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!

Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Ideas

I SLEPT AND SLEPT and slept and slept and slept in really lake, till past 3pm. My phone was chirping and chirrupping like crazy, but I turned it down so I could dream some more. I dreamt I was on a long train journey, where I accidentally dropped my methadone bottle down the side where it smashed; then I was up in the woods with exotic birds hopping towards me; then I woke up and supped cup-a-soup in front of the telly, wondering how I was ever going to engage with the day.

I made such a hash of trying to explain why I wanted to write my memoir didn't I? All I was trying to say was the idea came to me when I was feeling really negative; but I still wanted to go for it. Making lemons into lemonade type of thing.

I need to keep my story as short and sweet as I possibly can. Apart from Anna Grace's, the only drug memoir I know is Kate Holden's In My Skin. The tale of a middle class girl, very similar to me, who gets drawn into the seedy world of heroin, eventually takes to prostitution to fund her habit. Rather than feeling exploited, she talks about prostitution as a process of self-realization. I never went that route; I begged money off strangers. Heroin was a lot cheaper in London than Sydney so you could fund a habit of over a gram a day on £30 or £40. That's $48 to $64 a day in American money.

I've decided to continue with the NA. They talk about the same issues that bugged me: resentment at life not being set up to cater for the needs of the opiate addict. Which makes me want to throw in the towel all together. I don't think there's anything wrong with taking heroin, but I'm fed up of going against the flow. Something's making me want to stop. I cannot put my finger one what it is, but whatever it is, it niggles and niggles away and now I want out.

If I did get any money from my memoirs, I want to use it to clean myself up and leave the country. Burma, the most fascinating foreign land on earth for their mysterious beautifully scripted language, fried hornet cuisine and opium farming tradition is of course completely out of the window. Burma is the world's foremost supplier of high grade 97% purity white heroin. So I can't go there. Fortunately I've had a fascination for all things Japanese for about as long as I can remember, so I would go there instead. Japan is really expensive travel-wise, so I'd need an international bestseller to afford a trip there.

The other country I can see myself visiting is Morocco, where I've been before. It's like an African India. Very exotic. Very cheap. Yes they do happen to be one of the world's foremost producers of hashish, but I loathe cannabis more than any other psychotropic substance, so that's no temptation. I'd use Morocco as my personal alternative to rehab. Instead of talk talk talking about drugs I'm no longer taking, I'd take the opposite tack and let my wounds heal by leaving alone. I do think excessive counselling can be a psychological equivalent of scab-picking. Not good for you. There's research that shows that disaster victims who go in for talk therapies are more likely to suffer from post traumatic stress disorder and to suffer worse than people who are allowed to heal in quiet. "Least said, soonest mended." This is why I want to write my story BEFORE I leave the drugs behind. And to me, methadone is every bit as much a drug as heroin. It might be legal, but it's more addictive and less effectual. And I just want away from it. If they're going to insist on giving that to addicts they should at least give injectable amps. But you need a private doctor to get those. So a private doctor is what I intend to get. I'd need to write a book to pay for one.

My head has gone resonant yet again. That means I'm hearing words in the air. Not voices as such, but psychic emanations. This gives me a fear of going mad abroad. I need to make my own money so I can get away from mental health services. No travel insurance I know of covers mental health. If I had to pay doctors' bills myself I just wouldn't see any doctors. So that's nice and straightforward.

Hey this naturalist on the telly has picked up a tubby little vole. It's rambling about on his hand. Fully wild, yet strangely tame. Tamer than a roborovski hamster, that's for sure. Now some naughty baby short-eared owls are gobbling dead voles. They're on the island of Skomer in Wales.

Well I'd better go; it's nearly half past nine already...

TALES OF THE RIVERBANK

THE RIVERBANK CLOCK
"What can Hammy and Roderick possibly be doing?" asks Johnny Morris, the narrator. As Hammy patently obviously sits there washing his ears (again...!)



HAMMY THE FLYING POSTMAN
A terrible thing has happened; the post-boat has sunk. And now Hammy is trying to get the letters back... in the diving bell.
Then Hammy goes flying. And looks really entertaining doing it...




9 comments:

Janice Seagraves said...

Good luck with your writing, Gled. I really haven't made much, but who knows maybe you'll do better than I have with your writing.

But like anything else writing takes work.

The best advice I can give you about writing is to never give up.

This isn't an easy business. The ones who make it have to develop a thick skin and keep working on learning their craft. And above all else keep writing.

Janice~

Gledwood said...

Do you think I'll make anything at all? I don't really want to prostitute myself without getting a decent amount back for it. I know all the crap about how my moaning drivel might inspire one single person not to experiment with drugs and so it will all be worthwhile, but is it worthwhile for me? Humiliating myself like that?

