This weekend was so emotional, I need a vacation from it
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Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Palm Springs, Ca
Posts: 24
This weekend was so emotional, I need a vacation from it
Ugh, where to begin.
Well since finding out about a week ago that my boyfriend had fallen off the heroin wagon into the methadone sea which included lying and stealing from me, I learned that I am very codependant among other things. Went to my first Alanon meeting and church service, and started readind Melodie Beattie...only a thousand more steps to go.
Where am I going with this...the weekend was so emotionally overloaded it's hard to know where to start.
I guess with some questions. My bf subscribes to an online forum, one specifically devoted to opiate addiction. It's mostly people on there sharing experiences with trying to quit, quitting, sobriety, etc. He talked about how extended opiate use permanently alters the brain and he might need some type of lifetime opiate maintenance program to make his brain chemistry right again. I know he is right but I told him it just sounded like excuses to use, and reminded him that he does not just use, he abuses and no one likes him high except him. He knows.
We have been together almost 9 months. I finally met the most important people to him in his life, his Nana, his mom and his little sister. He is working this week and supposedly going to an AA meeting tonight (our area has almost NO NA meetings). He said he is doing everything that he can to make us work and have an ordinary life.
On his site, someone asked if there were any happily recovered opiate addicts. No one responded. People responded that they knew sober opiate addicts, but wouldn't exactly describe them as happy, and that got me thinking. I know 3 other heroin addicts who have been sober for several years...but have just manifested their addictions in other ways, and it frightens me. It wasn't until he read me that post, that I realized it. The first has become devastatingly codependant, the second is on anti-depressants and anti anxiety meds, as well as playing with other drugs here and there, including vicodin again (which she doesn't consider a relapse because it's not constant and it's not heroin. Hello denial.) and the third is a raaaaaging alcoholic. My boyfriend doesn't do any of these things. He will not take prescription meds like the first, may look into healing his own codependancy, and has no interest in alcohol.
I have to wonder, if we get through this and he can really stay sober (he said he is going to go a year opiate free and try every other suggestion out there to see if something makes him feel better, yoga, running, church, AA, herbal remedies, all that jazz) and if he doesn't, he will go from there. Is this the rest of my life? If by continuing to love him am I agreeing to live the rest of my life with him going on and off opiates? I cannot stand him high. He's like a child.
Everyone has some dort of vice or dependancy, mine apparently is people. I wonder as I continue to heal that and grow, if he will too, or if the answers will be more clear. I do not want to live my life with this constant struggle. And I know if it's not one thing, it's another, but still...
His mom hugged me extra long and tight, like she silently knew the battle I was in with her son and was greatful to have me in his life.
I'm overwhelmed. Another Alanon meeting tonight. So far I'm still messing everything up for myself. Too much focus on him, not enough on me, and the terror of wondering if I am with one of the 88% of opiate users who don't ever beat their addiction...
Well since finding out about a week ago that my boyfriend had fallen off the heroin wagon into the methadone sea which included lying and stealing from me, I learned that I am very codependant among other things. Went to my first Alanon meeting and church service, and started readind Melodie Beattie...only a thousand more steps to go.
Where am I going with this...the weekend was so emotionally overloaded it's hard to know where to start.
I guess with some questions. My bf subscribes to an online forum, one specifically devoted to opiate addiction. It's mostly people on there sharing experiences with trying to quit, quitting, sobriety, etc. He talked about how extended opiate use permanently alters the brain and he might need some type of lifetime opiate maintenance program to make his brain chemistry right again. I know he is right but I told him it just sounded like excuses to use, and reminded him that he does not just use, he abuses and no one likes him high except him. He knows.
We have been together almost 9 months. I finally met the most important people to him in his life, his Nana, his mom and his little sister. He is working this week and supposedly going to an AA meeting tonight (our area has almost NO NA meetings). He said he is doing everything that he can to make us work and have an ordinary life.
On his site, someone asked if there were any happily recovered opiate addicts. No one responded. People responded that they knew sober opiate addicts, but wouldn't exactly describe them as happy, and that got me thinking. I know 3 other heroin addicts who have been sober for several years...but have just manifested their addictions in other ways, and it frightens me. It wasn't until he read me that post, that I realized it. The first has become devastatingly codependant, the second is on anti-depressants and anti anxiety meds, as well as playing with other drugs here and there, including vicodin again (which she doesn't consider a relapse because it's not constant and it's not heroin. Hello denial.) and the third is a raaaaaging alcoholic. My boyfriend doesn't do any of these things. He will not take prescription meds like the first, may look into healing his own codependancy, and has no interest in alcohol.
I have to wonder, if we get through this and he can really stay sober (he said he is going to go a year opiate free and try every other suggestion out there to see if something makes him feel better, yoga, running, church, AA, herbal remedies, all that jazz) and if he doesn't, he will go from there. Is this the rest of my life? If by continuing to love him am I agreeing to live the rest of my life with him going on and off opiates? I cannot stand him high. He's like a child.
Everyone has some dort of vice or dependancy, mine apparently is people. I wonder as I continue to heal that and grow, if he will too, or if the answers will be more clear. I do not want to live my life with this constant struggle. And I know if it's not one thing, it's another, but still...
His mom hugged me extra long and tight, like she silently knew the battle I was in with her son and was greatful to have me in his life.
I'm overwhelmed. Another Alanon meeting tonight. So far I'm still messing everything up for myself. Too much focus on him, not enough on me, and the terror of wondering if I am with one of the 88% of opiate users who don't ever beat their addiction...
Member
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Illinois
Posts: 30
wntsluv2beit, I feel for you. I know how you feel. My AH has been hooked for 6 years. he has failed treatment 3x. No one can predict if your bf will make it through rehab or not. I know thats what plagues you. Truth is everyone here hopes and prays their loved ones will make it. i hope and will pray for the best for you. You are right about not enough focus on you. If you are planning on sticking this through with him, it's going to be a rough one. So you have to learn how to focus on you. Believe it or not if you step out of the box he's put you in, you can be happy and still love him. just don't have high expectations for him or you will be let down.
Member
Join Date: Feb 2009
Posts: 774
there are people i know who were heroin addicts who are very happy now to have reclaimed their lives, but i know others who are not that way. one drinks a lot more now. my feeling with them is they knew they had to quit and did it but maybe really didnt want to. i dont think there is anyway to know whathte outcome will be.
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