I never thought...

Ty.

On Netflix, i recently watched a documentary called Breaking the Habit. Dont recall if i posted anything about it here on HF, but i do remember that i enjoyed the documentary and could relate with the antagonists plight. The Ibogaine segment was the most interesting for me. I knew a little about this and film gave some good information.

 

Man I don't know what kind of cannabis you're growing but do know even in nice, friendly Mendocino, Humboldt or Oakland guns are intrinsic to any successful grow-op and you're out of your goddamn mind to not post security details. That seems rather universal.

Heroin is wonderful, but typically really I nod on either 180mg oxycodone and 24mg hydromorphone daily, 300mg morphine sulphate or 80mg oxymorphone in place of oxycodone. Heroin is a special pleasure for me and as such I use it just a few times or more monthly. All the same I'm typically nodding. Crackheads spook me out. That stuff twists logic in two, especially if broken down with ascorbic acid and slammed.

Thing is, I smoke about as much weed and pop as many benzos as I do opiates. I'm not very chill otherwise.

Watching my girlfriend die after our wreck on the way back from a drug run to TJ fucked my life up really bad. The first six months after the fact I was a zombified corpse on enough morphine to kill a horse; that is what kicked off my habit. The ease with which forgetting the tragedy only came in a near dead stupor. I'm not proud of it, it just is.

I have the legal right to cultivate 99 cannabis plants myself in my county. Alameda county is rather generous. I can be carrying I believe two lbs. at any given moment too. I forget but I think I can have four lbs. cured at my home with proper papers posted in visible locations. Weed is big biz here.

 

So I finsihed reading this. I had to wait a few days from when I first saw it since I had to be extremely jacked on amphetamines to put in the effort to read it. Like I said, the text formatting for long, Internet passages is difficult on the eyes.

But I am glad I read it. This type of inner dialogue is not foreign to me whatsoever given my own Hell with Schizoaffective Disorder (basically Schizophrenia plus suicidal Depression) since I was 12 or so. Sometimes I wonder how I made it until 19 before losing it completely. At least I could finish college before my worst days. But I am also happy that this type of inner torment is largely over for me. The last year and a half has been hard, but I have stayed out of the mental ward.

When I was young, I never understood why they treat mental health and drug addiction in the same facilities. Then when I was 20 or so, at my worst, I finally understood. Unfortunately, I had a conundrum: I could kill myself and end the horrible psychoses coupled with the inability to feel any pleasure or happiness OR I could try drugs (other than the psychiatric medicine I was taking). I started with stimulants (which I got my psychiatrist to give me after begging him...and not having a psychotic break for six months) and fell in love.

I was able to feel joy again and I was happy to have not killed myself. Things were still HORRIBLE though. Maybe one out of seven days was half decent now compared to continual hell on earth. Then I hurt my shoulder and was given Hydrocodone. I knew within two hours that THIS was the stuff for me.

It actually stopped all of my mental illness symptoms. Blah...blah...fast forward. I hit another conundrum: I knew I needed opioids to get back to being a normal person (that is, not locked up in a psych ward for the rest of my life...) but didn't have enough physical pain to get anything stronger than Tramadol and occasional Hydrocoodne. So I read that treatment resistant depression was being treated at Harvard with Suboxone, a partial opioid agonist. So I said "Hell...it may not be as good as Hydrocodone, but it might allow me to not kill myself." So I got the balls to ask a Suboxoen doctor to give it to me for mental illness.

It has worked great since then. I haven't done any "real" opioids in almost two years. See...my REAL addiction is to stimulants! I sort of "forgot" that I was slowly getting more and more hardcore in-to stimulants for the years between my little Concerta 18 mg script and the point where I was stable on Suboxone (and the other psychiatric medicine). Oops.

So during the last six months, I have been dealing with trying to curb my amphetamine abuse. I still have a lot of trouble stopping the Adderall train once I start it. It seems to only go crazy if I snort the stuff. I have basically put a "no snorting" policy into effect this month, and I am doing much better and for the first month since I was on Concerta, I will not run out of Adderall early. Of course, nights like tonight DO still happen, but I plan ahead for the occasional binge so I can still come out without running out.

Anyways, know that I read your post and took it all in...and felt it. And know that I actually DO know your pain, except my abuse is more with stimulants than opioids...kind of the inverse of you! To me, getting put on Bupropion for stimulant abuse maintainable therapy holds the loathed position that Suboxone and Methadone hold in your paradigm.

 

Dang etkearne, I wish the inner torment would stop for me. I often have disturbing dialogue going on with myself essentially convincing myself not to hurt myself, then I go ahead and accidentally overdose now and then. I've blacked out on too much blow and MDMA. I've blacked out smoking fentanyl. It's always the same. Either waking up with people surrounding me or waking up in an ICU. I've unfortunately tried committing suicide too. That was an all-time low. In fact, I had to stand trial for a competency hearing after that to deem if I was fit to take care of myself. Rehab that time was just another way to get new local sources of dope and hold it together well enough to get out in five days. That is the longest I've been off shit like morphine for about ten years.

I also get prescribed both bupropion and Dexedrine (I like my dextroamphetamine without any levoamphetamine myself, but I guess you're right since I don't need to take either to stay sane). My dope habit REALLY kicked off seriously hardcore when I got out of rehab a few years back though. I'd dabbled with needles a bit the year before rehab, and though I didn't get back into needles as bad as it is now, in Texas and Washington I went wild with dope and have lost two doctors even. My psychiatrist is aware of all this, including my use of psychedlics which she approved of unofficially when she noted how well rested I was after a trip on iprocin compounded with loads of Adderall.

It's fucking hard holding it together on days like today. I naturally haven't slept in about four days. Insomnia really pushes my buttons.

Honestly it truly saddens me that anyone. Anyone, can relate so well to what I wrote. Quoted in that dialogue is a song by The Dandy Warhols and three songs by The Velvet Underground, and since I can relate to those cautionary tales, even laugh at shit like the lyrics to Waiting for my Man, then since those lyrics date back to the 60's, I'd wager far too many can relate all too well also. That's what I mean. It is not as if I want detrimental addictions, but those fleeting moments of respite from myself make it worthwhile unfortunately. I don't even need to ask if you know what I mean; I'm sure you do.

 

hahaha40-Even if you may not be able to read this at the moment...Best of luck on rehab.Hope it works.

 

i can't really relate very much to you guys, but just wanted to let you know how much these soul-bearing posts help me to understand and have compassion for people who suffer from addiction. too many people see addicts as something other than human, and it upsets me so much. there isn't enough compassion out there.

 

It is posts like this that keep me posting on The Forums. I feel a sense of true solidarity with folks like you and the OP. In real life, I don't know any other addicts OR any peers with serious mental illness (bipolar or schizophrenia-spectrum) so it makes ME feel human to talk to you guys.

You are all the best!

 

Hey everyone.

Thanks to the couple people who wished me luck before I set out for Memphis. I am clearly back now and my time spent there helped me in a pretty decent way. Learnt a fair amount from the program and even more from all the people I was with there over that month and few days. I just re-read this thread and it is very very powerful still. About 30 mins after I wrote that post I bought more dope and was shooting it all night. Got a little sleep and was still fucked up going to the airport and basically got sober as I arrived in Memphis.

Thank ya for your support here people.