Day 23. I am sinking into depression

[hope2008]

I saw him on Monday night, I couldn't help myself. Thought it might help but the feedback I got on Tuesday via mail showed just more talk and procrastination.

He said he had been mistaken in thinking that addiction was equated with daily use and that he realised that although confined to weekends he could see it was not healthy. I HOPED he meant it but there is still no word back on meetings- only that he should go to them and see meetings people. He told me that the weekend prior he had spent £510 on coke. I asked him did he not think this was not normal and dangerous and certainly not recreational? He agreed.

I asked him to please tell me to let him go as I was so confused at the moment. I said this was because I didn't feel that we were parting because the love was gone but because of drugs. He said he didn't want to say this as he did love me and wanted to be with me.

I was also confused as in his message on Tuesday he used "we" a couple of times instead of "I" when talking about himself. Prior to seeing him on Monday night we spoke on the phone and he said he hadn't been able to wake his friend all day (for some reason, he didn't need to talk about this) and when I left the house 5 mins later who did I see drive past but him and this friend....He said the friend turned up just after the call and had lost his phone, thought it was there and then asked for a lift home but I don't believe it. All I can say about this friend is he has as big an appetite for coke as him and is also an ex heroin addict but now he only snorts coke and smokes it. It's true this friend pops in to see him often at work but for some reason I just don't believe that he wasn't there whilst I was on the phone....

I cried on Tuesday morning when he left and asked him when he would come home - that is to himself.

I started taking anti-depressants on Tuesday as I think I am near to a breakdown. I have been down in my life before as we all get from time to time but I have always bounced back, always been a strong girl but now I feel nothing but broken. I feel helpless and even more so now that I am not in the same house. Part of me wishes I had continued to live with him such is the pain of being away from him and the worry about him. Now at work I don't even talk to anyone but keep my head down and try to keep a lid on my emotions because no one would understand. I feel so so weak, I feel broken. I feel unloved, unwanted and uncared for. I feel helpless to help him and worry about him and how he is going to cope without me and I feel this is only going to get worse as his addiction deepens.

Tonight I came home with plans of doing things and got a notification of a thread he had replied to on facebook in relation to what people would rather do than listen to a certain artist. It said: "we would rather s*** in your mothers c*** and sniff your fathers ashes from her a****** covered in s*** than listen to this artist". I read it and cried and it has sent me in fear and depression again. This is not the language of the man I love and once again it is written in the plural when he is talking about himself. I feel like I am paranoid but I am starting to wonder if he hasn't slipped from the coke to heroin so big are the changes now happening in him and this constant use of we instead of I. Am I being stupid? Also, his father is dead and I found it really sick how his mind could even contemplate bringing father's ashes into the equation. Please, am I going absolutely mad or is he actually really really sick. Why am I so upset by this one message?

I don't want to take these tablets but I need something to help me through. They are not working yet apart from to at least make me sleep, which is a help itself.

I am so so scared for him. On Monday night I asked him if he was not scared about continuing to take all this coke because it makes him suicidal and he said that he didn't feel suicidial on it anymore, that he had learned that it is just a comedown and that he just needs to get through it. I don't understand this statement as surely the feeling would stay wouldn't it?

Please, please I need someone who has walked his path to offer me some advice, insight anything. I feel so alone and unsure this evening.

Thanks for listening. I know I am going to be back a lot in the next few weeks.

[anvilhead]

ah hon, he's an addict. as simplistic as that sounds, he's a screwed up dope fiend. and from the little you've shared about him in this post, this is NOT an addict of the mindset to want to quit. drugs suck period. coke is evil. crack IMHO is even worse cuz it grabs you so quick, and the high is almost instantaneous and it just turns people into freaks.

the best suggestion i've got is to limit contact with this man. get off his facebook thing, quit going by his house, quit taking his calls. you're dealing with someone who is probably high dang near 24/7 in some form or another....ya might as well go hit the zoo and chat it up with the penquins...really, believe me when i say right now your continued closeness and involvement implies consent to a degree to his behaviors.....you're still VERY much involved in his twisted world. is he in a bad place? YES. is it your fault? NO. can YOU rescue him? NO.

[hope2008]

I'm not on his facebook. I took him off as i knew I didn't need to see or hear what he is doing but for some reason it forwarded me a message because he had replied to one of my friends. I don't want to think he is now doing something all the time but I fear that he is due to all the changes and his lack of love for me and even easy acceptance of losing my love. I also know he has moved in with someone who loves coke and who is often not there in the week....It has progressed since my first post hasn't it? I am so empty I cant find words only tears. Thank you for sharing with me.

[Abundance]

I am in your shoes..... going through it.

