Gave up oxy's, now feel like my brain and my life is ruined

[chief ten beers]

After a very focused and rather good feeling year on oxycodone, I stopped and now everything is absolute shit. I almost have 2 weeks since my last dose and now I can see the damage it's caused me and my life. I've lost a lot of weight, I look older, my life is a mess, I've lost interest in all the things I love, and all the good people who were once in my life for support are not around. I went into rehab and they tried to get me to stay on suboxone but it's a good thing I researched how difficult it is to get off of it. So aside from some Kratom I'm clean. Now i can see the damage clearly and it ain't pretty. I feel kind of stuck where I'm at even though I know i need to move but I have almost no mental energy. Booze was bad for me but this shit took it to a whole new level of damage. I've never thought about suicide as much as I do now. I feel just awful, like my life crashed and burned after being in this pink cloud of everything is just alright. The deceptive thing about that shit is there is no pain until you stop taking it. As long as you you've got it coming into you steady it keeps you wrapped and comfy like a baby, but once it stops you will pay! I still have no appetite, constipated, absolutely no joy or motivation for anything. And piled on top of that is I'm carrying so much pain and regret and it's devastating. My mind won't stop convicting me off all my wrongs, I wasn't bad guy per se but certainly selfish and hurt and distanced those who loved me. And now at almost 50 there really isn't a lot of people left. This is the cost of alcohol and drugs man, they will slowly and deceptively ruin your life. I hope it gets better, it just feels dismal. I hope it passes, but death would be almost welcomed now, I would just have such a hard time doing it myself. It really does feel like serving a life sentence now, everyday brings pain, and negative self talk circles my heard constantly like demons. Thanks for letting me vent.

 

[JessFR]

I know exactly how you feel. I too have recently stopped using heroin, this isn't my first time trying to get off it, and believe me, I've been burned hard by my habit.

I'm going to give you my opinion just straight out here. And that's all it is, my opinion, an educated opinion, but still an opinion, I can be wrong.

I think they were right to recommend you stay on subs. It sounds very much like you are experiencing Post acute withdrawal syndrome. It does tend to happen if you've had an opioid habit for a long enough time, then get totally off it. Methadone and suboxone tend to be associated with better long term outcomes cause you tend not to suffer PAWS as a result of quitting that way, and the depression from PAWS often results in people not staying off drugs in the long term.

I'm not saying what you're feeling isn't real. If you're at all like me you've probably done a lot of bad shit to feel remorse for. I am on methadone and I'm still having more trouble with depression now than I have in a long time from quitting. But it's still a breeze compared to what it could be if I'd gotten totally clean. Even after withdrawal ends.

Depression fucks with your head, it just makes it all so much harder to deal with.

Anyhow, whatever the reason, the important question is what to do about it. Honestly I can only think of a couple things.

You can persue treatment for depression, therapy, antidepressants, and again, honestly, I've found this hit and miss at best.
You can wait it out, but you could be feeling like this a long time. I think it's the primary reason all the stats say going cold turkey has some of the worst long term outcomes. Cause you have PAWS pushing you to use all the time. Cause you feel like after all you've lost, all you've suffered, you could at least still have the drugs you lost it all for.

Which leads to option three, get back on drugs, And this is very dangerous cause this is the time when a lot of overdose deaths happen. When you've been clean for a while. And it's really not the answer, it's just stalling the problem.

Or, final option, you can see about getting on maintainence. I understand this isn't a perfect option, you're right, once you get on it it's real hard to get off. You gotta be picking up doses all the time. It's far from ideal.

It's up to you, I chose methadone. Cause I was afraid what's happening to you would happen to me if I'd gotten off everything.

I promise you, I've done some bad baaaad shit, I've lost nearly everything I ever cared about. With that in mind, I have absolutely no doubt if I'd gotten off everything, I'd be in exactly the state you describe. Even on methadone it can still be rough sometimes.

