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I am not now, nor have I ever been addicted to Heroin. Just so you know. I did al of the popular drugs in the sixties, lot of drugs. I saw a cartoon in the New Yorker back then; a guy was being offer a toke off a joint at what looked to be a fairly upscale party. The punch line went something like "No, thanks. I'll just get drunk like the good Lord intended"
As the sixties waned so did my major involvement in drugs. I kept a bag of smoke around for a rainy day ( I lived in Seattle at the time), but my drinking increased geometrically with each month that passed. Finally, I got sick enough and had burned enough friends (enablers), that I felt I had to do something. My third marriage was going down in flames, my job was hanging by the thinnest threads.....you know the story.
I went to one of the twelve step programs. Long story short. I cleaned up, both drugs and booze. I transformed back into the person I had been. I changed careers, went back to school, earned several degrees, and went to work in my new career.
The twelve step program (ready now for the blasphemy) did nothing to touch the root causes of my disorder. Don't get me wrong....I'm grateful. The twelve step programs and people where there when I needed them. I doubt that I could have stopped on my own and the support was wonderful On the other hand if an aircraft mechanic asked you for a 9/16th box end wrench to take the cowling off an ailing engine and you handed it to him/her and then to their next request for the next need tool you replied "Nope, the one tool is the only too you'll ever need....if you apply it properly there is nothing you can't fix with it....period, end of report," that person would think you nuts. The real horror is when, by shear dent of peer pressure and repetition, you get that mechanic doubting his own sanity and trying to make sensitive adjustments normally requiring jewelers screwdrivers with that bulky 9/16ths box end.
After thirteen clean years I went back out. Granted I was working only a marginal program at the time. I was also on the Dean's list at the college I was attending and working part time. Stress. I went out on Crack. I was so proud of myself that I didn't drink. At first anyway. After two years I did start drinking. My crack habit had gotten extensive and booze was the only way I could come down.
I stayed out just over thirteen years. Crack is the most scandalous drug I've ever associated with. I lost almost everything years ago to booze, but in truth booze had only taken me to my knees, Crack took me to the curb. I had little more than the clothes on my back.
I called an old AA buddy. He told me that he was going to a convention in Seattle, the city where we'd met years before. I was in L.A. at the time and had no idea how I was going to get to Seattle. I was fresh out of the hospital....my organs were in revolt bigtime. The long and short of it was I got to Seattle. I hooked up with my friend. We went to meetings at the convention. I hated them by now. I thought I'd heard it all. I hadn't thought about a higher power in years. I couldn't even bring myself to say the word in my own mine. Definitely no prayer in my life. I wasn't then, and am not now a "Christian" person. I had become a "Spiritual" person and that alone provided most of the pain I was experiencing at the moment. My buddy and I walked into a meeting and just as we got settled in a young American Indian girl got up to speak. She admitted that she only had two days clean, about what I had at the moment due to my two day trip to Seattle. My hearing was still set on major ignore mode. Something she said broke through the haze and denial. She was talking about her experience with the Great Spirit ( the higher power of her understanding) she was saying...."the spirit who moves through all things both animate & inanimate..." chicken skin the size of small pebbles rose up on my skin like I'd witnessed the Texas Chainsaw Murders and now the chain saw was coming my way. Electrified would be another way to say it. I had not been able to bring myself to say the word God even in the relative scantily of my own mind. But, all of a sudden, I had a new approach. An approach given me by a girl not of my own culture and less than half my age. In my program arrogance in days gone by I'd have dismissed anything she might have said saying myself that I'd probably spilt more booze on my tie than she'd drunk in her life....what the hell could she know????
Well, bless her heart, and thank God, she brought me the key to my own salvation, one that I'd discarded some time ago.
I did go back to the twelve step program. I got what they call dry. I wasn't drinking or sucking the pipe. I woke up one day though, after about six months clean and sober. I was on the beach at Lanikai on the island of Oahu in Hawaii. To me it was one of the most powerful of many powerful places throughout the islands. I did a lot of reflection there, and received answers when I was still enough. That's not a mystical place, "still enough" it just means that I'd been able to lower the volume on the constant "IwantIwantIwantIwantIwantIwant" that usually went on in my mind. It occurred to me that now, on my second time around, back safely in the arms of the twelve step program, I was doing exactly the same things I'd always done. I had always taken the program seriously and worked it the best that I was able, I was doing so now. The program phrase ...."doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results is a good definition of insanity" started playing in my mind. That's what I was doing and in the past it had left me with unresolved problems that actually sprung from my pre-booze years. Of course AA couldn't address them!
