where am i in recovery?
 

My name is MIKE. I am an addict in recovery. Ihave been doing drugs for 8 years. I am currently 24 years of age. I own a house, am engaged to be married, and have 2 kids. My addiction started back when I was 16. I have a very addictive personality by nature and got cought up in drinking and smoking pot along with some mild pain killers such as percocets and vikadin. By 17 I was drinking a 12 pack and a pint every night,along with a couple of blunts,and whatever else I could come up with. then started with the acid, mushrooms, opium, hash, snow balling myself into a toxic avenger by adding 400mg of oxycontine and or heroin, and at least 100 dollars of cocaine into my daily routine. Beleive it or not I was the top automobile technition in my shop and besides the unbeleivible amout of money spent, it was not really affecting my life on the surface. Then came crack. I came to love crack and quickly grew to hate it. within 3 months I lost my job,my respect, my integrity, and almost my family. Now I am doinng ok in my eyes, I am totaly clean most of the time,and I'm talking about no beer, no weed,no heroin,no pills,no acid,nothing. But the pattern is about once a week to a week and a half I succumb to some sort of powerful force and find myself smoking 20 to 50 dollars in crack. Then the next day I am back in my recovery for another week or week and a half. this has been going on for 7 weeks. I was smoking a couple hundred dollars a day. I need to kick it for good before I lose everything I know and love. My wife and mother have been very supportive, but just don't understand fully what a drug addict feels or goes through in ones fight for recovery. Does anyone have any suggestions.

Hi Mike and Welcome,

The thing that came to me when I was reading your post is when you said you use crack and then you're back in recovery for a week or so. Being in recovery is a lot more than not using alcohol, pills, etc. In fact, the 'not using' is only the beginning of recovery. What other things are you doing in your life to help your recovery? For me, it takes work, every day, working physically, emotionally and spiritually to stay in recovery, to grow, to move forward.

:c009: Welcome to SR, Mike. Glad you found a place with great information and support.

Speaking for myself, I am not clean unless I am sober. I am not sober unless I am clean. I am not in recovery if I use on and off.

So, if you really, really, really want to quit the insanity of drink and drugs, I highly recommend you find and work a program of recovery like AA or NA.

Glad to have you along with us on our jouney. Keep posting, Mike. :)

I am currently not working because I lost my job due to this addiction. I've been filling my time by cooking and eating alot, light workouts,and cleaniing my house. I need to get back to work but am thinking about changing proffesions. I have no god so spirituality is pretty tough for me right now. I've quit a pretty bad heroin addiction by myself, so I know that I can quit smoking crack, but my family doesn't think it is humanly possible and forces me to follow through with what they think quitting a drug should be like, none of them ever haveing had any sort of addition.

You know you're not doing this for your family, so however you decide to get clean and sober is the way that will work.

And, spirituality is a broad topic. I started to do volunteer work when I first stopped drinking. I had no idea how much it would help me through lots of dark days. It helped me to get outside of myself and do something to give back. It helped me to grow spiritually. If you're not working, why not look around your community and see what you can do to give something back?

I am currently not working because I lost my job due to this addiction. I've been filling my time by cooking and eating alot, light workouts,and cleaniing my house. I need to get back to work but am thinking about changing proffesions. I have no god so spirituality is pretty tough for me right now. I've quit a pretty bad heroin addiction by myself, so I know that I can quit smoking crack, but my family doesn't think it is humanly possible and forces me to follow through with what they think quitting a drug should be like, none of them ever haveing had any sort of addition.

If you know you can quit smoking crack, why on earth would you make the decision to keep coming back to it every few weeks when you have seen what is taking from your life? That, my friend, is what we call powerlessness and insanity. You're doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Ask yourself, do you honestly, deep down believe that you have any control over using? Do you really think this is a matter of willpower? If so, then like you said... since you know you can quit, quit. But, going back in a few weeks is NOT quitting.... Actually, it might be easy to quit, but staying quit is where you begin to learn you are powerless... CRACK makes your choices.

My suggestion... get to NA... go to meeting no matter what, whether you're sick, high, sober, whatever. Just keep going no matter what. The sad, yet realitic alternative is death, jail or institutions. Ask yourself if you've had enough? Are you willing to lose everything else, maybe even possibly yourself? And what are you willing to do to stay clean?