Planing to relapse - Can't Stop Fantasizing About The Feeling

[TaoistPLUR]

So I just passed my 6 month mark of sobriety. My DOC's are Weed + Alcohol, always co-morbidly (together). This is the longest I have been sober in 12 years. I went through an awesome treatment center, did 3 months there, then started volunteering there, and now I work there full time. I did 3 months at the treatment center and the last 3 months I have been living in 2nd Stage Transitional Housing. I have friends, family talks to me again. Life would seem good on the surface.

I am moving out on Nov 1st and getting my own place. I am also planning to relapse because the call of weed and booze is too strong for me. I fantasize ALL THE TIME now (I have already mentally relapsed - started about a month ago) about using. That sedated state you get when watching youtube/TV + listening to music whilst drinking a bottle or two of wine and blazing fat cannons all night. There is nothing like it. No amount of sober activities can replicate that feeling. Only drugs and alcohol can produce those feelings.

I wish I never knew how good drugs and alcohol felt.

I can see the trainwreck coming, but in true addict style, don't give a fuck. Must get high. Im sad because I've worked hard these past 6+ months to get where I am today, but if have to be honest with myself, Im not happy in sobriety. I miss dearly getting fucked up everyday. It was awesome. Unproductive as shit, but awesome.

I'm going to try to get a job making at least $15/hour so that I can afford to buy at least $100/week on Drugs + Alcohol (I've done the math/budget etc.). How long this will be sustainable for, I do not know. But I'm gonna try my damndest.

Life is just too boring without Drugs + Alcohol. Life is too short. I subscribe to a sort of Epicurean Hedonism that says that one should try to get as much happiness our of life as often as possible, because life is too short. I agree, the measure of a successful life is held in the experiences one has in that life. The more times I get fucked up (which makes me happy) = the more aggregate happiness I accumulate.

Sure going through life sober will make me more "successful" in terms of finish my school, maintaining a job, and possible finding a mate. However, those are societies standards of what will produce a "happy, successful life". Society can suck on my balls please. k thanks bye internet.

 

[methamaniac]

They say u relapse in your head before you physically take your drug of choice. Sounds like you done relapsed. Been there done that. No more for me. I'm going to stomp them thoughts out like a fire when they come. Romancing the drug is a bad movie.
You really do have to play the record all the way thru. When you do you will see that getting high doesn't look quite as attractive. You gotta know deep down you cant jus use every now and then
and you will be willing to trade your arm for your sobriety back if you get strung out. Dont have to know your situation personally it is the law of addiction. The ends are always the same.
No such thing as a successful addict.
Clinches are for a reason.
Good luck battling your demons. You've already proved u can stay clean. If u haven't had enough pain get out and get you some more.

 

[Allein]

I can only assume you got in pretty deep with booze and weed to need 3 months in a treatment centre but whilst is obviously stopped you using for a time it didnt get to the heart of the issue.

It really is all in your hands, it's your life after all.

What life do you want more ? it's as simple as that, for me anyway. ATM you're fantasising about it, is your fantasy genuinely what it was like ?Personally that seems unlikely as you chose to take 3 months treatment and you clearly see this as a significant problem.

If your genuine intention is to live in a hedonistic fashion, taking drugs of all kinds as and when you want, then I wouldn't waste your time (and theirs) at treatment centres. Whether or not this type of life style is something that will bring you happiness, at least in the short term (it doesn't seem you are that old) no one can say.

Good Luck

 

[PowerFarts]

Sometimes I wonder if substance management instead of 'sobriety forever' creates in ones head, thoughts like, I can't even drink on a Friday night? Or once in awhile, I have to never touch it again?!

And then, all this tension, like sexual tension, builds up, and explodes, and then the thought, 'all of it, or none of it'
(Instead of moderation to taper the 'thoughts'. )

Anyway, For some reason I had to not drink or smoke weed for 6 months, it nearly drove me fuckin' NUTS!

And I am a moderate drinker (fuck, I got beer! anyway don't keep extra beer around) 12-18 beers a week lately, my wellbutrin tapers my drinking.

Yeah, I just think 'sobriety forever' is just too scary a thought, for those with a problem.
More could be helped if they could somehow work out a way to manage their bad habits, instead of 'forever never ever drinking again'

Anyway, that's my IMO.