What has given me strength is to separate him from the addiction. I have to let go of him because that addiction lies with him. I am allergic to addiction.... period. When he is using - in active addiction - it is not my guy. So my boundary is to not pay notice to that "other guy". Does it hurt.. YES! But as soon as I figured out that the more I give love to my guy while he is in active addiction..... the more my soul is being taken away by a drug I don't even use!!!!!!! So . just like you are taking this anti-depressant to fight your allergic reaction to this addiction - you too have to get to the point that you don't want this drug ... just as you don't want him using this drug.

Do you get what I'm saying?

I also think about how I literally am hurting him by loving him / enabling him in active addiction ...... I am loving him to DEATH! I am losing myself to his demons!

I just have to pull myself together and say STOP!!!!!!!

I am at the point now that I can see just how much this drug is hurting me. I am not able to just stop taking it... I am not able to do anything except stay clear from it. Which means staying clear from him when he is using PERIOD. And then it's like a snow ball effect..... I start to feel lighter and while I do go through those stages of grief... I recognize they are just that ..... stages!

[anvilhead]

drugs are weird hope....there was a long long time way back in the day when i could lots of coke, up all night, manage to drag it in to work the next day...every weekend......then the whole basing thing started and one of our buddies was determined to make me his base hit protege........anyway, when the time came to up and quit, i up and quit, seriously, no problem........then about gosh almost six years ago now, when the guy i was just starting to see/hang with/whatever the proper term is when they spend every night at your place, announced he smoked crack and i thought, oh heck, been there done that, bring it on, i'd rather have you HERE with me.......well boy wasn't THAT dumb??? that sh*t HAD me inside of 3 months.........of relatively occasional use........now thank God i've always been kind of a lightweight......sure i partied my brains out, but i never went completely OVER the edge ya know? but still i went from thinking hey, this stuff is great and wow you sure can't beat the SEX....to waking up with it being the first thing on my mind......craving it, NEEDING it.........next thing ya know we're doing it back to back to back nights, and then every other day, on and off, on and off.........and my bf who had been doing it for YEARS went from being ok to one day completely FREAKED about the windows, and certain we were being watched, and hiding behind the couch, and crouched in the closet clutching the pipe........and panting and sweating and pacing and peeking out the blinds and all kinds of sick sh*t and we did that for years........my long winded point is once it starts to snowball, it picks up speed and becomes an almost unstoppable force.

only reason we were able to quit is cuz we were ready to quit, sick and tired of it all, sick of being completely ruled by a bunk drug.........

[Abundance]

He is inviting you into his drama........ you are allowing yourself into his drama... this poem is a sticky up top here of this forum, but I thought I'd copy/paste it here for you to read. Even though my guy can't tell me this - I know that *this* is what I have to do.

IF YOU LOVE ME, LET ME FALL

IF you love me let me fall all by myself. Don't try to spread a net out to catch me, don't throw a pillow under my ass to cushion the pain so I don't have to feel it, don't stand in the place I am going to land so that you can break the fall, (allowing yourself to get hurt instead of me)

Let me fall as far down as my addiction is going to take me, let me walk the valley alone all by myself, let me reach the bottom of the pit....trust that there is a bottom there somewhere even if you can't see it. The sooner you stop saving me from myself, stop rescuing me, trying to fix my broken-ness, trying to understand me to a fault, enabling me.....The sooner you allow me to feel the loss and consequences, the burden of my addiction on my shoulders and not yours....the sooner I will arrive....and on time....just right where I need to be...me, alone all by myself in the rubble of the lifestyle I lead...resist the urge to pull me out because that will only put me back at square one.

It I am allowed to stay at the bottom and live there for awhile, I am free to get sick of it on my own, free to begin to want out, free to look for a way out, and free to plan how I will climb back up to the top. In the beginning as I start to climb out....I just might slide back down, but don't worry I might have to hit bottom a couple more times before I make it out safe and sound.

Don't you see?? Don't you know?? You can't do this for me...I have to do it for myself, but if you are always breaking the fall how am I ever supposed to feel the pain that is part of the driving force to want to get well. It is my burden to carry, not yours.

I know you love me and that you mean well and a lot of what you do is because you don't know what to do and you act from your heart and from knowledge of what is best for me....but if you truly love me, let me go my own way, make my own choices be they bad or good.

Don't clip my wings before I can learn to fly....nudge me out of your safety net....trust the process and pray for me.....that one day I will not only fly, but maybe even soar.

[hope2008]

Yeah. He is paranoid now too. Noticed that at a festival maybe a month ago. A guy was just a little bit funny with him and he went on about it all day and all night and in the evening was even freaked by the crowds around us. Even when we were back and just walking in the street he started to be edgy about people passing us or if indoors about regular sounds of the house. It is robbing him of any confidence he had.


