Whimsiclette

A warning, or disclaimer: while I'd like to make this a more pleasant introduction, I am in a foul mood, and this is a potentially misery-inducing post, a drag on your mood, a black hole. Hence the shyness, the embarrassment, the cringeing as I type, the wondering why I'm posting at all. I do apologise for that.

So, hello. From a morose speed freak, bulimic/anorectic, long-term depressive, presently going her first night without using or bingeing/purging and trying not to think about the mess I've made of my life, such as it was. It is a dark night, and I buried under it, trying to ignore the knots of guilt in my stomach, the fish hooks in my throat, I googled a recovery forum to "check into" so to speak, and landed here...

I don't have a problem, I think, I have a problem, don't, do, don't, dodon'tdo....

I confess I have been to a couple of NA meetings, but already the spiritual principles are grating on my consciousness. Also I feel like a bit of a fraud there, since although my cocaine/amphetamine use has begun the horrible spin out of control lately, it's only been around 2 years that I've been at it. Compared to my first "love" - my eating disorder - which I've had for 15 years, it seems trivial. And yet it's had far more profound implications for lifestyle - since I've started using, I've pretty much pickled my brain, can't read a book from start to finish, and therefore have had to take time out from my degree (again). I live with a troublesome codependent boyfriend who strokes my back as I purge, whose life revolves around cocaine use...

I used to be able to maintain a certain ironic detachment, to control my addictions and wear my depressions with style - or at least a bit of dry humour - but as my memory problems, depersonalisation problems, mood problems increase, as I behave like more of a hazardous s*** to my friends, as I am thrown further into the troublesome boyfriend's arms and screwy life, I am losing my grip on these better scraps of personality. I am a drag to be around. I often think I'm just waiting for death.

So at the time of typing, I am unpleasant to be around, to hear from as a person who has dropped out of life. Galling though it is, it is much like Wurtzel says for me: It is over between me and the world. Things have not gone well between us. Fare thee well, my dark star. Or it is like Dorothy Parker says:

My land is bare of chattering folk;
the clouds are low along the ridges,
and sweet's the air with curly smoke
from all my burning bridges...

I apologise, I apologise, and I hope you'll forgive me for checking in so selfishly, in such a ugly way. But this board seems a good starting place to escape from ugliness. I hope it'll help me turn things around.

I hope my next post is more coherent, and cheerful...

JackNWA

Welcome!

eremc08

Welcome to SR! You will get so much support here, and it's helped so many others just like you and me. While I'm going through alcohol detox, the attempt to get clean and sober is similiar to yours. It's hard.. but as long as you have the drive to do so, and the people in your life to help you through it, you will be fine! You have made a GREAT decision to stop this insanity you're living right now. I know you feel like crap right now, but there IS a light at the end of this tunnel/journey. It's a great journey if you surrender to it. Positive thinking gets easier the more days you remain sober.

Come here and post/read as much as you need to because you will get support from us.
Welcome and congrats on your new life to come!

jamdls

Hi Whims, welcome to SR. Sorry you feel so lost. I lived in the kind of "dark hole" you describe for the better part of 40 yrs, I truly believe I was born depressed, my issues/addictions were different but a black hole is a black hole. Through therapy/medication and recovery from alcohol abuse my world is now a bright shiny world. Happiness is possible for everyone, it doesn't come easy but I hope and pray you find some joy.

Lilly03

You are clearly very unhappy with how your life is right now - that's how I was 24 days ago. When I first decided I needed a change I was also in the "I have a problem...wait do I? I don't have a problem...Maybe I do?" stage. Even if you're not 100% sure of the problem, still use your unhappiness with how things are now as motivation to make changes. Don't stop looking for help and support Good luck.

2stop

Welcome to SR! Glad you found us.

I have much in common with you except my drug of choice was always pharmaceuticals. Teens/early 20's struggled with anorexia/bulimia, always the battle with depression/agoraphobia and anxiety in general. I know how low one can get that's for sure, most here do. Please contionue to post. I found SR in 2003 and I credit it's members with my survival. This is an excellent place for experience, strength and HOPE! There IS hope you know. It CAN get so much better.

HOpe to see ya around!

Biggest Welcoming HUGS!!

Draciack

Welcome to SR Whimsiclette

You'll find a lot of support here.

I've been where you're at - depressed, using, miserable. SR and AA helped, but so did seeing a doctor. Glad you're here.

sobermax

Hey Whimsiclette,

WELCOME!

You are in the right place for sure.

Loads of what you say resonates with me. Although my drug of choice has always been booze, the feelings you describe could be my own.

I am very recently back on SR after a horrid slip and am very glad that you too have found this amazing site. No one will judge you, and you will find real support.

AA troubles me (I'm presuming that NA follows the same template) for exactly the reasons you describe. One of the best things about SR for me is that there are many people who have found sobriety through a variety of means - some are 12 steppers, some have no formal program, others design their own.

There is hope! Just 4 days in, and my head is clearing. Keep reading and posting, please.

SM

Dee74

Hi Whimsiclette

Welcome aboard

I remember becoming very black humoured and morose in my drinking and drugging days - I was that way for so long I thought that was the genuine me - but I was wrong.

I wouldn't worry about being a 'fraud' at all - it's not really a comparative thing IMO - the only person you need to concern yourself with is you - if you want/need help, you're in the right place here, and at places like NA.

Hope to see you around some more
D

Toss

Reading your post, I am at a loss of what to say. All I can think is that your life sounds miserable. You obviously posted to start expressing your need to get better. Alot of good advise and info on SR. Just starting myself, 5 days in, but we all have to start somewhere.