I wish I could be more help I really do. All I can say is, I've suffered emotional problems my entire life. I promise, even if you're right about everything that's happened and how bad it is. How you FEEL about it is not a real reflection of it. It never is. Everything we feel is chemistry, even off drugs. You've been on opioids, so like me you know a lot better than most that how we feel doesn't have to have anything to do with how bad things are or aren't.

I know people way more depressed than me with a lot less wrong with their life. What I'm saying is...

Do NOT let yourself think that this is how you should naturally feel after what you've done and experienced. Cause it's probably not, it's probably still a result of the drugs. But even if it were, you still shouldn't have to live with it. It isn't doing any good as far as staying of drugs goes, it's just motivation to get back to using.

I hope you find help, if you ever want someone to talk to you're welcome to pm me if you like. I promise you're not alone in this though, and I promise it can get better.

Honestly, I would seriously consider maintainence therapy. It's not a great option, but it's a hell of a lot better than using. For me I decided that I simply wouldn't make it in the long term getting off everything. I'd just wind up using again and even the downsides of methadone are still a lot better than that. I'm not saying to get on methadone, I'm not even saying to get on subuxone. I'm not you.

Just that what you're feeling is VERY common when people get off opioids and don't get on maintainence. And it's because our endorphin system in our brain still isn't working right after all the abuse we put it through.

It is temporary, but there's no way to really know how long it might be that you might feel like this. Months, years maybe.
And you shouldn't have too. So if maintainence is out of the question, perhaps antidepressants and counseling are a better option.

Just don't tell yourself that this is what you deserve, deserve has nothing to do with it. It's not what you need and it's not of any help to anybody. The important thing is staying clean.

 

[chief ten beers]

Thank you for your words of encouragement Jessfr , I sure hope it doesn’t last feeling like this because I won’t be able to make it. At the same time I didn’t want to become a slave to another drug. The shit had me long enough and I’m just going to tough it out clean as long as I can. I’m definitely broken, but I don’t want to be an addict any longer. But everyone is different, I want to be clean for a change even with the Pain and suffering. I just wish to god I didn’t earlier when it mattered more. I lost a loving wife who put up with so much, she really loved me. Now she’s found another man and I’ll probably never have that kind of love again. I have so much unprocessed stuff to deal with, got to start somewhere....it’s gonna be painful, already is. Good luck to you bro, and thanks again.

 

[JessFR]

Actually I’m a chick, but all good.

I really do know how you feel. I lost the man I loved more than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything in my life. I can’t begin to explain the shit I put him through. Or how much I miss him. I lost just about all my material possessions. I wound up homeless. Begging for money and worse. Just about everything I ever cared about and I have nobody to blame but myself.

He hasn’t moved on yet, so as unlikely as it is, I still haven’t given up. I can’t. It’s been about 7 months we haven’t been together now, but I’m still totally in love with him. But we (you and me and people like us) made the choices we made. Hard as they are to live with.

It’s entirely your choice, for me I decided I wasn’t willing to live depressed and that I’d prefer to be a slave to methadone than a slave to depression.

But I understand where you’re coming from. I knew when I decided to get back on methadone that I could be on it a very very long time.

If you think you’d rather go it without maintainence. I wish you luck. Something I always say about statistics... YOU are not the average. No single individual is.

There’s nothing to say you can’t make it without maintainence. The truth is people on it tend to have better long term outcomes. But there are lots of exceptions. That doesn’t have to be you. And there are other options to treat this beyond maintainence. I haven’t had too much luck myself, but some people do a lot better.

And you can always change your mind if it gets too hard. Just know that there’s support out there. Lots of people who know what you’re going through and want you to make it.

 

[Mafioso]

It takes time but you will level out. I chose to go from poly drug addiction to completely sobriety. It was really rough for the first 2 months, but it is getting easier as time goes on. I really didn't like the idea of being on any kind of medication. I'm a poly drug addict and will likely abuse anything that gives me a head change. I know some people go on methadone or subs, but personally I think that if you can manage without them then that is the better choice.

