Benhikin

So my addiction was some serious pot smokage, and I have to say that working in the restaursnt industry it is extremely difficult for me to deal. Just tonight I knew someone was going out back to smoke and I felt myself wanting to follow, but I didn't I told myself that that was not my life anymore. It is not me. I lost to much to have that in my life. It made me happy to be able to turn the other way and it put a smile on my face. I haven't done that in a while. I'm trying to get out of the biz because it is so previlent but it is difficult when you don't have a degree in anything else. Even for me to excel in this industry is requiring a degree, so now the qurestion looms, should I go back to school and become a whole new individual? A better me. I think I just might. I did attend a votech school for auto body, but that was a crock and it would have been the same as the restaurant industry. Drugs are a hard thing to get out of when the industries you work in promote it like candy.

best

I say you did very good.
Every place (industry) I have worked in had people who used one form or another of the things we all would do better to stay away from.

You are in school already and you are learning well. A+
Learning to deal with what is before us is a great lesson.

Going to school for anything is almost always a good thing.
School can help lift your esteem and you always are able to walk away with more knowledge then you had before walking in.

lulu70

Hello Ben--Welcome to SR!

It has got to be hard working in the restaurant business and trying to stay away from pot. Somehow food and pot always seem to go together, huh? I am a recovering pot smoker myself (and also an alcoholic). I have managed to stay clean and sober for a little over 2 years now. Of course, I am a preschool teacher so I don't have to deal with having my drugs of choice in my face all the time. (Not too many of us are sneaking out to smoke a doob and coming back in to care for the kids. At least we're not going to come back in and tell anyone about it!)

Have you thought about looking for a restaurant that advertised being a drug-free workplace? I'm not sure such a place even exists....

As far as finding a different career? If you want to, I say go for it. However, remember that drugs are EVERYWHERE if you look for them, and sometimes when you are not looking for them. Imagine what an alcoholic working in a restaurant must feel like!!!

Hope you will stick around!

Benhikin

Drug free restaurants are there but as you say and as I've been in, they creep up on you when you least expect it. One place I worked, that was part of my interview. The sous chef asked if I smoked I said yes, and low and behold I had a job. Very few restaurants drug test, if any at all. I tried in the last place I worked, but the Chef himself came to me for some. I eventually cut him off hoping it would rub off on me but I couldn't shake it. I would get a few weeks, but relapse back into it. I associated it with stres relief and as a creative umpf (I paint and write music as well) and it wasn't until my break up that, that was the wake up call. As I said it's hard coping with al that I lost, but I also look, to all that I will gain.

tyler

I know what you mean, pot is everywhere, and the hard thing is many people don't have a problem managing their smoking. I guess it's kinda like alcohol, it always out there, but for us, we just can't do it. I've never had a problem having a beer or two and putting it down. But pass the bud and I'm off to the races. I still have a couple of friends that smoke, and it's hard to turn down that hit off a joint or smoking a bowl, but I personally know where it will lead me. Maybe not that night, but if I keep at it, I will end up right where I was before, 24/7 smoking. I was spending well over $1000 a month just on herb. Not to mention the impulse buys I'd make and the booze I'd drink. I just can't do it anymore. I'm here to support you, as are other's on this board. PlanoTexan, livewyre, many other's I don't remember at the moment. Pot is a tough one as it sneaks up on you. Anyway, I wish you the best, from a fellow recovering pothead. Take care.

Benhikin

Thanks tyler,

Yeah I start smokin' and I'm like a chimney. I was spending around 500 a month, and I never put 2 and 2 together that gee we're broke maybe I should quit smoking and get a steady job at say the P.O. Ahhh but that was the mind of an addict. I've been so clouded over the years, I can't help but think how I would have been if I never started. It sucks, and hurts, but I'm on a new path now, and trying my hardest to not look back to the life I lead.

earlybird

Yeah,...I waited tables for 8 or 9 years,.....its crawling with people in addiction. Party Party Party. I suggest getting out of it if you can. Yes,....GO BACK TO SCHOOL!! Good for you. Great Idea. Hope all is well.

aloneagainor

Ah, Benhikin, be mindful of allowing regrets to creep in and drag you down. It's one thing to look at your past and learn from it, but wholly another to wish it away. You know every experience you've lived, good or bad, contributes to the creation of who you are now. We take what we've learned, use what we have, and proceed ahead with the best that we can give. You have gained insight into yourself and into life that you'd not have had had you not lived the life you've led.

I remain involved in the restaurant industry, growing organic produce, and in the music industry...imagine the hippie-freak-pot-smoking associations therein! It's SERIOUSLY challenging. But I love the work and my life-interests revolve around these arenas, so it's a matter of either abandoning all my interests that make life worth living, OR, abandon the drugs and retain my interests. Curiously, without the drugs, there's MORE time and energy and mind to invest into my interests and occupation. Drugs are all around us no matter where we go. If you want them, regardless where you go, you'll find them. So it's a mindset change you're working on here. Begin with acceptence of your past, it is what it was...no regrets! Only learning. And move forward from there.

PlanoTexican

I totally agree with what you have posted on a life changing plan being what you need.

You know what you need to do. Now is as good a time as any to get started on a new life.

After thirty seven years of pot smoking, I myself started a new life a little over a year ago.

I would never want my old life back again.

At forty nine years of age I now know what my future holds.

The only way I found this out was to quit smoking pot.

REZ

I was a pothead too. I got clean through NA meetings and hanging out with my sponsor and NA friends. Have you tried that? It helps to have positive reinforcement when there is all that crap out there.

Benhikin

I'm looking into meetings around the area. I am seeing a therapist and playing music is definately a help even though the guys in the band do it they are well aware that I don't want to be a part of it and they are very supportive which I was suprized to see.