 

[Allein]

^^ I believe I get where you're coming from, it's not a one size fits all approach but at the same time people, and include myself in this are just great at constructing reasons to carry on abusing drugs.

It's patently clear that at least some drugs can be used regularly with little issue in some, alcohol seems the best working example simply due to it's unprecedented, widespread use.

Neither do these things seem to be in any way static, I drank casually and sparingly for 20 years or more before getting into real trouble with the stuff and now I abstain altogether.

I don't hold with the 'drugs are bad mmm k' line, it clearly doesn't hold water but in this case the OP has spent 3 months in treatment so must have considered this habit detrimental, I assume.

IME if you've tipped the balance with a substance and entered into abuse it's nye on impossible to go back to it without ending up in the same situation, others may feel differently but I would urge them to consider if they are just constructing justifications to go back to those days with their 'rose tinted spectacles' firmly on.

 

[cay]

It's a double edged sword, unless you hated your DoC (then why were you doing it amirite?) you know what that feeling was like, you had a reason for doing it for years and you had a reason (as bleak as it seems now) to get off. But that sounds like shit you already know and who wants to be preached to, if you are looking for permission here, you got it above. I am sure I will relapse myself eventually and it's as PF says moderation is a better key to success, but addicts have proven they cannot moderate, and that is the double edged sword.

 

[methamaniac]

I know this will sound harsh, apologize in advance.
Maybe you're ( I mean anyone this applies to) the exception to what millions of people have already learned. You could be. I thought i was too. Statistics are hard to argue with. Facts are stubborn things. The cure for addiction is not using the drug that makes your life unmanageable. Unlike someone with clinical illness you have to Not take your medicine for it to work. That's your prescription. A kid with cancer would love to be in your shoes.
If you could use without negative consequences you wouldn't be reading this obviously. Poblems with life have happen sober or not. Sobriety doesnt guarante happiness, just the chance to be.
It really all boils down to to one thing- what lifestyle offers you most happiness?

 

[TaoistPLUR]

I do not deny how bad it got. It got bad. HOWEVER, even amongst all the badness AT LEAST I was able to feel real feelings of happiness a few times a day (e.g. Wake & bake, taking the first few shots of hard liquor, etc.). Even If it was an artificially created happiness that was fleeting, and few & far between, it was happiness none the less. Guaranteed happiness I might add. There is no doubt that If I smoke a joint of some kills to my head that I will be happy shortly thereafter.

Weed makes everything more enjoyable. In that respect its like salt. Imagine someone saying "you can't put salt on anything ever again". Everything would taste so bland and disgusting.

In my previous 6 months of sobriety I never ACTUALLY felt happy. There were just more times when nothing bad happened (as it did when I was in my addiction). The only way I can describe it is as being what they refer to as "A Dry Drunk".

For this reason I am planning on returning to Drugs & Alcohol to perhaps give it one more shot, however futile that may be. I just cant stand getting older and not experiencing experience everyday.

 

[Smoky]

For me I can rationalize a way to use again and be high in a matter of minutes…
Yet seeing this thought process for what it is … I have to call its bluff.

 

[methamaniac]

I really dont know perfect thing to say here.
I think you might be looking for someone to validate you relapsing. I cant do that. I will support ya either way. I'm not saying your a failure if u use, just that your setting yourself up for failure. Only say that because something made you want to get clean. Maybe you didnt do it for yourself. Maybe you did but u dont think your worth it. You talk about smoking pot. Does this make your life unmanageable?? What about
the alcohol? Does this make your life unmanageable? This is what you have to ask yourself. I dont see anyone being happy with an unmanageable life.

If you can smoke a joint every now and then and dont have to be high all day long, maybe the alcohol is problem. Or combo of two. Again only u know that. You may ask yourself why do u feel like you have to have a substance to feel good.
Honestly you may not be able to get there on your own. You may need some pro help. No shame in that.

 

[Uber_Penguin]

Alright, well hey, then you aren't ready to quit, and if someone isn't ready to quit then they aren't ready and chances are they aren't going to get and stay clean until they are. And of course some people never are.