The hardest part of getting clean is often dealing with the consequences of things we did while still using. Easier said than done, but beating yourself up for mistakes you made will not undo them. Self-acceptance and self-love are very important. It's easy to hate yourself for mistakes you made and problems you caused, but that won't lead to much progress and likely just cause more problems or prevent you from dealing with them.

Getting sober is the first step in stopping the damage and beginning the healing process. I lost quite a bit due to my substance use and still deal with regret and frustration and even depression because of it. I try not to focus on those things and instead focus on the positives that getting clean has brought me. I can now truly move forward in life and avoid having to deal with the same types of problems. It's not easy starting over but it does bring a sense of freedom. I really try to embrace the freedom that a fresh start brings.

hang in there. It may not get any easier but it can get a lot harder..

 

[ShroomySatori]

I feel the same way if it's any consolence, I could have written that myself I think. Except I am 30. I'm around a week off the oxy and the damage I have done to my life and myself is extreme. I feel that even if I can get clean, I will be miserable for the rest of my life because I simply can't get over some of the losses emotionally particularly the romantic relationships that I ruined over drugs. I was in the hundreds of milligrams of oxy before switching to sniffing heroin full time and I dug myself even deeper into this pit of hell. The longer we use, the worse the withdrawals are, the more emotionally traumatized we become. I am certainly done using this garbage, but the question is do I even want to live anymore? I can't find a single reason to stick around.

All I think about are hateful things and ways I could kill myself. I figured the best idea yet would be to jump off the massive cliffs near my cabin in the woods since they are so damn steep there would be no way of ever surviving. Fuck faking it with a needle and some dope because those opiates decimated and ruined my life and I couldn't stop. I'm getting clean so I can kill myself with more clarity of mind and so that at least I will be clean when I make the decision I have been considering for a very long time. 5 years of bad bullshit, but this past year has been WAY too much for me. Everything came crashing down and I am left with NOTHING but hate. I want out, and I will be getting out of this fucking nightmare. I'm too physically weak to kill myself right now the way that I want to. That is what a god damned pussy I have become.

 

[chief ten beers]

Actually I’m a chick, but all good.

I really do know how you feel. I lost the man I loved more than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything in my life. I can’t begin to explain the shit I put him through. Or how much I miss him. I lost just about all my material possessions. I wound up homeless. Begging for money and worse. Just about everything I ever cared about and I have nobody to blame but myself.

He hasn’t moved on yet, so as unlikely as it is, I still haven’t given up. I can’t. It’s been about 7 months we haven’t been together now, but I’m still totally in love with him. But we (you and me and people like us) made the choices we made. Hard as they are to live with.

It’s entirely your choice, for me I decided I wasn’t willing to live depressed and that I’d prefer to be a slave to methadone than a slave to depression.

But I understand where you’re coming from. I knew when I decided to get back on methadone that I could be on it a very very long time.

If you think you’d rather go it without maintainence. I wish you luck. Something I always say about statistics... YOU are not the average. No single individual is.

There’s nothing to say you can’t make it without maintainence. The truth is people on it tend to have better long term outcomes. But there are lots of exceptions. That doesn’t have to be you. And there are other options to treat this beyond maintainence. I haven’t had too much luck myself, but some people do a lot better.

And you can always change your mind if it gets too hard. Just know that there’s support out there. Lots of people who know what you’re going through and want you to make it.

