jamdls

I'd of paid for those last night Viv! :ghug3

shockozulu

I'm next in line! I want a hug too! :ghug

Zencat

Went to my PTSD group today. I have missed 4 weeks. Why? No reason other than as my old psychiatrist would say: I'm lazy. Oh on that note as it happens, I have a new psych doc. Its a county mental health thing to change up docs as they come and go...wonderment. So to side track a bit, my new psych doc is weird and anxious making. Ok back to my PTSD group. It was good to be back to group...a lot of regular faces...plenty of time to process PTSD stuff. Thank my lucky charms there enough money in California's depressed debacle of an economy to keep my groups going.

Gypsy Feet

if you change psychiatrists all the time, does your head get big again before the new guy can shrink it? Err, I mean, isn't the guy/gal supposed to know your back ground and stuff to help you? I dont really know the difference between one head doc and the next, so maybe I've just been watching to much law and order again

oh ya, chirp chirp, still around

lunarise

FOR EVERYONE!!!

:ghug :ghug :ghug

Lenina

Zencat,

Wow, I can't imagine having to sort through all my history, compact it into a Cliff's Note version and get used to a new doctor.

I am very worried about the services cuts in our country. So many people are helped by them. I guess we could stimulate a little "enlightened self-interest" in our fellow countrymen and women by letting them know just how many bodies they are going to have to step over on their way to the gym.

I will not rant here! Sometimes I can't help myself.

Love,

Lenina

gneiss

I'm still alive. I promised Phal a full account of my time off but I've been sick the last couple days and I'm exhausted. Here are the highlights:

3rd of July: celebrated the 4th early with my cousins. Turns out my cousins are complete potheads, and I had no idea. I confess. I smoked with them and I had a good time doing it. I still have mixed feelings about using pot though.

July 4th, early hours of the morning: I returned to my grandparents' house stoned. All the Rx painkillers (for grandma's multiple surgeries and grandpa's cancer) were on the kitchen table. I really wanted them. Didn't take any though. Yay!! Temptation resisted.

July 5th: Visited a friend. We drank (shouldn't have!). But, here's why this is a WIN. He asked if I wanted to get some meth. For the 1st time ever in my life I said no and really made it stick when he was persistent. This was dangerous ground for me. I wanted to do the drugs, I was drunk enough that I normally would have said "yes" in a heartbeat, but I said no. This would have been better if I'd said no to the beer, or even better not purchased it. The next day we went off-roading in his old Volkswagen Bug (the Baja style with the exposed motor on the back of the car). He managed to puncture the oil filter and it stalled out on some train tracks. We were not actually at a crossing, so we had to push the car across 6-inch high railroad ties. We managed to get it off the track about 30 seconds before the train passed. It was terrifying and I burned myself 3 times on the muffler (no kidding, second and third-degree burns. It hurts, no two ways about it). I'm getting a little tired of cheating death, I'd like to stop tempting it.

Thursday: Spent $600 to furnish the new apartment I'm getting on August 1st. The new furniture is in a friend's garage for now. I'm really excited to live somewhere the druggies don't know where to find me.

windysan

i'm here. on crutches and agitated, but here. yay

jamdls

Well Windy at least if you are agitated on crutches you have something handy to wack people with.

I'm bummed today, I thought my bathroom remodel was going to finished today and i went home at lunch and the plumbers did NOT show up! I called my contractor who is also my son-in-law, he had told me yesterday they were going to be at my house this morning, well he hasn't been able to reach them today. So I've got another weekend, if not longer, w/o my room finished. This has gone on for 6 freakin weeks, part of the delay was my fault I order the wrong size vanity top, then the correct vanity top arrived but it ws damaged but now I have the right one I just need the plumber to hook up the tub/sink/toilet. I hate things being in disaray.

keithj

Does anybody on this forum actually care enough about gneiss to tell her the truth? We can love you right to death, that's for sure. I've seen it happen more than once.

Gneiss, I absolutely do not have any kind of spiritual consent with you. You'll just have to forgive me. Or not. It doesn't matter. You're getting pats on the back for resisting temptation, when you should be getting a 2x4 across the face. You're in active relapse, and I'd bet your DOC is around the corner.

Are you unlike the dozens of other meth addicts I know who have gone full blown with exactly this kind of start? What makes you different?

windysan

Gneiss, just be careful. I don't smoke the weeds because I don't like the buzz. I drink in moderation. Early in the game you need to be careful and it is best to not hang around those doing dangerous dopes(meth, H, blow, etc). I don't agree with the 2x4 thing as all of us have our own ways of dealing with our problems. Some totally abstain from everything. Some can drink in moderation. Some dabble with other substances and don't go back to junkyism. Different strokes, Gneiss, but please be careful. Feral people are dangerous.

