Heroin i want to quit heroin, but i don't see a reason to

[e92]

i've been using opiates on and off for 4 and a half years, but i've been clean more times than i've been not clean. this whole time i've managed to keep it together. never injected or smoked heroin, never let it ruin relationships. only once did it make a mess out of my life, when i was 19, and had no money to support my habit and was stealing from people around me. aside from that, i've managed to keep it under control for the most part.

i'm only 22 so i do float from job to job trying to find my niche, but i am steady with my jobs. i live alone. i stay in shape.

but its just that when i stop using opiates there is nothing to replace it. i cant replace that joy i get when i sit alone in the nights and get high. when i am sober, the pain and the reason why i initially started is still there

i want to stop just because we learn morally that "doing heroin is wrong" but why is it wrong for someone like me? i enjoy it so much.
yeah maybe a junkie who sells the clothes off his back and literally sucks dick for heroin should stop. but me? i lead a normal life. i dont even do that much

 

[Steven325]

Well, you lead a normal life.. now

I've only been addicted to weed and the first 5 years of smoking 24/7 everything went fine. Then at one point your tolerance is so high you need to use lots. Then at one point you will have some setbacks in life as almost everybody has (lose job, family member dies, whatever) and you will start using it as an escape tool. By then you're screwed. I had to choose between a normal amount of food and weed+cigarettes and chose weed for years, eating 1-2 sandwiches a day, some cookies and smoke 2-3 gram a day and barely sleep. I lost 20kg and looked worse than most people on heavy stuff. You're only 22 and have enough time to screw things up. No doubt heroin is even worse. Ofcourse with weed I understand most people don't have this and I'm the exception but.. don't let the drugs fool you just because it goes alright now...

 

[e92]

Well, you lead a normal life.. now

I've only been addicted to weed and the first 5 years of smoking 24/7 everything went fine. Then at one point your tolerance is so high you need to use lots. Then at one point you will have some setbacks in life as almost everybody has (lose job, family member dies, whatever) and you will start using it as an escape tool. By then you're screwed. I had to choose between a normal amount of food and weed+cigarettes and chose weed for years, eating 1-2 sandwiches a day, some cookies and smoke 2-3 gram a day and barely sleep. I lost 20kg and looked worse than most people on heavy stuff. You're only 22 and have enough time to screw things up. No doubt heroin is even worse. Ofcourse with weed I understand most people don't have this and I'm the exception but.. don't let the drugs fool you just because it goes alright now...

..are you really comparing heroin and weed? my tolerance is already pretty high, i have been using opiates pretty regularly for over 4 years. and it IS my escape tool, hence "when i am sober, the pain and the reason why i initially started is still there"

 

[Sprout]

While Cannabis and Heroin are nothing alike, Steve's point about life setbacks is a pertinent one.
We all held it together for a while, it just goes downhill so fucking quickly with the slightest provocation, and the fun thing is you won't even notice it happening. It's insidious and so very easy to rationalise - I held my Junkiedom together for a good length of time, then my fiancee left me and kicked me out of our home, within a year and and a half I was injecting Heroin to cover the withdrawal from IV Fentanyl while living in a bus station with no one and nothing left of the life I once knew.

 

[Steven325]

Addiction is addiction and it always goes the same. I said no doubt heroin is worse. I'm just saying how it went for me and how it goes for almost everybody that is 'addicted' to something no matter what it is.

And for me personally weed is more addictive than any other drug I've tried so far. Now it's your escape tool for your pain. In a few years once you lost your job it will be your escape tool to not realize how much you fucked up and then you're screwed. Using drugs to escape from the pain is not a solution and it will bite you in the ass later in life.

And furthermore on the comparision, a lot of harder drug users seem to think it's weird, but guess what.. I messed up my life more on weed than a lot of people on heroin. YES if I used heroin instead of weed in the amounts I did heroin would be infinitely worse, I'd probably be dead already. But I was high literally 24/7 for almost 10 years.