Well my apologies on your gender Jess. I hate to say it but after lots of struggle I finally popped a Vicodin, I'm probably going to hate myself but the depression is just killing me. I hope it was worth it but it probably wasn't. I guess better that than being on a long term plan like suboxone or methadone. If I would have known what I was signing up for I never ever would have touched oxy's. It's probably worse then heroin in it's all synthetic chemicals. My stomach hurts, I can't hardly eat, I actually have a layer of skin peeling off a few of my fingers, but worst of all no sense of peace at all. That is the worst thing I'm dealing with, it really sucks to wake up because my mind instantly tells me everything sucks in every possible way. Though I have to tell myself, it could always be worse. I'm not in jail, I have a roof over my head, I'm not broke, I have a functioning vehicle, and no legal problems. So I should count my blessings but I can't seem to do that right now. I'm probably going to kick myself for using but at least it's not the drug that did me in. I only hope these these posts can dissuade someone from ever playing the opiate game, because if it don't kill you it's at least going to leave a hell of a mark on your life.

 

[Mafioso]

One Vicodin is not the end of the world. I've used Vicodin to help myself sort of step down from smoking oxy and tar.

Keep pushing through. Hold on to whatever little bit of hope that comes your way, I know it may be a rarity. Things will get better and it is possible to be happy without using opiates. Things may get worse before they get better, but you can get there and you will be glad that you did. I don't know anyone who has successfully quit opiates and regrets doing so...

 

[chief ten beers]

One Vicodin is not the end of the world. I've used Vicodin to help myself sort of step down from smoking oxy and tar.

Keep pushing through. Hold on to whatever little bit of hope that comes your way, I know it may be a rarity. Things will get better and it is possible to be happy without using opiates. Things may get worse before they get better, but you can get there and you will be glad that you did. I don't know anyone who has successfully quit opiates and regrets doing so...

Thanks again for your words of encouragement, I do have a whole jar of them which I do have a script for as I do have serious back pain. I have been on these for years, until I started using oxy then I found I no longer needed them lol. But they are at my disposal and I think I'm way to depressed and have such a sense of unwellness in body and in mind that I doubt I'll be able to abstain from them now that I broke my clean streak. Maybe I did try to go opiate free too soon, because I've been such a mess lately and any relief is welcome...except going back to oxy, which I will never do. I still want to get well and get clean, it just may take a while longer to get there then I thought. I really feel using oxy was the worst habit to introduce into my life ever, now I'm paying a heavy price. I even used dope sporadically when I ran out, even though I knew I was going down a slippery slope to hell. At least I had the presence of mind to smack myself and say knock it the fuck off before I picked up a habit on that shit too! The things addiction will make you do...oh "the places you'll go". Thanks again Mafiso, I've appreciated your words in previous posts as well.

 

[JessFR]

One Vicodin is not the end of the world. I've used Vicodin to help myself sort of step down from smoking oxy and tar.

Keep pushing through. Hold on to whatever little bit of hope that comes your way, I know it may be a rarity. Things will get better and it is possible to be happy without using opiates. Things may get worse before they get better, but you can get there and you will be glad that you did. I don't know anyone who has successfully quit opiates and regrets doing so...

While I agree with you that opiates aren't really a good thing, to say that no one successfully quits and regrets it is kinda neither here nor there. Cause if you quit them and did regret it, you'd just go back to using them.

I'm being a bit pedantic here, but my point is that quitting alone isn't going to fix your life. It's a good step, it's a big and important step, but one step of many nonetheless. I guess what I'm saying here is just getting off them isnt usually enough on its own to make life worth living.

 

[Jabberwocky]

IME cessation requires far more than just abstience for most people to find sustainable, long term abstience. That doesn’t mean you can start recovering before achieving abstience though! Again IME that process generally tends to begin prior to actual cessation, especially when it comes to long term opioid habits.

 

[ShroomySatori]

It has been a full week now, and my brain feels totally fried. I don't have the physical energy to play guitar, if I try I will be fatigued in a minute. I can sleep, but I can't eat very much at all. I am a skeleton and earlier this year I was a healthy 200lbs while using. Since I was able to do basic things like cook food and shower without it being an immense struggle.