Zencat

gneiss...I think your dancing on thin ice with new leather sole shoes there...with the chipping away with some bud and brew. Yet on the other hand...your were firm with your resolve to not pick up the Meth. But doing this buzzed is risky business. Just concerned, please be careful.

Lenina...I hear you. Health care for the poor seems like the first thing to get cut when times are hard...shameful.

Lisa...LOL good one . Yea maybe thats why the Psych Dr.'s over at Mental Health push the **-step meetings for us duel-diagnosis patients. Deflate that ego because it evidently expands the cranium and makes the Dr.'s job harder without outside help.

And...for the rest of the Secular Connections peeps...

lunarise

Thanks for the :ghug3

Ill help pass them around lol

:ghug

Ananda

yeah my experience with 2x4s was tht when they come out i become very defensive and build higher walls.....

for my own expereince... I know that after a couple of years clean....the urge for drugs became very low level....and alchohol was the easy and quick available fix. well it is a drug i guess..but..the point for me was it wouldn't matter what substance it was if it would take me out of awareness it would do.

Now some people think because I no longer really think about using speed i must notreally be an "addict"....but then again i had nor reall desire to drink before i drank....

I do take medications for pain as directed..and it scares me everytime..cause the not being aware of is the draw for me...and any drug can do that.

So... I have found that it is easier for me to simply quit all substances not perscribed by a trusted dr.

Actually being clean and sober may be the utlimate goal, but to acheive that and keep it....and not just wanna die...i have to learn a new way to deal with life instead of using/drinking....It took a while for me to realize that being clean and sober wasn't really of much value to me if i was still in dangerous abusivee relationships, etc.......I've done the train thing..but sober i haven't yet

may take up bungie jumping though

:ghug

californiapoppy

Checking in before my 4 day weekend, Happy Bastille Day! I'll catch you Wednesday!

gneiss

Thanks, everyone. I know I was in a bad situation, I said myself I was on dangerous ground but thanks for the reminders that I was, indeed, in a bad situation.


First, I have no idea what spiritual consent is. Maybe it doesn't matter.

Keith, I actually appreciate your comments. It's always good for me to have another perspective. As for being different from other methies, I don't suspect I am. I know one other meth addict in recovery so I don't have much comparison. I left the rest behind because they had no interest in being quitters. But what I will say is given my history the fact that I had meth available and didn't do it is friggin' incredible. There have been a number of times I went ahead and did drugs.

So there's another issue: why was I in this situation yet again? Gawd. Good question. I don't have an answer to that. This friend and I are both meth addicts, both in recovery. I was not even slightly surprised that he asked if I wanted to get some drugs. He seems to have more trouble with it than I do, his addiction is stronger. And I admit that a good part of my weakness about dope at this point is really weakness about him. Once I decided to stop, I could tell anyone no--except him. But I found out I can even say no to him now, which is a new thing for me.

You said I was in active relapse and was basically teetering on the brink of full-blown addiction. You said it was a start. Considering my history, this is an ending. I figured out how to say no to the one person I've never really successfully said no to.

So what about my other drug use? The beer: no two ways about it. Should not have been drinking. I posted a while back that I was questioning whether I am really addicted to alcohol or it was just making the meth problem worse. I'm still not sure. I've had a beer or two several times now and had no problems, not gone on a binge or slipped back into my old drinking habits. But I don't think I should be experimenting at this point either; I should not have been drinking. It was not a smart thing to do. The pot: Still have mixed feelings on this. I sort of put it in the category of other mood-altering stuff like nicotine and caffeine as far as my own use is concerned. It's fairly harmless, I'm not addicted. At the same time, using it makes me feel like I'm halfway out a revolving door; I'm still in Drugland. If it were legal I would have no problem with it.

Keith, that's the best reply I have. But, dude. Put down the 2x4. You have some good points in your post but it all comes across like you're trying to be Superman or something. My savior complex isn't impressed. So.. I'll just take what's helpful and leave the rest, right?

Dee74

Hey Gneiss...got here late - but everyones said what I would have more or less. Windy Zen and Nands especially.

My main concern? You remind me a lot of me, trying a lot of ridiculous Wile E Coyote ways to skate out, just a little bit, on to that thin ice - without anything 'bad' happening....