 

[aihfl]

when i am sober, the pain and the reason why i initially started is still there

Your way of dealing with life is not healthy. I can only echo what everyone else here has said. Sooner or later, your life will become unmanageable. I destroyed a marriage and a wonderful post-marriage relationship because these two women got sick of managing my life for me at the height of my alcoholism because I was incapable of it. Eventually you are going to have to deal with life on life's terms if you don't want to destroy yourself. I found myself one notch above homelessness and friendless there at the end when I decided to quit drinking.

You sound like you could be depressed. At the very least, I would see both a psychiatrist and therapist. The psychiatrist can help you kick the heroin and provide meds for any underlying disorders driving your addiction and the therapist can help you work through your issues. Just talking about your problems in a 12 step meetings has helped many people. If you really want to quit like you said in the title of this post, you'll figure out how to do it.

 

[Tinker55]

You mentioned that you are in pain and depressed when sober, sitting alone at home. Is it possible that you were looking for a way to fill that void? Perhaps the pertinent question is why you are using such a potentially destructive substance to substitute for real life experience.

 

[adder]

I suppose you need no heroin if you're satisfied with your life. I got addicted to opioids mainly because I was unhappy with my life and felt nervous/anxious all the time, and couldn't stand it. It's been 11 years since I started taking opioids, I also got dependent on benzodiazepines around the same time but luckily I managed to quit them. I've been on buprenorphine for 3 years now, it basically feels now as if it didn't work at all until it wears off. Funnily enough even though I became older, learnt to deal with problems differently, have a different perspective now, 11 years later I have the very same problem that drove me to opioids, but at some point you realize you don't get what you need when you try to substitute it with drugs, they just dull the inner voice but it's still there. For a long time I thought relapsing might be a problem for me if I found myself close to opioids like heroin again and had problems, but I actually don't feel like escaping to drugs any more no matter how frustrated I am. Basically all your doubts don't come from some cultural expectations or stereotypes that heroin is a horrible drug, it's just that you know you lack something even though heroin might give you some temporary peace for now.

 

[Burnt Offerings]

You'll never quit if your desire to quit is founded in some kind of moral question (and a moral question with a validity that you seem to find uncertain). You'll only quit when and if you fuck your life up enough that you stop and think, hmm, this isn't working for me any more, time for something new.

 

[e92]

I suppose you need no heroin if you're satisfied with your life. I got addicted to opioids mainly because I was unhappy with my life and felt nervous/anxious all the time, and couldn't stand it. It's been 11 years since I started taking opioids, I also got dependent on benzodiazepines around the same time but luckily I managed to quit them. I've been on buprenorphine for 3 years now, it basically feels now as if it didn't work at all until it wears off. Funnily enough even though I became older, learnt to deal with problems differently, have a different perspective now, 11 years later I have the very same problem that drove me to opioids, but at some point you realize you don't get what you need when you try to substitute it with drugs, they just dull the inner voice but it's still there. For a long time I thought relapsing might be a problem for me if I found myself close to opioids like heroin again and had problems, but I actually don't feel like escaping to drugs any more no matter how frustrated I am. Basically all your doubts don't come from some cultural expectations or stereotypes that heroin is a horrible drug, it's just that you know you lack something even though heroin might give you some temporary peace for now.

well to be real honest, i lack girls. its always been like that. funny enough, i'm a VERY good looking guy. and when i mean very, i mean i am the best looking guy in the room most of the time. nearly every day by i am told i'm good looking. whether it's backhanded compliments from my coworkers, or from my older cousins (who are girls) who tell me "you are so hot, why dont you have a girlfriend. all my friends ask about you" (yes, my girl cousins call me hot - we have that type of relationship)

but now i'm 22 going on 23, and i've never had a serious relationship.

i'm starting to think it's something really wrong with my personality. i mean i have a steady job, i'm outgoing (seriously), i'm great looking, im in great shape, well groomed always, girls even hit on me sometimes. but when when things escalade and move forward i always fuck it up. always. meaning; when i get her number and try taking her out on dates things always get fucked up and thats the way its always been.

i want something real so bad. i've never had a girl tell me she loves me, or say "no don't go" when i say "i gotta go".

like just last week i met a beautiful girl and we hit it off great and have a great conversation and have great chemistry and i get her number, and i think i have it in the bag! i call her once or twice and she never returns my calls...

and with heroin, that is the void i am trying to fill. heroin is my girlfriend. if i had a girlfriend i guarantee i would not use heroin

if i was like 18 19 20 i'd say fuck it. but now i actually want a girlfriend.