The insomnia always comes a little later on for me. It took everything in my willpower to go wake and bake at my buddy's farm today, something I normally would really enjoy. I have had perpetual suicidal thoughts this whole first week. Almost half of my time is spent fantasizing over suicide. I feel like opiate addiction is a fate worse than death. What the fuck was I thinking sniffing all that heroin and popping oxy's like candy for years upon years on end.

My buddy today said it sounded like a prison sentence and to be glad I could do it from home. A good analogy for what I'm going through might be a month in prison with a year of probation (I know jail totally sucks, but so does heroin withdrawal when it gets this bad). I think that is a good way of looking at it. Essentially I am imprisoned in my own mind, there is absolutely nothing I can do about it. I can eat healthy, exercise a little bit, but it's not going to stop the necessity of time to heal. I fully expect to be completely strung out at the one month point. It is absolute hell and I never expected I'd get in over my head this bad. I'm just happy I ran out of money because if I was holding a job in my field my habit would be exponentially worse than it already is. I haven't worked since my habit got out of control, but the first two years of daily use were some of the best of my life. My life hasn't been worth living ever since apart from being happy with a girl for a little while this summer, who I'll probably never see again because I relapsed three times while seeing her. I live with immense regret over a lot of things and it makes me want to go back to using, not to mention I am severely mentally ill and it seems that heroin is the only thing that can make me content.

There is so much I want to be doing to better myself, but I can't even read 2 pages of a book before getting distracted by the physical symptoms and it has been an entire week of suicidal depression and hellish physical symptoms. I sort of feel like how the girl in the exorcist would feel being possessed and thrown around and mocked by the gods, kind of like that I guess. I'd really like to be able to apply for a job, considering my finances have been totalled by my opiate use. I can't bring myself to do it, I'm not ready yet. I cannot do a single constructive thing for my future other than do what I can to get off heroin and oxy's. I have a lot of ideas swirling in my head and it fucking sucks that I can't find the strength for action.

 

[chief ten beers]

It has been a full week now, and my brain feels totally fried. I don't have the physical energy to play guitar, if I try I will be fatigued in a minute. I can sleep, but I can't eat very much at all. I am a skeleton and earlier this year I was a healthy 200lbs while using. Since I was able to do basic things like cook food and shower without it being an immense struggle.

The insomnia always comes a little later on for me. It took everything in my willpower to go wake and bake at my buddy's farm today, something I normally would really enjoy. I have had perpetual suicidal thoughts this whole first week. Almost half of my time is spent fantasizing over suicide. I feel like opiate addiction is a fate worse than death. What the fuck was I thinking sniffing all that heroin and popping oxy's like candy for years upon years on end.

My buddy today said it sounded like a prison sentence and to be glad I could do it from home. A good analogy for what I'm going through might be a month in prison with a year of probation (I know jail totally sucks, but so does heroin withdrawal when it gets this bad). I think that is a good way of looking at it. Essentially I am imprisoned in my own mind, there is absolutely nothing I can do about it. I can eat healthy, exercise a little bit, but it's not going to stop the necessity of time to heal. I fully expect to be completely strung out at the one month point. It is absolute hell and I never expected I'd get in over my head this bad. I'm just happy I ran out of money because if I was holding a job in my field my habit would be exponentially worse than it already is. I haven't worked since my habit got out of control, but the first two years of daily use were some of the best of my life. My life hasn't been worth living ever since apart from being happy with a girl for a little while this summer, who I'll probably never see again because I relapsed three times while seeing her. I live with immense regret over a lot of things and it makes me want to go back to using, not to mention I am severely mentally ill and it seems that heroin is the only thing that can make me content.

