confused1

well this whole thing is so very strange, I really don't know where to begin so I apologize if this ends up rambling too much....

I am a man in my mid thirties, I know I have an addictive personality. Throughout my life, I have been addicted to pot, sex, telephones (before the age of the internet), the internet/computers, and working. I have probably missed something, but I guess you get the idea. I still smoke pot, although it is more recreational now as opposed to a crutch which I admit in the past it has been. I strongly dislike alcohol, probably because when I was 18 I lost my brother in a motorcycle accident that involved alcohol. I have tried cocaine and crack, but thankfully I never really liked them, and it has been probably 10 or so years since I have done it. My father is also an alcoholic and his father was too. So thats my history.

As part of my addiction to sex, I have occasionally picked up prostitutes. Not a lot of different ones, but the same ones many times. One of these girls really got my attention, she was young, very good looking and it was very obvious she was somewhere she shouldn't be. At the time however, I maintained my distance because I didn't want to get involved. I had previously helped a girl get off the street and it was extremely painful and difficult. The good news is that she is still off the street to this day and has never gone back, is working a regular job and living a regular life. That was about 14 yrs ago, and I am very proud to have been able to affect her in that way.

Back to the current girl. She is 20 yrs old, and extremely addicted to cocaine and the whole street lifestyle. She smokes crack, and is or was also injecting cocaine. She comes from a very wealthy family, but her father sexually abused her for 9 years, from 3-12 yrs old. I almost puked when she told me that. After I found that out I felt so guilty for also exploiting her by paying her for sex. She also has a young son who lives with her parents. If there is anything I have seen her get emotional about, it is not seeing her son. When this emotion came out, that is when I really started feeling for her. I have ended up spending so much time with her in the last couple of weeks and I have given her huge amounts of money, just so she wouldn't have to go sell herself. I also feel really guilty about that too, because I know it almost all goes to pay for drugs, but at the same time all she has to do is go sell herself anyways, and being very good looking and young, she has no problems getting picked up very quickly and making money.

One day last week when I picked her up (not from the street but from the apartment she is living in), she had 3 needles with cocaine in them. I watched as she tried to find a vein to get them into, and it was very painful to see. She did 2 of the needles but couldn't find a spot to do the 3rd one. During that evening we cried together about her son and what she is doing to herself, and I promised that I would do anything I could to help her get off of it, if thats what she wanted. Later that night I watched her dump the contents of that 3rd needle into the toilet. I was so happy for her. In the last 4 or 5 days, she claims she has quit doing needles, and constantly shows me her arms and hands as proof. Of course she could be totally lying to me (I know there are other places to shoot), but I have to wonder if an addict who was doing needles could spend 6 or 7 hours with me and not need to do one. But at the same time, she is still smoking crack, and smoking tons of it.

So in all of this, of course, I have slowly fallen for her. Not exactly what you would call 'in love' because I really don't truly know her, I only see bits and pieces of the real her, when she isn't totally wrecked. I guess you could say I am love with the 'possibility' of what might happen. At the same time, I would also be totally satisfied to get her off the street and off the drugs and never see her again, knowing that she will hopefully go on to realize her real potential in life.

This is such a dilemma for me. I have promised to do anything for her, and she says she wants to quit, but that it will take time. I told her I would get her an apartment, a car, and get her into school (school is her idea) and she says when those things start happening she will be able to 'wean' herself from the crack. I know a former crack addict, and he told me the only way he could ever quit was cold turkey, but I suppose every person has their own way to do it. I just find it hard to believe that you can 'wean' yourself from something so terribly addictive. It would be like an alcoholic saying he will only have a glass of wine with dinner. Yeah, right.

But in the meantime, this whole thing has just been so emotionally demanding on me. I have problems sleeping worrying about her, and I have already lost about 10 pounds from not eating properly.

I am so desperate to find a way to get her to quit killing herself like this. I know you cannot force an addict (or anyone for that matter) to do something they don't want to, but I have seen a glimmer of hope from her that she does want to stop. But then I also think that if the desire for crack is stronger than the love for her child, how could I (a virtual stranger) possibly do anything meaningful enough to get her out of this. Then the other side of me thinks that perhaps because I am a stranger and I show her that some stranger from the street cares enough to do these things for her, that she might wake up.

