damonoxide
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Apr 11, 2006
- Messages
- 199
i didn’t vote because i think the answer is… complicated. i have known some people who did enough heroin to be physically addicted, lived the junkie lifestyle right with me, but got clean, and can smoke weed and/or drink socially or whatever. lots of friends who were serious binge drinkers who just grew out of it too. but of course, low level alcoholism is pretty acceptable in our society.
but i think that there is a type of addict who is just… well, hopeless if they pick up. i mean… i fuckin’ know i am. like, sure, i can have periods of… moderated (i am not going to say controlled) use with certain substances if i am in a good enough place mentally. but i have two decades of evidence showing me that if i only let myself do one thing, i will absolutely become obsessed with it eventually. i’ve had a comical number of “DOCs” that have totally different effects. the closest i can stay to “control” is with weed i guess, but i don’t really like weed very much anymore and over and over i’ve eventually said “fuck it” while stoned and picked up something that i will not be able to stop if i retain access.
i kick opioids and start drinking. get sober but become physically dependent on gabapentinoids. taper off but start taking 30g of kratom a day. graduate to painkillers again. kick them and go on as long a meth binge as i can afford/access. it is absurd.
oh, i guess i can kind of control my benzo intake because i truly have never found them recreational in the slightest. my relationship with them has always been utilitarian, in therapeutic doses. BUT, having been through psychosis from benzo withdrawal, i try to avoid them entirely… unless i’m on opioids and want that extra boost. i’m still taking normal Rx doses, but not for therapeutic purposes and i’m putting myself at greater risk of OD and hellish withdrawal. because i am not in control when i am actively using.
for a few years i was all about the psychonaut life. try everything and move on. but dope got me. it was too close to perfect, exactly what i had always been missing. i stopped exploring and experimenting and i lived for that shit. i loved everything about it. the ritual of prepping my shot, the sting of the needle, the timelapse red flower blooming in my rig when i registered. the rush. the high. the secrecy. eventually even the naked desperation became romantic in my twisted view, because i felt alive with that raw need driving me, a primal urge more immediate and absolute than anything i had ever known.
i am lucky that i made it out of my dope years alive. in the end, i didn’t walk away - i fucking ran. a forced period of abstinence (and an attendant withdrawal that was so much worse than i had thought possible) and i saw my life clearly and i was absolutely terrified. but it changed me. i was left with an appetite that i cannot control. i would excise my memories of heroin if i could. i have resisted going back for over a decade, but i remain under its thrall. all the booze in the world won’t equal a shot of dope, but part of me just can’t help trying, learning and forgetting or ignoring the same lessons again and again with whatever chemical is most accessible. i don’t even like being drunk. and yet, i blacked out a couple days ago at like 11am.
so yeah, i think there are people who, once they’ve tickled the right receptor with the right molecule, can never go back. but only a couple people i’ve used with in my life are like that, like me. i know a lot more who at one point fit the clinical and/or logical definition of “addict” but just… moved on. and hey, good for them, and any of you who pulled yourselves out of that darkness and can now enjoy a light buzz or whatever. i just can’t pretend that i’m one of you lol. but i’m pretty okay with that today. i’ve had enough clean time before to know that i can have a good life without drugs. i hope i make it back there. i’m getting old. i know that any slip could be my last. i don’t want to die chasing something that i know i can never have. i guess we’ll see what happens when i finish this bag.
but i think that there is a type of addict who is just… well, hopeless if they pick up. i mean… i fuckin’ know i am. like, sure, i can have periods of… moderated (i am not going to say controlled) use with certain substances if i am in a good enough place mentally. but i have two decades of evidence showing me that if i only let myself do one thing, i will absolutely become obsessed with it eventually. i’ve had a comical number of “DOCs” that have totally different effects. the closest i can stay to “control” is with weed i guess, but i don’t really like weed very much anymore and over and over i’ve eventually said “fuck it” while stoned and picked up something that i will not be able to stop if i retain access.
i kick opioids and start drinking. get sober but become physically dependent on gabapentinoids. taper off but start taking 30g of kratom a day. graduate to painkillers again. kick them and go on as long a meth binge as i can afford/access. it is absurd.
oh, i guess i can kind of control my benzo intake because i truly have never found them recreational in the slightest. my relationship with them has always been utilitarian, in therapeutic doses. BUT, having been through psychosis from benzo withdrawal, i try to avoid them entirely… unless i’m on opioids and want that extra boost. i’m still taking normal Rx doses, but not for therapeutic purposes and i’m putting myself at greater risk of OD and hellish withdrawal. because i am not in control when i am actively using.
for a few years i was all about the psychonaut life. try everything and move on. but dope got me. it was too close to perfect, exactly what i had always been missing. i stopped exploring and experimenting and i lived for that shit. i loved everything about it. the ritual of prepping my shot, the sting of the needle, the timelapse red flower blooming in my rig when i registered. the rush. the high. the secrecy. eventually even the naked desperation became romantic in my twisted view, because i felt alive with that raw need driving me, a primal urge more immediate and absolute than anything i had ever known.
i am lucky that i made it out of my dope years alive. in the end, i didn’t walk away - i fucking ran. a forced period of abstinence (and an attendant withdrawal that was so much worse than i had thought possible) and i saw my life clearly and i was absolutely terrified. but it changed me. i was left with an appetite that i cannot control. i would excise my memories of heroin if i could. i have resisted going back for over a decade, but i remain under its thrall. all the booze in the world won’t equal a shot of dope, but part of me just can’t help trying, learning and forgetting or ignoring the same lessons again and again with whatever chemical is most accessible. i don’t even like being drunk. and yet, i blacked out a couple days ago at like 11am.
so yeah, i think there are people who, once they’ve tickled the right receptor with the right molecule, can never go back. but only a couple people i’ve used with in my life are like that, like me. i know a lot more who at one point fit the clinical and/or logical definition of “addict” but just… moved on. and hey, good for them, and any of you who pulled yourselves out of that darkness and can now enjoy a light buzz or whatever. i just can’t pretend that i’m one of you lol. but i’m pretty okay with that today. i’ve had enough clean time before to know that i can have a good life without drugs. i hope i make it back there. i’m getting old. i know that any slip could be my last. i don’t want to die chasing something that i know i can never have. i guess we’ll see what happens when i finish this bag.