He also told me that he had broken our arrangements to see each other (last wed, then thurs, then fri) because he was so busy with work. This work I know took place and he said he did it because he needed to buy a new engine for his bus....but then on and on Monday night he told me he had sold a mixing desk for a few hundred pound......he is still really busy with all his other work outisde his regular job so he has an income but now that I think about it if he had already spent the whole of last week doing overtime and jobs all over the place why has he now sold a mixing desk? When I tried to encourage him to sell all his equipment to get rid of his debt with the bank he said he couldn't as he needed to earn a living from it and that it was half someone elses and now he is selling it off at random. I think that the more I think about it the more I realise that he is either using coke more regularly or in larger quantities than he is admitting - or he is using something else.

[anvilhead]

Simon says take a couple giant steps BACKWARDS!!!

[hope2008]

When he stayed on Monday night too he was saying the room was really hot and sweated all night in the bed. He has been sweating for a while tho even before we moved into separate houses so I just assumed that it was the coke....am i jumping the gun?

[Abundance]

Hope..... he is using.... without a doubt. Do not doubt yourself or make yourself feel crazy second guessing yourself. He is using.

The hardest thing for me when my guy is using is that he is doing something behind my back..... experiencing parts of life that are so dark - that he is ultimately wanting to hide from me - but the thing is.... it's parts of his life he can't share with me! That is one of the things that hurts the most. Listening to all of the "stories"... the lies .... they make me CRAZY! They make me doubt what is really the truth. The truth lies within you - he is sick - he has a disease that he is not treating. He is in such great denial - which is also giving you denial of what is really going on.

Focus on how you are feeling..... do you really want to give power to this?

[anvilhead]

he's weirding out no matter what right? he's obviously ON something right? you guys moved to separate pads on purpose right? try to worry a little less about his thoughts, his actions, what type of drug he's doing, how he's reacting to it, and just stay a little more in your own shoes. you can't really enjoy hanging out with somebody whose jacked all the time can ya? if your presence in his life was THE ANSWER it'd be totally different now right? he's gonna do what he's gonna do, you can either grab a front row seat and like a Gallagher concert probably get ook all over ya, OR yu can get the hell out of the way.........

[hope2008]

I just want it to stop before we both get even more sick. I just don't want him to end up back on the heroin because I don't think he would survive a third habit of that. Regardless of heroin I don't want him to continue on the coke because he is insatiable and I worry even that could end in tragedy. I want him to acknowledge my pain. I want to feel free from worry and fear. I want to be able to tell him he is a selfish pig. I want to be able to wake up and smile again and look forward to my day. I don't want to miss him anymore and feel like my life is empty without him. I want to feel loved and wanted and secure. I want to know that my partner is sincere and honest and do what he says. I don't want secrets and unreliability. I want to get my strength back and my optimism and a laugh that is genuine and not feined just to fool people into thinking I am having fun/am ok. I want to think about me and my life and my plans and be happy.
That's what I want. But all I can manage right now is to get myself in and out of work to pay my bills and the rest of my time is spent feeling like a see-saw. What I want the most is for him to get better. I can handle not being with him, it's the uncertainty of who he is and where he is going that I find difficult. I would have preferred to lose him to another woman than drugs because with drugs there is no closure.

[anvilhead]

if there was anything YOU could do, you'd do it in a hearbeat right? but it's not YOUR call........this is HIS choice, HIS road.......and yes it is DAMN hard to "watch" someone you care about go down that road......

he simply CANNOT be who you wish him to be. he is who he is, exactly, right now this minute. right now his primary character is that of an addict, fully engaged in body mind and spirit. and that means there is NO ROOM for you....drugs ARE the other woman, more powerful, more intoxicating, more alluring and captivating..........i remember how hank would say he'd hated to love it and loved to hate it....and if the pipe was suitable for mating, he'd marry it.......sick stuff

[hope2008]

Thank you for sharing with me tonight. I am still upset but don't feel alone. I am going to go to bed now and hopefully sleep. Speak to you tomorrow.
Thanks again

[hope2008]

Slept really bad last night, having nightmares about his dealer looking for me to get me. Don't get that.
Opened up my mail this morning and for some reason there's a mail from my ex which he sent on Thursday but which only arrived today. I am not going mad it really only arrived today but it was sent on Thurs. In it he is asking after me and hoping I am ok and telling me has been good but that since Tuesday evening he has been horizontal due to putting his back out and that now (Thurs) he is back at work although feelig bad and doesn't kow how he is going to make it though the weekend with all the work and miles he has to drive with his band. Coherent. Yet Friday morning he puts that gross message up. It doesn't seem to be the same person. Why am I so confused by this? Did he really put his back out? Should I feel bad for doubting him? On Tuesday via mail I told him if he didn't show me a positive sign he was sorting himself out I would have to forget him because I was now so depressed I had to admit defeat and on Thursday he seems to have been trying to show this via his mail and yet Friday's message seems to be from a man who is def not himself.

