COUNSELLING, COUNSELLING, PSYCH-IN... TOTAL PSYCH-OUT, I have appointments coming out of my ears. Yesterday I was in such a tizz. "Tizz" is a nice way of putting it. All I wanted was to take a fat hit of gear, jump out of a 50th floor window. Or stay by myself staring at the wall. Actually TALKING about anything was not on my agenda. But I HAD to go to a pure counselling appointment ~~ not a druggieservice appointment but a counselling centre one, where the format is 50 blank minutes, unstructured, with the counsellor staring across and I so much could not handle this. Did not want to go. Missed the last one because did not want to go. Thought "I'm just wasting your time here. We should call this off." Didn't want to let the counsellor down, who I knew was coming in just to see me. So I turned up "reeking of drink". Laughing, Crying. I wasn't that drunk (I mean, 2 hours later I was stone cold sober.) I was only laughing out of nerves and a penchant for self-mockery. Somehow whenever anything bad happens to me, part of me finds it hilarious, no matter how bad it is or was. I don't know why. 
The counsellor tells me that these years of drugs have made me remote from myself. I'm constantly switching my emotions off. Like other people on heroin (and methadone only perpetuates the state at a lesser intensity) "the lights are on but no-one's home". This is the state of heroin intoxication addicts crave. Many of us have probably witnessed this on the bus. Someone gets on obviously out of it. Sits down, barely conscious ("the lights are on ~ no-one's home"), jolting and swaying to the motion of the vehicle. But because the lights are on, and burning bright, a smackhead ~ as opposed to a drunk ~ is highly unlikely to fall off the seat, trip over or crash into something on the way home. Weird.Anyway the counsellor said "I cannot work with someone who is pickled with alcohol" so sent me home early (I was so glad).
I don't want to give up on the counselling because it is a link with normality. And thought therapy-speak does annoy me, I am able to tolerate it. For example, the notion that emotional pain is somehow self-inflicted or wallowed in and thus easily escapable to one who sufficiently desires escape. So I said "what about someone swathed in bandages with horrific burns in a hospital bed, can that person convince themself to stop hurting?" "No, because that's not emotional that's physical." So I said "but emotional mechanisms are as real as physical ones..." blah blah blah, we went on from there.
I had two huge chunks of counselling in the past. 3-&-a-half years of it, at least... so how far down I can dig in just 12 more weeks, I'm not sure...I had about 18 months or two years of "person centred" (ie crap) in my early 20s. Two-and-a-half years of "psychodynamic" (ie deep) in my mid 20s. The bookings were supposed to be limited to 24 months only at this place as it was staffed by qualified volunteers, working pro-bono. But I was such a mess I got this 6-month extension. The latter counsellor, who was spot-on and very bright kept saying "I think you need more help than I can give you" meaning seeing a sinister psychiatrist. I was totally against the idea.
Then I turned into a raving smackhead. Now I'm here. Nearly 40 and no hope left. What a wondrous journey life has been!!
But hasn't this life been your choice? I mean there are other options. Like showing up tipsy at the therapy session--that's sabotaging the whole thing, right? Anyway, I hope that there will be a good life for you.
ReplyDeleteHere is a blog that might give you some hope: http://thewarondrugs1.blogspot.com/
Ah keep on journeying Gledwood. There's always plenty of time to drop dead so there's no rush. Don't get too down on yourself either. I pretty much f*ck up a free lunch everyday, and I don't have any excuses.
ReplyDeleteSyd: the point is, I really really did not want to go and only turned up so the counsellor hadn't wasted time getting there. That was all. I was not in any mood to talk to anyone, especially someone asking how I am... y'know
ReplyDeleteAS for choice, yes trying drugs at all was obviously a choice, as was continuing to "try" them... but full-tilt addiction is no choice, it is just automatic to score... use... etc... go on scoring, using... etc that is no choice, that is instinct. That's why I mean the only choice is NOT to do that and to stop
Molson: I quite often wish I'd fucking died years ago
I've had therapy and always feel guilty because I'm not really on their wavelength.
ReplyDeleteI think you could probably do a better job of analysing yourself.
SB thank you
ReplyDeleteLiz probably I could. I have DISTINCTLY mixed feelings about counselling... what's that old saying? Less said soonest mended? Aye!!
There wasn't really any point in you going to the counselling session was there if you were so set against it? Will you get another chance, or don't you want one?
ReplyDeleteYou do make me angry sometimes. You have this opportunity to help yourself then just wreck it. I don't qualify for free counselling, take advantage of the services that are offered to you. Then if there's no will, there's no way. You're clearly an intelligent man but you shoot yourself in the foot all the time!
ReplyDeleteAkelamalu: I will get another chance and on thinking of it thought I will give it a go properly. I just have VERY mixed feelings about counselling ~~ whether it is at all healthy ~~ e.g. research has shown that trauma victims e.g. post 9/11 actually heal FASTER without counselling... less said soonest mended. I am not at all convinced that talking talking talking about things you might NOT WANT TO DISCUSS is the best way and I really was NOT in the mood for being probed at that day. AT ALL. I only went so as not to let down the counsellor, who had come in just for me. Otherwise I would never have bothered turning up, y'know...
ReplyDeleteBaino: But I'm not sure counselling is even good. Sometimes I feel it is like taking an open wound and poking at it... or picking at a scab that is trying to heal, again and again, and wondering why years later you are still not healed, still in pain... Woody Allen, in my opinion, is the walking advertisement that shows too much therapy does not necessarily get you anywhere except deeper into self-obsession and self-justification!!