Onewithwings

I have 6 days clean and for whatever reason it's bothering me that the last drug I ever did was crack. I just don't like that fact. Maybe that itself is my bottom-- the fact that I did such a drug in the first place. I'd say "it's not my drug of choice" but who am I kidding?! My drug of choice was whatever you had. I had no morals or standards when it came to drugs. If there's a drug I didn't do, it was only because I hadn't run into it yet. I would do anything that was offered to me, pretty much. I always thought crack was the bottom of the barrel. I'm not sure why exactly, it just seemed "dirty" to me. Is this just a pride problem? Maybe it's a good thing. I just came from the streets where that stuff was rampant, EVERYONE was smoking it, it seemed. I just followed along because it was something to get high off of. Still though, it's bothering me that, if I manage to stay clean (which I am more serious about than ever after what I've been through the last few weeks) crack will forever be the last drug I did. WHY does this bother me. Has anyone else ever felt this way?

Lenina

OnewithWings,

I never did crack but I think I can recognize the Addictive Voice. It's Giving you a reason to do some other drug. But I'm sure the real you knows you'd just be hopping on that same old cycle.

You might read through the AVRT thread on the Secular Connections board. Lots of good stuff there!

Hang in there!

Love from Lenina

northbelle

Yeah I can understand the "stigma" attached to the label. It conjures up some pretty ugly images! I know I used to look in fear and revulsion at the places my drug threatened to take me! And then I went there...I became that very thing I did not think I would ever become!
Thank god we are not there today. A addict is a addict. The end result of long term crack cocaine looks the same on everyone. ..
There is does not have to be any shame in our game. But it is always there for the taking should we decide to use again!!
Do some reading up on the true nature of addiction. It is some deep and deadly stuff. Very real and powerful . I have total respect for the dis-ease . Through years of living it and now working with people in variouse stages of the illness.. It affects mind body and soul. Seek to understand rather than be understood.
I hope you get the awesome glimpse into the woman that you really are when you are not rockin with the pipe... You are a beautiful person ....and you have lots of folks in recovery here to support you! Getting and staying clean takes alot of work!

Post back !! Glad to see you here!!!

love norty

Impurrfect

(((OWW))) - Crack WAS my DOC, but only after I'd abused alcohol for a while, then opiates for a while, then discovered crack. It was a drug I looked down on, a drug I feared (saw a couple people die from it when I was still a nurse...and they were young). Yet still, I became a die-hard crack addict.

I actually used to think the same thing about heroin users...a long time ago. When I recently asked my stepsister what it was that brought her down so hard, she said heroin. I said "oh"..not in shame, not in disgust, but empathy because I know how hard that is to kick from people here. Before my own crack use? I'd have probably been a bit horrified.

There are stigmas attached to many drugs. However, the more I read here? The more I see the PEOPLE behind the drug and it really doesn't matter to me any more. I can't tell you how many times I've heard someone at work call another worker "worthless crackhead". Lovely. I just say a "thank you it's not ME they're talking about" and pray that they never have to find out what it's like first-hand or with someone they love...they will change their tune if it happens.

Hugs and prayers,

Amy

Onewithwings

That's the thing, I am usually SO non-judgemental, except when it comes to myself. My first sponsor was a crack addict, and she was a wonderful person. I dated a guy from the program who was once a die-hard heroin-and-dilaudid addict, and I thought nothing of it, never judged him for it... why am I so much harder on myself than I am on anyone else??

Captain1

I think its part of the process of getting clean seams the shadow or beast tries to play games with our head.

5 steps forward 2 steps back for me. My emotions and thought processes were all over the place on a daily bases. I think it's still my body trying to look it every spot, sliver in my head to try and use.

Push it out! know one cares what drug you used they care that you are not!

Threshold

We sure are good at crazy thinking...must be an addict thing. I will lay in bed and analyze all sorts of stuff and argue both sides and play judge and jury.

Yes, my addict...the one that lives in the attic of my brain, is a sensitive soul, and a perfectionist, and has very set ideas about things, and gets tremendously insecure and upset over odd details.

So I am not at all surprised that your thinking has taken that turn. Sounds very familiar.

The thing is my addict is up there raving in my attic trying to get sober me to make it feel better, and it tells sober me all sorts of horror stories and justifications and ratinalizations and drives sober me nuts, until sober me starts thinking it's worth doing anything just to shut the addict up. But the addict will get louder if I give into it.

Sometimes I sing her to sleep. Sober me now distracts the addict!

There are things I did using that irritate me, and things I never got around to and now never will that irritate me. I mean, damn...maybe I stopped too soon...

Crazy thoughts, brain farts, open the window and let them out and let some fresh air in. They don't mean much.

My job right now, and boy oh boy has this been hitting home for me lately, is to get to know who I am. And that's a process that can't be forced. I have to listen respectfully to what my mind is saying, thinking, feeling. But I don't have to make a rush judgment or decision.

I was always so busy judging before that I never even really heard the facts.

I have a number of relationships in my life that I wish didn't end the way they did...with people, substances, jobs, places...but there is no going back, no do overs. I am learning to practice acceptance and focus more on what I am experiencing now, than on what already went down, or what I am afraid may or may not happen tomorrow.

cris1

Onewithwings,

I have. A LOT!! It was May, 2004 when I found myself on a river, trying to kill myself, coming down off a crack high. I couldn't believe I could stoop so low. It took me almost 8 years to forgive myself. It was why I kept relapsing. Now, finally, in the last 8 months I have forgiven myself. I can't control what I used, how much I used, or even who I used in the process of my using. The only thing I can do is know that all of it is past tense. I am no longer that person. And I don't have to use anything no matter what today. All substances can be a bottom. I have the choice today to not use. So do you.

Thanks for posting what you did. Please feel free to reply to this. I wish you well.

CR

masshole88

I wouldn't sweat it. I remember I swore I would never do crack, like I thought it was some hell drug. Well all drugs are hell, and about the only common ones Ive never tried are ketamine and meth, because I havent run into them. Heroin was my downfall, it was the last drug I did. That bothers me. It should bother you. Not because it was crack, but because it means you're finally recovering. Good for you. All hard drugs are the same...a waste of time, money, happiness and health. Just my two cents.

finaltime

Honestly there is no changing what you did in your past, the only options to change now are your future. Live in the present now, take things one day, one moment, sometimes one step at a time. The feelings you are having are sooooo normal...I went from being the high school president, star volleyball player in college, to a daily pill popper, weekend coke head, acid user, even tried glass in a Taco Bell bathroom!!! I never went down hill in other peoples eyes, but I sure did in mine...I am always going to have those memories pop up of stuff that I did in the past, and I feel now like WHO THE HECK WAS THAT PERSON. Then the moment I get bored, or hear about pills, or even see a pills commercial on TV I want to feed that dragon! Even a few weeks back at work a coworker past around some Altoids. I was thinking, "Wow I wish this was MY whole box of pills, this meeting would be so much better!" It never ends....Don't feel guilty, you can't change that. And crack is bad, but it is just coke cooked! LOL and look how many of us have done coke!