 

[ducednig]

1. NMDA drugs (itll completely alleviate opiate wd, + give u a new perspective in life and kill cravings for the most part (if u partake in an nmda drug once a month)
2. Lots of psychedelics + benzos (will give u a similar perspective of life after the withdrawals like NMDA drugs + killing of cravings)
3. Ride it out, hit rock bottom, realize ur fucking up ur body, and $$$ keeps going up, than begin to grow a feeling of wanting to quit.. than try numbers 1 and 2
4. Jesus, believe it or not, stats dont lie, believe Jesus is God and know that He is the master Healer. (optional, dont take it the wrong way, im just saying it out of personal experiences)

 

[e92]

1. NMDA drugs (itll completely alleviate opiate wd, + give u a new perspective in life and kill cravings for the most part (if u partake in an nmda drug once a month)
2. Lots of psychedelics + benzos (will give u a similar perspective of life after the withdrawals like NMDA drugs + killing of cravings)
3. Ride it out, hit rock bottom, realize ur fucking up ur body, and $$$ keeps going up, than begin to grow a feeling of wanting to quit.. than try numbers 1 and 2
4. Jesus, believe it or not, stats dont lie, believe Jesus is God and know that He is the master Healer. (optional, dont take it the wrong way, im just saying it out of personal experiences)

1- i'll look into that
2- i dont do psychedelics, never tried them but i have enough crazy shit going on in my mind, i dont need psychedelics. and besides, i've had many friends who have been just like me who have used psychedelics before/after/during their addiction and it did not help them.
3- i've hit rock bottom before with this. i told you, i've been using opiates for 4 and a half years. that is a long time bro... but i hit rock bottom when i was a kid when i had no money and started stealing from others. now i support my habit and keep it manageable.
4- i am jewish, i actually live in israel. and no priest/reverend/rabbi/ whatever will not help with this stuff. its better to see a professional and i think that's what i will do. i think i'll go to an AA meeting soon

 

[Burnt Offerings]

Other drugs (i.e. dissociatives and psychedelics) are only effective at treating addiction if they're combined with a genuine desire to quit on the part of the user. Otherwise it's merely polydrug use.

 

[Wants2Nod]

e92, you sound like me around that age. Really, really similar. I was a smart kid from a bad neighborhood, was working multiple jobs to pay my through college, and used dope to compensate for my high work and stress load. I really thought I had it under control. While my junkie neighborhood friends were going to jail and rehab, and literally dying, I was kicking ass at school, all on my own. After a long stressful day, a shot of dope really helped. Another shot in the morning to get me going....one after class before work to keep me going...and more, and more, and more.

Then I literally lost everything. My tolerance got too high, I couldn't afford college anymore. I was dopesick all the time. I ended up homeless for awhile, eventually living in a shooting gallery and commiting petty crimes to get by.

Somehow, I came out of it. What followed were years and years and YEARS of on and off again (mainly on) opiate addictions.

Point blank - in current society, heroin is NOT a maintainable long term addiction.

I will say that, for me, the past few years of my life have been the best. I discovered kratom a few years ago; it's not nearly as intoxicating as 'hard' opiates, but for me, it fulfills that need - it gives me that improved outlook, that mood boost, and that mild euphoria that I have come to realize that I need to function. My life has been incredibly stable for the past few years. I don't rush and nod every day now, I don't get annihilated on OC and booze, but I don't need to. Kratom 4x a day (and admittedly, tramadol in the morning) keeps my grounded, positive, and quite bluntly, normal. A couple of drinks a few times a week - like a normal person! - are really enjoyable with my kratom regimen.