I understand your hedonistic approach, I believe the exact same thing, and I think we have way too many "Omg you guys, sobriety is the BEST! It's amazing! Sobriety is the clear winner! Everyone should be sober, or else you're just a wretched soul who's lying to yourself!" people out there. If anyone wanted to hear that ridiculous, irritating emotional masturbation they'd spend all their time at AA/NA meetings like some folk do (the sort who are also most likely to relapse HARD when they do, because their life still revolves around drugs, it just revolves around not using the drug rather than using it), and I think it's not helpful or realistic. Fuck that pollyanna-ish self-delusional bullshit, it annoys me just thinking about it.

BUT, the question you do have to ask yourself: does getting fucked up really, truly make you happy? Obviously people's views of that change over time, when I first started doing drugs I really truly thought they were the key to everything, but eventually I came to realize that wasn't necessarily the case. It makes me feel good in the immediate sense, but it's still not ultimately that fulfilling. Realistically it could be said that that's a failing on the drugs' parts, that there's obviously some complex part of my mind that can escape even the most euphoric effects of any narcotic/s, but that's besides the point.

And of course that's me. What few seem to be acknowledging is that maybe you truly are happy getting high and drunk and just living your whole life that way. There are going to be people who are like that who really want nothing more, and in that case do whatever it is that makes you happy. You decide that for yourself. I'd still sit and really truly question whether that's what you want for your life, if years down the line you'll be sitting there as an old man who knowing it'll all end soon and you'll look back and be happy that that's what you did with your life.

Once again, maybe that wouldn't bother you. There are those who neither expect nor desire any more from lie. But those people are fairly rare. Most aren't satisfied, they just don't see any other way, generally for a whole host of reasons. If you've already decided you're going to relapse then it's going to happen and there isn't a thing anyone else is going to do about it, nor should anyone except you concern themselves with it. Just think about all this, think about your life (and not just your life now, also your life 5,10,20,40 years from now), and decide whether this is what you really want or not.

 

[fizzymk]

You really do have to play the record all the way thru.

I liked this statement,im in the same boat but with heroin...longest ive been clean in the past 4-5 yrs is only about 3-4 days, I know the fucking mess using creates, trying anything and everything I can in order to get money on a daily basis, then waking up the next day, wondering what the hell Im going to do now, how to get more money, etc.

being able to 'play the record all the way thru' would be a good way to try and stop, or slow down, but even tho i know whats coming when that bag is empty and im back to having a few cents left to my name, that initial feeling of copping and using overpowers all the negative aspects.

Plus, i know in my head, using will really only get me feeling normal,and take away all the withdrawl shit, and not get me good and high, like it once did (well, sort of, I DO get feeling pretty damn good when using, but its NOTHING compared to those first few times).

Even though Ive seen the nightmare using regularly creates, I STILL view it in a positive light...when I do get enough money, and get ahold of my guy, I start feeling a little better even then, and when they get back at me and say 'ok, meet me here in 20 min'...that text is almost as good a feeling as the dope entering my system!!! LOL, its fucking crazy how strong the lure of drugs are...its kinda like getting REALLY excited about heading to a firing squad, thats how fucked up I think it is, yet I know this and still go thru this process as often as I can.If that is not pure insanity, I dont know what is.

 

[knockout_mice]

OP, if you want to understand the psychology of happiness, read this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Flow-The-Psychology-Optimal-Experience/dp/0061339202

On "Epicurean Hedonism":

When we say...that pleasure is the end and aim, we do not mean the pleasures of the prodigal or the pleasures of sensuality, as we are understood to do by some through ignorance, prejudice or wilful misrepresentation. By pleasure we mean the absence of pain in the body and of trouble in the soul. It is not by an unbroken succession of drinking bouts and of revelry, not by sexual lust, nor the enjoyment of fish and other delicacies of a luxurious table, which produce a pleasant life; it is sober reasoning, searching out the grounds of every choice and avoidance, and banishing those beliefs through which the greatest tumults take possession of the soul.

—Epicurus, "Letter to Menoeceus"

 

[twistedhunter]

instead of thinking i can never use again, try thinking i just wont use drugs or alcohol today. ive been getting sober, then go on a horrible binge for a couple years and i can promise you this , im a fucking pothead like you who dabbles in all kinds of drugs, and it does get worse every time. but if you are not done , like someone else said before, go out and get some. i send no bad vibes or wish no ill will to you, i just hope you think before you decide that high is worth it. good luck my friend