Words of encouragment!!!

This was in my journal but with so many new "faces" here i thought i would post it!

For anyone that is new to this battle let me share some things I have learned and offer you some support. Let me start by saying welcome and good for you!! There are so many new people here its great. Actually it goes both ways if you think about it. It’s a shame that anyone has a problem with addiction but its great that we all came across this site. This forum has truly been a life saver to many, myself included. When I came here in December of 2007 I was just a few weeks clean. I was lonely and depressed. When I found this forum I thought I would drop in and ask a few questions and maybe even get a little help. I never thought that I would still be here over 7 months later, still clean and even helping others. I have gotten some of the greatest help and support here and even along the way made some truly great friends. Some I hope for life. You kinda come full circle here. What I meen by that is..you come here down and out and asking for help then before you know it you are the one offering the help and support. To me I kinda feel like its my pay back to this community for everything that was given to me. Still when something happens or I am craving or just having a bad day I come on here and post. Its nice to vent to others that know exactly how your feeling and what you are going threw. You don’t feel like you are being judged and by no meens do you feel like you have to explain yourself. Everyone here has been where you are, no matter what point in this journey you are. That’s another good point I want to make. Post Post Post!!! You will not believe how much it really helps to get it out and not keep all your feeling and emotions all bottled up! You have to truly want to get clean in order to stay clean. It is one of the hardest things you will ever do but in the end it is so worth it. You will see!! Yes you will feel like **** for a while, about a week, but it really does improve everyday. Kinda like a bad flu. Just try to keep yourself busy. Watch a funny movie, read a good book or take a walk. I remember someone telling me to take a walk and I was like ..yeh right! That’s the last thing I wanted to do but I tried it. AT least right now its warm out when I was going threw WD’s it was December and so cold..i hate the cold. I got all bundled up, I actually resembled the little kid Randy from The Christmas Story, and took that walk. I will tell you what, when I got back home I did feel a little better and it also kept my mind off of how crappy I was feeling. You will eventually find what works best for you and when you do stick with it.
Just always keep in mind that we didn’t do this to ourselves over night so its not going to be overnight that we fix ourselves either. It’s a journey. It’s a journey that is so worth it in the end. To wake up each day and have your life back and feeling good about yourself and what you have done. There is no greater feeling! We all have those off days here and there where you feel down and yucky but the way I look at it is that everyone, even those who are not addicts, have off days. Its just another reminder that we are returning back to a normal way of life.
I wish everyone here, newbies and those that have been here for a while the best of luck. I am so happy that I have all of you.

Hugs to you all,
Jen

[catburgler]

Nice post.  Good luck to you.  May God bless your family.

[bandnmom]

Good luck to you and yours also catburgler!

[scaredmom330]

Great post Jen...take care my friend and God bless you, you are definitely one of a kind...


Friends
Karen

[Korley]

Thanks for the post and am so happy about your 7 months. It is so true about helping others b/c I think in order to keep what we have, we have to give it away. Also I have to remember that my worst day sober is much better than my best day using. Thanks again and keep it up!

[wilkie530]

i've just read ur post it was so great to go thru it makes me so much stronger after readind them im struggling a wee bit of late but im rolling on to 3 days clean from everything not feelng so great but when i read some of the posts in ere it makes you realise ur not on your own anyway my battle cotinues .
thanks for the post it helped me no end

[PerciMan]

That was a great post.  Thanks.  I'm 4 days out from doing 10/325 oxy's, 4 pills a day for 1 year.  I decided I've had enough.  Reality set in for me and I realized that there was no way I could do this for the rest of my life.  Although I found myself loving the feeling it gave me, I would always try to stay in control and only do enough to take the pain away, or at least dull it a little.  But what happened is that my tolerance level increased and I found myself up to 4 pills a day.  A couple of times I did 5 or 6 a day, and that's when I said enough's enough.

And so, I'm in my cold turkey detox for the past 4 days, using more or less the Thomas Recipe, and I'm sorry to say it still feels like hell.  Since I have nothing to base it on, I suppose I'm doing better than if I didn't do the recipe.  I don't want to even imagine what that would feel like.  I think I would really have to go into the hospital for the rapid detox program.

But what I want to really say is that I'm doing it and not giving up.  And even though my wife has 4 pills left of her own that she needs for her headaches (she doesn't even go through a 30 pill bottle in a year), I'm determined to not go near them.  It's turned into a fight of hell that I'm not going to loose.  Quite frankly I'm hoping that the better days are not far in front of me.  My new metaphor is that taking percocet is like flying knowing that eventually your wings (percocet) will be plucked and you'll come down crashing hard to the ground.  However, on the way down you grow new wings (natural endorphins), and those wings are your natural wings.  And you use those new wings to come out of the fall and fly to a better and more natural life.  Sounds nice, Ae!

I didn't know about this withdrawal process.  If I did, I would have asked my doc for another way.  I have 4 herniated disks in my neck and I can feel the pain coming back, on top of my withdrawal.  I must admit, it was nice to not be in pain for the past year, but I just can't continue this charade any longer.  At any moment my doctor could cut me off and using will be over anyway.  I think it's best I end this myself and seek out an alternative to control my pain.  Although I feel narcotics should be banned because of the pain of withdrawal, I must admit it was wonderful.

Well, best of luck to me and everyone else that's going through this.
And thanks again for the post.  Very inspiring.

David