There is so much I want to be doing to better myself, but I can't even read 2 pages of a book before getting distracted by the physical symptoms and it has been an entire week of suicidal depression and hellish physical symptoms. I sort of feel like how the girl in the exorcist would feel being possessed and thrown around and mocked by the gods, kind of like that I guess. I'd really like to be able to apply for a job, considering my finances have been totalled by my opiate use. I can't bring myself to do it, I'm not ready yet. I cannot do a single constructive thing for my future other than do what I can to get off heroin and oxy's. I have a lot of ideas swirling in my head and it fucking sucks that I can't find the strength for action.

I can relate brother, I feel like I really did some damage to my body and my psyche. I'm a guitar player too and I haven't even touched my guitars in over a month. It's hard for me to go out now and do the basics of life. I was just going through some boxes of stuff that I haven't peered into for years. I found some of my old journals, cards from my ex wife, letters from old girlfriends, keep sake stuff that I just hung onto and each piece I picked up had an associated memory attached to it. Back when I had a life, all kinds of books, musical and spiritual. It made me sad actually, especially reading my old journals, because they reveal the history of how alcohol and depression have plagued me since I was around 19, and I'm now 49 . Alcohol really fucked up my life but the Oxy gave it the death blow. I really feel like I'm done here and that I failed in this life and it's basically over for me. The question I ask myself is could I really go through with something like that? It's very drastic and goes against everything I was raised to believe, but I don't want to be here anymore. So what to do? How does one actually get the courage up to do something so heinous to themselves?

 

[ShroomySatori]

I feel like I have been traumatized and tortured in so many ways. I can relate to everything you are saying. All I have are my past memories of a better life, before I developed drug problems in university and ruined my life. I always knew to stay away from opiates but after a severe injuring resulting in chronic pain I eventually started using heroin and then got a script for oxy's as the pain was and is so bad and I am not even 30 yet. I am getting there though, I will be in a few months. I completely ruined my 20's apart from a couple of years before the addiction really got a grip on me and I was still full of energy, vitality, and life. I feel like I have no soul no, or that I am slowly regaining my spirit.

The old memories are the worst. This addiction torn apart my last relationship and she was the lady who I know I want to marry one day. However she apparently wasn't enough since I relapsed three times when I was with her, each time at the fucking pharmacy when my prescription came out. That shit haunts me it really does because she and I are so quirky it could never be replicated, sure there are other women but I'm not interested in them.Might seem silly but this tortures me and not a day goes by that I don't cry about her. I sometimes freak out and trash all my shit. I can't deal with it, we were amazing together when I was sober but as soon as I began actively using we could not even stand to be in the same room together. Probably sounds stupid but for me, this is the worst part of all. The greatest loss of my life and the reason I am in tears writing this.

I am an engineer and I should have started my career like 7 years ago fuck. And I did. I had a great life, a country home, and a beauty grow op. Growing kali mist, now those were the days. Vaping out my volcano every morning and heading to engineer shit and be a leader. Look at me now, I am a laughing stock and a downright failure. All I did was smoke weed back then, but then I damaged my spine somehow. I was fired because I couldn't keep my shit together with the chronic excruciating pain in my spine. I was unable to work so even if I get clean what the fuck do I do? Either way I'm screwed. Ever since my life has been hell, a slow downfall into dope sickness and insanity. I am heavily addicted to benzos as well and I just see my life as totally fucked.

That being said, I am a week clean and that is by far the longest I've voluntarily gone without opiates in years. What surprised me is that I woke up today and actually did 2 things with my day that were out of the ordinary. Well - 3, considering I ate a small amount of food (like maybe someone really really sick might be able to stomach aka fuckin nothing). I drove out and had a wake and bake at my buddies farm. That was very hard to do. Whatever happened to the days when I didn't even have to think about doing shit like that I just did it? Let alone force myself to do things I used to enjoy? One positive thing I can say is I actually applied to an engineering job today. That is the first time I have done that this whole entire year, because I have been caught up in heroin highs and dope sickness. I'll take the chronic pain, and if I can't quit, I have plenty of time to go jump off a cliff and put myself out of my misery. I'm really surprised and even shocked that I actually applied for a job though. I have such nasty bad self esteem issues that it makes it really tough for me to find work since I don't believe in myself. My self image is fucking disgusting. Pain, anger, regret man.

