taking antidepressants, they can send you off into a manic episode!

Caren Erin said...

I herd the news today too. Makes me feel not alone. You make me feel not alone.

I scored some H, good stuff. Although it is black tar its very pure. So my mood is stable right now. I had to fix in my juggular though. Dangerous, I know.

Drugs are bad, but they sure make you feel good.

Atlanta Roofing said...

I’m floored to read about this. I curiously looked up Bipolar II after reading this and the previous blog posts and I am recognizing the symptoms in someone I love. I didn’t know there was a diagnosis outside of depression for non-psychotic not-uber-manic behavior. Thank you so much Ms. Zeta-Jones for going public with your struggle and babble for covering it!

Gledwood said...

CAREN: I'm glad I'm not the only person it stabilizes. Clinic won't admit self-medication is real medication. Wikipedia says some sorts of depression are best treated with opiates/opioids
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endogenous_depression
but of course the rest of medicine won't listen. I hope you're OK.

ATLANTA: I had bipolar symptoms for years but they were mild (the highs were, not the lows, the lows I had nearly all the time)... I got high of antidepressants and said nothing at the time, then when I did fess up nobody did anything about my condition until I was so manic I was being offered hospital admission. It's all fucked up. I'd advise your friend to get help soon if they feel they need it. Better to get help while you have symptoms then you'll get believed. Instead of waiting for it to fuck your life up and then maybe it's too late to repair some of that damage

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