???

[hope2008]

I called his mum and we had a long talk. I told her everything about recent days. She has been keeping her distance from him as she said at his age he is now an adult and she has no control over him. When I told her about the 500 odd pound on coke over weekend she said she feared we are at a stage now where a simple meeting wouldn't help and that he will need rehab again. When I told her about the message she was as disturbed as me and wondering if he actually wrote it or one of his cronies if they were all high together as it certainly wasn't the language of her son. I said it was at 8 in the morning and I didn't think so. She was equally as upset due to the fact his father is no longer alive.

She said I really must let go now. I agree.

I just wrote a very long mail to him and at the end included the "let me fall" poem, so beautiful in its simplicity it made me cry. I feel I have said all I can say. I know I have said this in past posts but today I know, epsecially in light of my current mental state, that I simply cannot support him anymore in addiction - only in recovery and a serious attempt at it. That means not just meetings but rehab. I fear so much that a third serious relapse could cost him his life as does his mum but I have also realised I have no power or control anymore. It has taken a long while but I now accept that.

In writing to him all that I did I feel that if it does take this road I can at least be at peace with myself in knowing I did all I physically could, that in the end he just chose to self-destruct. It hurts so profoundly to be in this place considering where we were last year but I now acknowledge I played no part in this and this would have happened with or without me in the equation.

I pray he hasn't progressed onto anything other than coke. His mum said that as he is clearly in self-destruct even if it ends not being life-threatning it could go on for months and so I need to detach. I agree

I felt so powerless and weak this week but strangely enough in admitting my weakness it has made me realise the strength I do have. I think when we are most weak (as is the case with our addicted loved ones) is when we too are in denial. Admitting my weakness has helped more than I ever possibly thought it could because I can now start to slowly rebuild myself. I guess I too didn't realise I needed to hit bottom - and I am not even in addiction. We always tell ourselves to keep it together and actually in trying to do that we actually make ourselves more ill. I have realised it is ok to not be ok and in admitting that I actually feel more ok.

I have been through all the emotions and feel nothing now. I cannot be shocked anymore, I can not feel let down anymore, abandoned, any of those things. I feel only a sense of sadness and loss and disappointment. I know I will not contact him anymore.

I pray for any of you that are in a similar situation to read any of my old posts and avoid any fruther pain. You really do not make a difference, you simply can't. What you can do is get out of the situation tho. I know it hurts and you feel responsible and everything but the truth is once an addict is back in addiction they see, think and feel nothing for you in their heart aside from when they are coming down and remourseful for maybe a day or so until the next time they get high.

I am going to keep coming back. I hope it is ok to keep talking.

xx

[Momsrainbow]

JMO I think the hardest thing was to finally realize that we cannot help our addict-no matter what we say or do. Once you are able to accept this, life does get easier and a lot better. I read what addicts do and let me fall so many times I can recite them both.

It doesn't sound like he wants to get better-just saying what will keep you somewhat happy.

Praying for the best for you. MY RAH is in prison over meth and sounds extremely well, but I have my doubts.

[rozied]

Dear Hope, I read all of the posts above & the one where you said what you wanted out of a relationship struck me as oh so normal, but you are not dealing with a normal guy here. You are looking for things from him that he can never give you, at least not as long as he keeps using.
Everyone has given you really good advice. Coke is bad, crack is worse, until HE decides he doesn't want to use anymore there is nothing you can do. Sad but true!
Diane

[Abundance]

Hope... this is oh so very true.....

You really do not make a difference, you simply can't. What you can do is get out of the situation tho. I know it hurts and you feel responsible and everything but the truth is once an addict is back in addiction they see, think and feel nothing for you in their heart aside from when they are coming down and remourseful for maybe a day or so until the next time they get high.

[Hangin' In]

(((((((((((((((Hope2008))))))))))))))))))

Have you tried going to face to face meetings, Al Anon or Nar Anon? I did that, added meetings to help me. And kept reading and posting on this board. Both helped change MY thinking which was so screwed up. It's a family disease and I had been sucked right into it.

Sounds like you've been sucked in, too. Maybe you can find a meeting and get twice the support....this place and face to face recovering people who understand what you are going through.

Hugs and prayers for you,
Hangin' In