 

[CfZrx]

After a very focused and rather good feeling year on oxycodone, I stopped and now everything is absolute shit. I almost have 2 weeks since my last dose and now I can see the damage it's caused me and my life. I've lost a lot of weight, I look older, my life is a mess, I've lost interest in all the things I love, and all the good people who were once in my life for support are not around. I went into rehab and they tried to get me to stay on suboxone but it's a good thing I researched how difficult it is to get off of it. So aside from some Kratom I'm clean. Now i can see the damage clearly and it ain't pretty. I feel kind of stuck where I'm at even though I know i need to move but I have almost no mental energy. Booze was bad for me but this shit took it to a whole new level of damage. I've never thought about suicide as much as I do now. I feel just awful, like my life crashed and burned after being in this pink cloud of everything is just alright. The deceptive thing about that shit is there is no pain until you stop taking it. As long as you you've got it coming into you steady it keeps you wrapped and comfy like a baby, but once it stops you will pay! I still have no appetite, constipated, absolutely no joy or motivation for anything. And piled on top of that is I'm carrying so much pain and regret and it's devastating. My mind won't stop convicting me off all my wrongs, I wasn't bad guy per se but certainly selfish and hurt and distanced those who loved me. And now at almost 50 there really isn't a lot of people left. This is the cost of alcohol and drugs man, they will slowly and deceptively ruin your life. I hope it gets better, it just feels dismal. I hope it passes, but death would be almost welcomed now, I would just have such a hard time doing it myself. It really does feel like serving a life sentence now, everyday brings pain, and negative self talk circles my heard constantly like demons. Thanks for letting me vent.

These are the thoughts of a truly depressed Chief! I think it's time to find a harmless way to elevate your mood!

 

[Fresco]

You guys (and girls) are being way too hard on yourself!!!

 

[Mafioso]

While I agree with you that opiates aren't really a good thing, to say that no one successfully quits and regrets it is kinda neither here nor there. Cause if you quit them and did regret it, you'd just go back to using them.

I'm being a bit pedantic here, but my point is that quitting alone isn't going to fix your life. It's a good step, it's a big and important step, but one step of many nonetheless. I guess what I'm saying here is just getting off them isnt usually enough on its own to make life worth living.

...I don't think people go back to using any psychoactive substance because they regret getting sober. Like even you mentioned, sobriety isn't going to solve all your problems. People generally relapse because they haven't developed a healthy way to cope or manage problems in their life, not because they think getting sober was a bad decision and they regret it...

I don't think I ever said or implied that all someone needs to do is to quit using, but generally when someone is talking about getting clean it is because drug use has become problematic in their life. Quitting will solve at least one of their problems, but I also understand that people generally use drugs as a coping mechanism due to other problems and struggles in life...

 

[JahSEEuS]

I am here to tell you that it gets better.

I quit using oxycontin almost 10 years ago. After 3.5 years of steady use/abuse. I went through all of the things you are going through now. 2 weeks of cold turkey hell. Couldn't eat, couldn't sleep, couldn't stand being awake, couldn't talk to family, couldn't look in mirror, hell I couldn't even get out of bed without spinning out of control from a lack of proper nutrition/fluids. If I could manage to squeeze some food down my gullet I would just puke it right back up the second I was out of prying eyes.

If you've made it to the 2 week mark you are the right path for sure.

I won't tell you what to do at this point. I will share my experience.

I was lucky enough to have a caring family. My father was kind enough to keep me working around the house and those were the easiest days after first quitting. Just hard, sweaty, work around the yard, helping his friends roofing. I would finish the day and feel accomplished. I would also be too tired to think about using. Sure it crossed my mind, but after going through 2 weeks of straight hell how does one ever rationalize using again? I know I didn't want to end up in the same spot, or worse.

