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 14, 2011

The Tale of Hachikō... & I had an Onken


忠犬ハチ公 HERE'S THE STORY of a great Trotterdonkey Doggie named Hachi, which means he was 8th in the litter, who met a professor of agricultural engineering in Tokyo sometime before World War II who faithfully followed the professor home every night. Each evening, Hachi used to wait at the main railway station for his master to return home. When one day the professor died suddenly of a heart attack Hachi refused to accept the death and continued to show up, every single afternoon at the appointed time. Thin and bedraggled he was fed sandwiches by the Japanese commuters... All attempts at rehoming him failed. The faithful furry simply ran back to Shibuya Station and continued his vigil.

After he died, a statue was erected in Shibuya Station in Hachikō's honour. In 2008, a Hollywood film was released, starring Richard Gere. This is the story of Hachikō's life. Original Japanese version. You don't need any Japanese to follow this; it's all set to music:~~~~~~~

ハチ公物語 Hachikō Monogatari ~ The Tale of Hachikō



Top illustration: the original Hachikō...

Here's an Akita-inu tied up on the way to the dog show. Same coloration as a brushwood doggie; much bigger. Then you get to see lots of Japanese people down the precinct.



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I HAD AN ONKEN this afternoon. Vanilla yogurt with chocolate flakes.

Not much else to put. Not feeling too good.

8pm Hey I'm having "psychiatric symptoms" ~ "racing thoughts". I keep hearing the most random ideas spoken each side of my head. Down the library this afternoon I heard some woman whispering my full name, which irritated me. Then this other woman continued to have what appeared to be a pretty detailed conversation about me. The cow! I told myself I was "just being paranoid".

8:55pm the "psychiatric symptoms" have died down. I've been having them all day. I feel ill. I nearly went to bed just after 6. I don't know whether to see a dr. I don't see what a dr can do for me. I don't know what to do.

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HERE are some 柴犬 brushwood doggies, some shiba-inus in the snow...





9 comments:

jams o donnell said...

Wow the Shiba-inus are so cute!

Gledwood said...

doesn't the last one look too perfect to be true, it looks like it's been manufactured by fleiss, the teddybearmakers!

Spindrift said...

I was thinking the same thing too, the smile maybe, maybe.

'I don't know what to do.' I self medicated until 18 months and we are similar ages. I kept myself to myself and believed noone needed to know. I then reached out because I got to a point I felt I couldn't do it by myself, I was going in circles. It has helped. Some people run towards professional help, others run away from it, some are indifferent. Trusting other people with our mental health why they tweak medications to find dosages that maintain rather than disable can be harrowing for individuals. I guess as you say, you have found your anti depressant in heroin. Pity it's not legal and you couldn't get your fix from the corner store.

My wife has just noticed your brushwood doggies, hope you are feeling better tonight.

Paul

Syd said...

The story of Hachi is so touching. I haven't seen the movie but know that it will be a tear jerker. I have so much love for animals. I think that a dog would really cheer you up.

Furtheron said...

@Gled - exactly what I was going to say that looks like a toy one to me.

If it isn't that is well odd

Furtheron said...

Hang on I'm being a complete numpty... look at it's rear left side leg... yes that is a label!!! LOL

Gledwood said...

Spindrift: I need something else apart from antipsychotic pills because on them I end up depressed but less obviously psycho. They seemed to make me "hallucinate" less but not very much less paranoid. So probably I will have to submit to those mood stabilizers. I'm scared of mood stabilizers, especially lithium. I get a new dr's appointment soon though, so that should be OK.

Syd: I would quite like to see the Hachi movie. It kind of passed us by, in the cinema for all of a week or so then gone. I noticed in Germany it got on the DVD bestsellers list whereas here it barely registered, I don't know why. Brits like to think of themselves as a nation of animal lovers but interestingly, the Germans actually seem to love animals more.....

Furtheron: well-spotted. I just thought perhaps it was a badly touched up photo, or the dog was on medication!

Liz Hinds said...

Those are such cute dogs!

I hope you can get your council tax sorted.

Is Severely Mentally Impaired the same as mental illness? It sounds more like a um thingy, a condition that someone is born with rather than an illness that can be treated.

Gledwood said...

Severely mentally impaired: EXACTLY what I thought but apparently not. Still smells of complete bullshit though, know what I mean.

I SHOULD be able 2 sort the council tax.

God knows how.

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