~~Good vibes and thoughts going out to you~~

Toss

least

Welcome to a wonderful recovery site.

DayTrader

BS! Who cares about being cheerful - I'd much prefer the honesty, thank-you-very-much! I used to walk around with a fake smile in an attempt to make everyone around me believe I was fabulous....only I wasn't.....and I ended up resenting everyone for "making me" act a clown.

You've got a lot goin on there but the honesty about what's happening and how you feel about it is a great start. If this is the first time you've really spoken up about it, you're off to a helluva start in the openness category and you're to be commended for it.

I'm an AA guy and yes, in AA (and NA + every other 12-Step program I'm aware of) we approach our addiction from the point of view that we NEED a solution outside of ourselves. That's done not because we all just wanted to snuggle up with Jesus/Allah/Mohammad/Buddah/the spirit of the universe/Mother Earth/etc. but because we had tried just about every other path and none of them worked. The weight of perpetually new "day 1's" became more than we could bear so we had to go check out that last house on the block.

As I'm sure you'll be told plenty, there ARE other solutions and perhaps one of them will work for you. The most important thing I've discovered in recovery is a tough pill to swallow - that I have to be willing to give up every preconceived idea I have about everything. That doesn't mean everything I thought was wrong but it does mean I have to be willing to at least consider it. I have to be willing to consider that if I something feels good that it isn't necessarily good (and this applies to alcohol and drugs, but also my viewpoints re. relationships, spirituality, what's "normal," and what's acceptable).

As is said around recovery tables all the time, "If it's your thinking that you've relied upon....and it got you here....your best thinking is not going to be the tool to use to get you out of here." Early in my recovery I was lucky to figure out rather quickly that I needed support, help but also a lot of guidance from folks who had walked the path I was on. The hardest part is following that advice and not stepping where they tell you not to step - especially when every bone in your body tells you to not listen to "them."

Congrats on getting the ball rolling though. I'm friends with on girl who's been in your shoes (substituting crack for the speed and adding prodigious amounts of alcohol) and she's got 8 or 9 years clean & sober, and hasn't had to submit to her bulimia for the same amount of time.

LaFemme

What Day Trader said:-)

Also welcome...you write beautifully. Someone posted yesterday about unearthing our gifts when we get sober perhaps this is yours.



I worry about your relationship with your boyfriend...I was in a codependent relationship prior to sobriety ...breaking free helped immensely.

Xoxo...T

Anna

Hi and Welcome,

We do understand how you feel, and please know that there is a way out.

There is lots of support and information here, so keep reading and posting.

Spawn

Kitey

Welcome Whim

You have made an excellent Choice coming to this forum, tons of support is here for you... Think how happier you will be living a new clean life, I hope your Boyfriend's drug taking doesn't tempt you to stay down that road, you must be strong and think of yourself if he doesn't quit with you! xx

Spawn

topspin

Welcome to SR;

You do write beautifully.


.

coffeenut

Well.....welcome!

Whimsiclette

Gracious, what a lovely welcome! For a moment there is a melting, a thawing of the iceberg my heart has become...a drop, a trickle. Then, naturally (unnaturally?), by force of habit, I feel the familiar old panic clawing under my ribs.

When my mother and I used to talk more, we had a running joke that I am screwed up because (a) she dropped me on my head when I was a baby and (b) she started sending me to psychiatrists as soon as I started school for the first time. So I have been encouraged to be open and honest...though more often "open and honest" for a good long while. My spirit is now hardened, coiled and doubled like a serpent. I do not trust my motives for anything, when I am crying I don't know if it is a performance or no, since tears come in response to something else, in the wrong context, but at the right time for maximum effect. I do not know if I have any natural reflexes left. I wonder sometimes if I'm in the grip of an "antiscript" (Eric Berne, anyone?)

So DayTrader: I do hear what you're saying...and I feel my ears closing at the same time. I've been here before, a nasty little voice says. And, Lafemme, Topspin, thank you, but it's not new, and I don't trust my heart to write.

My greatest fear for this forum is: I will do what I have always done: start sincerely enough, then get caught up in the stories I tell...especially when I hit a roadblock that is hard to put into words, that causes people to get confused into silence. I will start to lie, or at least "lie". Then be racked by guilt, leave, change home, lover, city, rinse, repeat.

Recovery for me so far has been a crazy (though no less sincere for it) attempt to pour kerosene over former selves I don't like, set my old life on fire, start again brand spanking new. It's not just that I can't stand the long haul-ness of it; it's those awful moments where I hit a problem that I really have no bloody clue how to fix, and nobody around me does either. My danger zones, those. I cannot stand that lull in conversation, I have to shut my interlocutor up as quickly as possible lest they say something trite (including professionals) and thus confirm my thesis that I am, at root, f***ed, a defective model, will never be "fixed"...at least to a normal, functional level...

***********************

I don't trust my heart.

And yet, and yet. One of the more positive bits of advice I got from NA was: to at least make a habit of little positives without over-analysing.

Like saying thank you to you all without an asterisk.

I want to shoot you all down, prove you all wrong, prove that nobody loves me, everybody hates me, might as well go down to the garden and eat worms. However, I'm well aware that language being a slippery thing, you can prove positives as well as negatives.

I can write...or used to be able to (you're only as good a writer as your next completed essay, story, poem...and completion has long been foreign to me), perhaps the gift to be unearthed is my heart?

But enough already. This was supposed to be a short and sweet thank you post(!)

Today is a moderately good day, since I haven't used so far, cracked open the bath scents and moisturisers and perfumes...and as any girl knows, there is just something about these simple pleasures that is truly life affirming even for a short time...rapturous