I'd been hearing snippets of information about a thing that people were calling "second stage recovery." The idea was that after you put down the booze and/or the drugs, and worked through the steps you might be ready to look at some of life experiences and the pain they brought that booze & drugs had become the answer to.
I started a CODA group on our side of the island. We worked through the material which was pretty varied and scarce at the time. A group of us got together and met for a year and worked through a book and related workbook put out by one of the pioneers in the field. The hardest thing I had to accept was that these issues were senior to my alcoholism and drug addiction. That was not the party line in the twelve step world. The next really difficult thing to grasp was that recovery was the natural outcome of doing this work. I look at it now and say that anyone who is willing to do the work can achieve recovery in five to six years. Some will need to work with professionals, some will not. The twelve step universe doesn't support anything but temporary reprieve. At twenty years clean and sober you are considered just as susceptible to relapse as a person with twenty days.
So, Barbara, should you go through it all again? Hell yes! But by the same token don't just automatically figure that your failure was yours because you are, after all an inferior person....damned druggie...dig it? Stay away from the drug. You can only cruise the realm of personal recovery if you are sober & drug free. Use the cow ( Docs, programs) to get clean & sober, just don't try to get silk thread or laurdry detergent from them. Ongoing sobriety and recovery is possible, you just need to look where they are...not where they are supposed to be. Good luck, God bless.........
Mickey-D
PS Because of bad hips (both replaced last year, I got hooked on Oxycontin. I'm withdrawing now, cold turkey.......I can dig it.
Thank you for your long and informative response. Yes I to have done the 12 step program and I agree that some people should explore more. I know for myself I could never talk about my personal deep down feelings in a group setting but I could with one on one theraphy or with prayer. I believe in a God and don't try to cram it down anyone's throat. I just try to live my life the best I can and treat everyone the way I would want to be treated.
I have still be snorted bags but I am trying to taper off. I even thougth of going the methodane route but I see people tied to that drug and it scares me. I would rather go cold turkey and be clean of everything than be chained to methadone. Now that is my personal choice and not for everyone. Just the one I want to make.
I also live with a user and I love him. My heart doesn't want to let go but my mind tells me to break free and clean my act up. I need to make choices in my life that I don't want to but I do know I want to be clean again. I liked being FREE and waking up feeling human not chained......Barbara
I am supposedly a very bright person with a high IQ but cannot seem to overcome this addiction. I've been to AA on several attempts to get better but always relapse. My longest period of sobriety was 11 months. I was given Vicoden ES for injuries from a car wreck and there I was again! Is it possible that some of us just can't get out of this at all?
Here I sit, half wanting to die and unable to bear the thought of living without something to make me feel "normal". Yet I want to live like a normal human being and be free of this stigma of being abnormal. I would appreciate any input about what to do as I have tried everything.
Thank you--- JBRO
Just out of frustration, I quit taking my Paxil against my doctor's advice. Within two days I noticed a big change in my mental and physical self. I find that I am more energetic and aggressive in my work. Things feel like they've been sped up and I am more "in charge" than before. Also, I think a lot less about getting high to the point that even my drinking has gotten less and less over the past two weeks. Maybe I'm too busy to think about it anymore? I heard that antidepressants may cause some people to want to abuse substances more. In my case, I believe this is so. Before Paxil, I was taking Xanax which really caused me problems. Before Xanax it was Valium. Now I am free of all of it and like it this way! I would say that this is a major turning point for me and it's not at all hopeless.
Best regards----- JBRO
I hope that everything is going well. My name is Di. I was a heroin addict for about a year. I have 2 beautifull girls, I guess thats what made me stop, they mean the world to me. I was never gready with the drug, but I did have it everyday just to feel normal. I did my own detox program at home and by myself, with no help, maybe I suceeded because I didnt want to loose my children. I have been off now for over 2 years, but still have cravings, but none strong enough to make me weeken. I am very proud of myself, but up untill recently I have substituted it with Marajuna, I have'nt smoked now for a month, and I feeling fantastic.
Anyway why I am really writing to you is because my husband is still using, we started at the same time, but he was always greader and obviously he found it harder to kick the habit, after 3 long yaers on it he decided to stop. He went into Hospital for a rapid detox program. This program is called the Pegasus program in Australia. It is done by adminstring a drug called Naaltroxine intravinsly, this drug flushes the heroin out of the body within in 2 days. then you are supplied with 3 months of Naltroxene by prescription. This drug is amazing, it helps stop cravings, and blocks the recepters to the brain, which means even if you do use heroin you will not feel the affects of it. Now my husband (ex, now) took this pill everyday religously and was like the man I married. Working, fantastic Dad again. It was great to have him back. But about a month ago he stopped taking the Naltroxene, and he's back on it again, Doctord recommend that this pill should be taken for a minimum of 6 months up to the rest of your life. So I think with Naltroxne and counselling, people can kick the habit for life. My hubby thought he didn't to take the pill anymore, he thought he was stong enough without it, he also didn't follow through withall aof the counselling. I really wished he had of because I still do love him dearly and the girls and I miss him dearly. But I dont think I will ever go through trying to help him get off it again. The pain is just to overwhelming to the people who love the heroin addicts. You just can't help, untill they ask for it, and you just never know how long that takes.