I'm guessing you've seen enough Looney Tunes to know how that ends.

D

keithj

Gneiss,

I hope you accept my apologies for the 2x4 comment. Another poster reminded me how inapropriate that was. I was indeed frustrated, and that emotion will always show through for what it is.

My concern is real Gneiss. My method is flawed. I saw a buddy of mine yesterday, all eyes darting, licking his lips and picking his face, the usual tweaker stuff. Could see this freight train coming a year ago when he stopped doing what was working, started thinking a beer with his girlfriend would be OK now and then.

I got no desire to save him any more than you. I don't have the power to do that. Really, all I can do is try to be helpful. So Gneiss, in the attempt to be helpful, I hope you take alook at your actions and see them for what they really are.

Best of luck to you, and again, I'm sorry for the comment. I'll do my best to not repeat that mistake.

gneiss

When I act ashamed that I did drugs again, everyone's cool with it. When I post that I did drugs and I know I shouldn't have but I had a good time with it anyway, I kinda get told off (usually in a nice-ish way). The "you need to stay away from these situations and be careful" comments, and posts like Keith's in a way are more helpful than a cheerleading section because, as keith hoped it would do, it makes me step back and re-evaluate the situation. But the cheerleading section is useful to reinforce the stuff I did right. It's uncomfortable to be told off for using, but I always have a mixed reaction to my drug use. I know I shouldn't do it, I'm embarrassed about it, but I still had fun. So if I package my story here on SR to only say I feel horrible about it and disgusted with myself (which is 100% true) it looks like I am having the "appropriate" reaction for someone who "relapsed" (whatever that means, exactly) and is trying to get back on track. But the truth is, I've had fun doing drugs every time I've done them even while feeling ashamed and disgusted with myself. Drugs have never stopped being fun for me. Getting drunk/high isn't enough to overshadow the problems they cause, that's all.

I guess I kind of feel like I get told off when I post a more honest account of what happened. And that makes me suspect other people are doing the same thing I sometimes do: package the story so it's acceptable to the folks here on SR and edit out the parts that will get them told off. Am I really the only person on here who acknowledges that my DOC is kind of fun, and that's why I used it, and that's part of why I continue to have problems staying away from it?

If that's the case, should I be here? Is this a useful tool if I feel encouraged to edit out important parts of the story? Is it helpful if I have to read between the lines on others' posts and assume they aren't being 100% honest/forthcoming?

And keith, no worries dude! I thought it was a little harsh but your comments were still helpful. And maybe if they hadn't been so harsh it wouldn't have worked; I didn't take it personally either way. I see your point about the drinking. The meth, not so much. I think the particulars of the situation are probably a little different. But even so I spend a fair amount of time thinking about this and I try to use the help offered even if I don't like the packaging. So thanks, I really don't think you have much to apologize for.

tyler

I know what you are saying about "enjoying" your DOC. Pot is mine. For many it is recreational, much like having a beer or two, but for me, it was a 24 hour obsession. Forget wake and bake, I'd get up in the middle of the night to smoke and go back to sleep. It's been a couple of months since I've smoked now, but I gotta say, I love to get high. I've tried many other drugs over the years, coke, meth, LSD, X, narc pills, but none of them compared to my beloved pot. I honestly believe that if there were no societal reprecussions I would be quite happy just being stoned all the time. I function quite well this way. Pot places me just slightly outside of reality, a place I like to be. Nothing gets to me, good or bad. That is both the upside and the downside!!

However, this is the real world, there are societal implications, it's illegal, expensive, you have to pass drug tests to get a job, etc. So my 24/7 smoking idea just isn't going to work in the real world. Perhaps if I were a rich rapper or someone like that I could make it work, but I'm not thinking that's gonna work out. In my heart I know I'm a better person when I'm not stoned all the time, but my head often thinks differently.

Alcohol is a different story. I use it to escape. I don't especially enjoy it, it's a means to the end. I need to find different ways to "escape" and probably more importantly less of a need to escape in general. I need to find a way to "be comfortable in my own skin" without the need for drugs and alcohol. I am working on it. I use bits and pieces of many "programs", SMART, Lifering, a theripist, starting to "work the steps" with an SR friend, whatever I can find to try to help me. I used to draw a deep line in the sand between 12 step and secular, but I guess I'm to the point now where I really don't care anymore. Anything I can find that may help me, I'm up for.

Anyway, that's where I'm at today. Hope everyone's doing OK as well. Take care all.