I ended up dealing with some issues from my past and going to drug court for my past actions. While the outpatient I went to wasn't really useful, it was nice to have one-on-one sessions with a trained professional if it only made me aware of some sort of possible self-actualization. Some of the info in treatment was useful, but mostly it seemed a money grab by the private institutions and the courts. It did get me into NA where I met some good people and learned some things. Some good, some bad.

I've gone through so much since then. Love, loss, beauty, pain, nature's loving hand, and humanity's crushing grasp. All without reaching for a pain killer. I never thought I'd be able to deal with the physical pain I was feeling right after getting clean, much less the emotional tolls that were past due and still coming on the journey ahead.

I am here to tell you that we can get through this. You can do this. You will succeed. If that is what you want to do. You may falter, you may slide, but you will get back up and become the person you are meant to be.

I know this because I am here today. Hell, you might even meet the love of your life in the process. I know I just did.

Much love,

Jah

 

[JessFR]

...I don't think people go back to using any psychoactive substance because they regret getting sober. Like even you mentioned, sobriety isn't going to solve all your problems. People generally relapse because they haven't developed a healthy way to cope or manage problems in their life, not because they think getting sober was a bad decision and they regret it...

I don't think I ever said or implied that all someone needs to do is to quit using, but generally when someone is talking about getting clean it is because drug use has become problematic in their life. Quitting will solve at least one of their problems, but I also understand that people generally use drugs as a coping mechanism due to other problems and struggles in life...

Strictly speaking I didn't say people go back to drugs cause they regret quitting, I said saying that nobody regrets it is meaningless. Ok, virtually nobody goes back to using because they "regret" quitting as the motivation. They do it cause as you said they still have the problems that started the use in the first place. But while that may not be regretting quitting, they aren't exactly thinking that quitting has helped enough to stay off it either.

All I'm getting at is saying that nobody quits and regrets it isn't something I find particularly helpful or motivating. Cause like I said my addict brain just dismisses it by going "well no but so what? If I quit and did regret it I'd go back to using wouldn't I?".

I get what you're saying. It's just right now I'm in the process of trying to quit heroin myself, and to me reading it, it doesn't feel like there's any weight behind it. It feels a little like saying "nobody who improves their life regrets it". Yeah it's true, but it doesn't mean anything, it's not helpful.

 

[chief ten beers]

You guys (and girls) are being way too hard on yourself!!!

I don't think so in my case, the problem with me is I've always been too easy on myself. I always made excuses or justified my reason to use, and slack. I was able to do that for a very long time, but now I can be as bad as I want to be so to speak but there is almost nobody left to get on my case or call me to task on it. I know I'm the only one who can change that, but I really feel stuck at the moment. It feels like the water faucet of life which once freely poured is closed up tight now, with maybe a trickle coming through once in a while. But I'm no longer young, I'm tired and now life is a lot harder. I'm praying just to want to live, or if god won't help me at least take me out of this place. A digression perhaps but you know what I'm sort of taking solace in right now is watching episodes of Locked up abroad( or Banged up abroad). Many whole episodes are free on youtube actually. When you start feeling bad about your circumstances, Imagine what it would be like to be locked up in a third world prison! The series is well done and it has the actually people who went through it, literal hell. For some reason that helps me right now, I say to myself see you could be in that situation, quit crying and deal with my comparatively cushy personal rock bottom period. Now that would be hard, I probably couldn't handle it myself but these are people who actually went though hell and back and lived to tell the tale. For me right now tales of real hardship take me out of my head and temporarily at least make me feel not so bad about my situation. Anything to stop thinking about poor old me! I also try meditating, anything to stop my mind from thinking about how bad I feel. I just want me with all my current dysfunctional egoic/mental operating systems to disappear. My usual method to do that is drugs and drink, it's hard not to do that right now, very hard!