 

[GolemGolem]

Eh, OP who knows, you got anything you would like to do if you had more money or more time? Music, girls, scuba diving?

 

[SluttyPeach]

OP you and I are in the same age range (early-mid 20s) and we are at a point in our lives where adulthood is new to us and it IS hard to deal with stress and emotions on top of fending for ourselves. You might be wondering why I mention this..

I'm an addict too. First it was alcohol, then meth, and now opiates. This history of drug abuse at my age isn't uncommon but it certainly hinders your emotional development and I'm thinking it may have happened to you also to a certain degree. Yes, addiction changes your brain no matter what age you are but it seems the younger you start the harder it is to stop because your brain is still developing (most sources say humans have an "adult brain" around age 25)

If you don't want to quit then you aren't going to be able to unless life knocks you flat on your ass. Not trying to borrow trouble on your behalf but it's pretty much inevitable if you continue using. Some of us have had this happen and have yet to learn our lesson. But as another poster said it will help you a lot if you get help with your mental distress. If you aren't ready to quit then it won't work anyway, you have to really be determined. I wish you luck and go to a psychiatrist man. Hope it helps

 

[Burnt Offerings]

Eh, OP who knows, you got anything you would like to do if you had more money or more time? Music, girls, scuba diving?

Yeah sometimes what motivates people to stop using opiates (or to slow down dramatically, at least) is not so much that their lives have gotten so bad because of opiates, it's that their lives could be better, and opiates are not helpful towards that end. Another user here on BL posted a news article about how drug users tend to slow down or quit as they age, because other aspects of their life rise in importance (compared to the value they used to place on just getting high). Non-drug related interests, family, finances, personal health/wellness, etc.

The money thing is pretty big for me personally. I don't like to think about all the money I've spent on drugs, it just makes me depressed.

 

[ducednig]

1- i'll look into that
2- i dont do psychedelics, never tried them but i have enough crazy shit going on in my mind, i dont need psychedelics. and besides, i've had many friends who have been just like me who have used psychedelics before/after/during their addiction and it did not help them.
3- i've hit rock bottom before with this. i told you, i've been using opiates for 4 and a half years. that is a long time bro... but i hit rock bottom when i was a kid when i had no money and started stealing from others. now i support my habit and keep it manageable.
4- i am jewish, i actually live in israel. and no priest/reverend/rabbi/ whatever will not help with this stuff. its better to see a professional and i think that's what i will do. i think i'll go to an AA meeting soon

right on.. i can relate to u with the 4 year habit.
u can always taper with pharms and get off with the thomas recipe.
u can use gabapentin, benzos, and weed.

but what i found that helps MOST with future and current cravings/reminders, is
numbers 1 and 2.
which i believe is the most important factor, if u are wiling to quit and stay clean.
otherwise u can always use other methods, but i found them to have a higher chance of relapse.
MXE works the BEST since its the least intoxicating but just as numbing as ketamine and dxm. and lasts helluva longer.
if u are unsure of the anxiety they may bring, just have a few benzos with you bro, itll be cake.

 

[infectedmushroom]

Doesn't sound like you want to quit, which is all that matters. If you don't want to, you don't want to. I'm not sure what advice to give you as I'm also still using opiates but all I know is what lead me to get clean the first time was being sick and tired of my life not being where I wanted it to be. Everyone gets bored and tired of the same old thing, and put simply, there's more to life than getting high and obsessing over a high. All the best haverli.

 

[SKR]

e92, like you said, you don't have a reason to quit. I've been there for sure, maintained hugely expensive habits but those costs were usually covered because I dealt biggish weight which was either made at low cost as some here would understand or acquired wholesale so to speak (also held down the same half decent job for 16 years)......what I'm saying is like you for me my habits and lifestyle didn't infringe on others until it did, circumstances and status changed and I did eventually change to suit, but I wanted to.

If you are saying you want to quit because of the negative view of others or societal pressures then me personally, I don't see those as good enough reasons, in fact I know if I did quit for those reasons I wouldn't last a week being clean, hope you reach a good place if not already, take care.