I really don't know what kind of feedback to expect here, and quite frankly it feels somewhat therapeutic to just tell my story here rather than have it continually race around inside my head. I have left so much out because its hard to organize it all sequentially, so if anyone has any questions or wants more details please let me know.

Thanks for reading this and thanks for this online place to deal with this.

Regards.

Gooch

Welcome .. There is hope. addicts do recover! and codependants too!

you may want to check out the friends and families forum for some experience in being addicted to the addict.

Live

there are so may here so much wiser than I. The sometimes harsh truth is that we can only work on our own recovery. Too often we try to manage another's and it really only helps it continue.
Have you checked out the forum nar-anon? It may be a great source of experience, strength and hope for you.

best wishes,
live

splendra

confused1-

Welcome to Sober Recovery!!

Unfortunately with addicts dope does all the taking when they are active!!! It sounds to me like you are just helping her get high.

I am hoping you will get yourself into recovery alanon or naranon(for friends and family of alcoholics and addicts) either could help you learn how to help her... check it out!!! Prayers going out for you both...

SomeWhiteKid

Not to sound shallow but I've been the white knight plenty of times. It doesn't work and though you think you may be helping her psychologists call what you're doing enabling. If she is going to stop, it needs to be on her own. Best thing you can do is let her fall. She needs to find her own strength, not someone else's. Good luck brotha

confused1

To SomeWhiteKid:
You are correct that I am 'enabling' her, however I also consider the other side, being that she can simply go out and sell herself to get the money anyways, so I guess I view it as at least keeping her off the streets (to some degree anyways).


To everyone:

She still swears up and down that she has quit needles, she is spending several hours a day with me, and I don't know if she would be able to do that without needing a needle. I also used to see needles and alcohol wipes and spoons in her purse and stuff, and since she claims she quit using needles I haven't seen any of that stuff. Of course she could simply be hiding it from me, I really don't know. But I am not seeing any new track marks on her either, not that I am looking for them, but they are not hard to miss. The old marks on her hands and her arms are healing up, and they look old and not used.

Also every time I see her I make sure that she eats, and when I get her food she literally inhales it. I don't know how a tiny girl can eat so much!

Today she had to go to court, which was about an hours ride away. I was very concerned that she would just forget about it and get another warrant, but I was very proud of her for actually making it. I even bought her a greeting card, and wrote a few paragraphs letting her know how proud I was, etc. etc. This seemed like the only reward I could give her that had any true meaning, money would simply be spent, material things pawned/sold/traded etc.

She wants to go visit her sister in a different city, and I think that could be a good thing for her, so I am going to get her the tickets and make whatever arrangements are necessary for her to get there and back.

I have been researching cocaine addictions, and I am very much considering spending the money to send her to mexico to get an ******** treatment. I still need to do more research on it, but it really sounds like the ***** treatment is a dream come true that is not receiving the recognition it deserves. In fact, if it does work for her, I am tempted to open a clinic here (as it is not a prohibited drug in Canada) and offer the treatment for a price for those who can pay (ie families at their wits end with a loved ones abuse) and use the paying customers to finance free treatments for those who cannot afford it but need it (and want to stop). Has anyone on this board had any experiences with ********? Good or bad? I would love to hear about them, either in this thread or by PM.

Thanks for all the support, this place rocks!

Cangel

I understand you want to help, I truly do, I wanted to help my AH, but knew I couldn't so I had to leave. When he was ready to get help, he got it and has been cleaned for 11 months now, but it is still just one day at a time.

If you want to help her, tell her you will drop her off to a detox center to get her some help. Trust me you will find yourself with no money messing with her. Tell her that once she gets herself together than all the plans that you guys had will come during her sobriety. Confused, you may think you are helping her, but you are not. It took me to go to counseling and coming here to realized that. You can't live for them. You are falling in love with an addict and she is falling in love with your money. Are you afraid to know who she really is when she gets cleaned, she may not be the person you thought her to be. She needs help and if you are going to help her than you need to start offering a solution and the solution is not give money or by an apartment, the solution is offer detox. Are you afraid that if you don't give, give, give, she won't come back?