Good fortune
Di
Naltrxone tablets cost approx = Aus $50.00 week
Pegasus program casts approx = Aus $ 3000.00
I hope that everything is going well. My name is Di. I was a heroin addict for about a year. I have 2 beautiful girls, I guess thats what made me stop, they mean the world to me. I was never gready with the drug, but I did have it everyday just to feel normal. I did my own detox program at home and by myself, with no help, maybe I suceeded because I didnt want to loose my children. I have been off now for over 2 years, but still have cravings, but none strong enough to make me weeken. I am very proud of myself, but up untill recently I have substituted it with Marajuna, I have'nt smoked now for a month, and I feeling fantastic.
Anyway why I am really writing to you is because my husband is still using, we started at the same time, but he was always greader and obviously he found it harder to kick the habit, after 3 long years on it he decided to stop. He went into Hospital for a rapid detox program. This program is called the Pegasus program in Australia. It is done by adminstring a drug called Naaltroxine intravinsly, this drug flushes the heroin out of the body within in 2 days. then you are supplied with 3 months of Naltroxene by prescription. This drug is amazing, it helps stop cravings, and blocks the recepters to the brain, which means even if you do use heroin you will not feel the affects of it. Now my husband (ex, now) took this pill everyday religously and was like the man I married. Working, fantastic Dad again. It was great to have him back. But about a month ago he stopped taking the Naltroxene, and he's back on it again, Doctors recommend that this pill should be taken for a minimum of 6 months up to the rest of your life. So I think with Naltroxne and counselling, people can kick the habit for life. My hubby thought he didn't have to take the pill anymore, he thought he was stong enough without it, he also didn't follow through with all of the counselling. I really wished he had of because I still do love him dearly and the girls and I miss him dearly. But I dont think I will ever go through trying to help him get off it again. The pain is just to overwhelming to the people who love the heroin addicts. You just can't help, untill they ask for it, and you just never know how long that takes.
Good fortune
Di
Naltrxone tablets cost approx = Aus $50.00 week
Pegasus program casts approx = Aus $ 3000.00
I hope that everything is going well. My name is Di. I was a heroin addict for about a year. I have 2 beautiful girls, I guess thats what made me stop, they mean the world to me. I was never gready with the drug, but I did have it everyday just to feel normal. I did my own detox program at home and by myself, with no help, maybe I suceeded because I didnt want to loose my children. I have been off now for over 2 years, but still have cravings, but none strong enough to make me weeken. I am very proud of myself, but up untill recently I have substituted it with Marajuna, I have'nt smoked now for a month, and I feeling fantastic.
Anyway why I am really writing to you is because my husband is still using, we started at the same time, but he was always greader and obviously he found it harder to kick the habit, after 3 long years on it he decided to stop. He went into Hospital for a rapid detox program. This program is called the Pegasus program in Australia. It is done by adminstring a drug called Naaltroxine intravinsly, this drug flushes the heroin out of the body within in 2 days. then you are supplied with 3 months of Naltroxene by prescription. This drug is amazing, it helps stop cravings, and blocks the recepters to the brain, which means even if you do use heroin you will not feel the affects of it. Now my husband (ex, now) took this pill everyday religously and was like the man I married. Working, fantastic Dad again. It was great to have him back. But about a month ago he stopped taking the Naltroxene, and he's back on it again, Doctors recommend that this pill should be taken for a minimum of 6 months up to the rest of your life. So I think with Naltroxne and counselling, people can kick the habit for life. My hubby thought he didn't have to take the pill anymore, he thought he was stong enough without it, he also didn't follow through with all of the counselling. I really wished he had of because I still do love him dearly and the girls and I miss him dearly. But I dont think I will ever go through trying to help him get off it again. The pain is just to overwhelming to the people who love the heroin addicts. You just can't help, untill they ask for it, and you just never know how long that takes.
Good fortune
Di
Naltrxone tablets cost approx = Aus $50.00 week
Pegasus program casts approx = Aus $ 3000.00
IN NEED FOR HELP OR SUGGESTIONS
LISA
can anyone help me find a place for him to get help ?
he is on medication ; depakote , any suggestions?????????
Lonely...