I thought I would just write the fucking thing and decide afterwards whether or not I wanted to publish the bloody thing!

Anyway I'm more into writing Valerie's memoirs than my own. But I want to get mine over and done with y'know...

Gattina said...

Morocco has changed a lot especially since there is a new king at least he does something for his people and is modernizing the country.
BTW in Holland the bike is a MUST in the center of Amsterdam no cars are allowed and only bikes are used. In the Flemish part of Belgium it's the same. The country is flat like a pancake and everybody has a bike ! I hate them because they don't respect anybody !
You wrote : "What I was trying to say was the idea came to me when I was feeling really negative"; Please tell me when you don't feel negative ? Write your book !

bugerlugs63 said...

hi,
I not had any signal since i sent Hammy your way. next door somehow know we using their signal & code, so every time they go out they switch it ALL off! mean eh?
Anyway I am truly pleased that you enjoyed TOTRB and found all the other episodes that we watched that day. but the Hammy & canon "mischief" was so definitely "you" , I had to send one.
Its brill innit? I would love to do that with my (23 . . .yes 23 (another story of a desperate male (laddio) having noticed his partner giving birth, realising his eviction could be . . .well, any second now, thought it might be the best time to "give it one more go" as it were. Managed to catch Samuel (!) in between her alternately feeding her five pups, eating to make more milk & sleeping, and indeed "gave it one more go!" so 23 now! sorry where was I? yes i would love to film "stories" with mine.
I often "voice over" them for Hamper G, she even does it now . . they would make fine stories, Rampant Reggie would have to be toned down.
So any name suggestions welcome,
I defo think you should write something . . .I'm sure you could "inject" har har some humour into your memoirs, doesn't have to be miseries miserable memoirs does it?
I've been "wondering how I'm going to engage with the day" as u put it (most eloquently as usual)most mornings these days . . .it can go on for hours . . .I went for blood test today as I have never been so tired & sluggish, its horrible, not me at all. So, yes writing is your "thing" I reckon you could write a multitude of stuff similtaneously, mood dependant like . . bit of that book when u in mood for that . . or that . . or that. SHIT just looked up and past 50 words were in caps, hate that . . .couldn't leave that.not even if i said sorry afterwards and that ai wasn't shouting . at all . . .I fear i might be rambling, so tatty bye, a la prochaine, un all that.
with love
take care
di
x

bugerlugs63 said...

ps (of course)
I meant names for ten new pups (5 x 4 weeks old, 5 x 1 week old)
no idea on sex of these lot yet . . .you can adopt one if you like . .that way you got one without the responsibilties
. I wouldn't ask for maintenance unless you become very rich in next two years . . .ok, just a thought. I'm off ;-)
hey! word verify . . .wonghes
WONGAs . .aint that money?????
get writing ;-)
x

Baino said...

Have a go you mug. If you want you can flex and practice on www.thetenthdaughterofmemory.blogspot.com we could do with some new flesh!

Welshcakes Limoncello said...

Always rooting for you, Gleds.

Sid said...

Blimey Gleds!

I got 95 referrals from your blog just today! Wtf?!!

Thanks tho :)

Hope your good mate?

Gledwood said...

Gattina: I wanted to leave the book behind me when I died, that was the negative idea, also I thought it should help sell it if it was marketed as a junkie's suicide note. From that my motives changed to writing a book that explains why someone as bright as me would do something as idiotic as taking heroin!

Bugerlugs: HOW many roborovskis have you got??

You make a good point. I was going to try and make my Misery Memoir as entertaining as possible.

What puts me off is all the white covers featuring weeping children. I actually like white covers on books, I think they look really clean and surgical. But I once saw a 5-pack of misery on sale at WH Smiths for £5. Imagine your life story going in a 5-pack of misery so some self-indulgent secretary can read it in bed with a box of chocolates and red wine crying over stuff she really knows nothing about. That's a point would my story make anyone cry? I'd rather make 'em laugh!

You could call one of them Gledwood
Hang on I'll think up some other names

Chrystobel
Samantha
Mary
Poppy

Morph
Diamorph
Indica
Sativa
Ephedra
Coca
Meow

Perkins
Durry
Trotter
Scrabbler
Ping
Scuttle
Scratcher
Earwasher
Swine
Tonkie
Jugstable



Welshcakes: thanks to you and bo! to Simi (our dog used to say that)

Sid: are you sure?? What the hell is happening?? I will check my stats

Are you sure you got that many hits from mine? All in one day? Whatever for? How peculiar!

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