Just read some earlier threads I've made here and elsewhere. Wow wow wow.

[Joey]

Between my last Dark Side thread on this site and three elsewhere. 2 from 2011, 1 from early 2014, one from late 2015. I have found I have a pretty good catalog to detail my cycle in and out of addictive patterns. I'm not gonna link the other site cause this is pretty personal but I want to add to it. I'd be interested to hear some responses too.

I just saw myself say I am 20, I am 22, I am 24. I am drinking/first detox. Too many detoxes and rehabs with unidentiified mental health. More of that and getting an assessment with psychiatrist while I'm sober so I can do that BEFORE I relapse (which I did within a few months following that assessment).

I am now 26, pushing 27. I am again in the same spot. I have my diagnoses. I have concurrent disorders. Addictss and mental health. I smoke/snort meth, mostly smoke, and I'm in the early phase of coming to grips with that diagnosis ONLY recently. You see, I started a medication and I stopped very quickly. I found work. I started partying. I lost work. I fell apart. I took off.

This is the cycle described in every thread I just read of myself.

Now I'm a meth addict with a bipolar diagnoses, among others. I'm trying to deal with both at once. I started a med. I have an impending detox. I'm gonna get meds added and increased. I'm gonna go back into addiction recovery. I'm gonna take my first real shot at calming this mind I have. I've been so, so fucked up. So many years.

I'm doing this with a worry of winding up homeless or in failure. I always have.

Maybe, maybe if I can stabilize the mental health this time too I may have a chance.

Maybe.

Hey bipolar methheads whats goin on? Isnt it fantastic? Fuck.

 

[Joey]

Cant forget to mention that I was really heavier on the alcohol side in the first few threads 20-22. 24 I was kind of middling. Now drugs drugs drugs.

I quit heroin/pills about a year ago. 25 was the age I started drinking less. Drugging more. Its the age.. well a lot happened. I still drink a little. Had 1.5 beers today tall and thats actually more than the last 2 days.

I figured out that my relapses have always been identified with feeling I get after being down in the shit or doing OK, whichever, I go crazy. I knew I had bipolar diagnoses by 24 but didnt really think deep on it til now, 26. Mania makes me much, much more likely to fall down.

But it's an ongoing process. I have a really good doctor who specializes in both, and as concurrent disorders. Trying to figure this all out now. Too much time on my hands and I don't sleep a whole hell of a lot. Trying to sift the shit from the gold.

Anyway, there is a very distinct pattern which was pointed out to me which I took time to process... That's what I have to work with now. It became really obvious around the start of this year how the addiction and the diagnoses are linked in my life story.

I read a page on managing bipolar lately that made perfect sense to my life. From adolescence on. The comorbidity sections and the ages things are usually first spotted are spot on to my life.

https://www.aafp.org/afp/2000/0915/p1343.html

Im still a horrible junkie, just hoping knowing what KIND of horrible junkie will help me out.

Anyone relate with concurrent diagnoses and dealing with that.

 

[Painful One]

I relate to having concurrent diagnoses Alex_1991. Mine are a bit different than yours- chronic pain/injury along with major depressive disorder. Hard to deal with. I can relate very much to not sleeping much and some of the other things you mentioned and are going through. Chronic pain, anxiety, and depression go hand in hand, as do these diagnosis you have.

It took me years to even understand what was happening to me, myself, let alone try and explain that to anyone else.
Then it took me years to accept and deal with these problems correctly. You are not alone. There are many others in the world whom have these kinds of problems.

The key is to "manage" these health problems. Forgive yourself for the cycle you have been stuck in and find BALANCE.
We whom suffer from such things walk a razor edge of balance. Never, ever stop any kind of medication abruptly.
It is of the utmost importance that you keep the balance in your body so you can prevent or at least have some kind of management over "going overboard".

Sending you love

 

[Mafioso]

It's impressive how well we can hide an addiction from others, but it's always surprising how well we hide it from ourselves. The addicts famous words are always "one last time" "one more time" or "only one time", and it rarely ever is.

For me, it wasn't my last until I couldn't anymore. I went a little over 7 months and now I'm smoking weed every day again. It's not that I think smoking weed is a gateway drug or that it is bad(if done in moderation, like anything else), but just the way it's slowly crept back into my habits and nearly every day I've been telling myself it's the last one scares me. It's surprising how quickly how much time can disappear.

Getting off harder drugs has really helped, but it hasn't solved everything. It's definitely much easier living without the drug induced manic episodes, blacking out, coming down/withdrawing. Life seems simpler, but it still doesn't seem easy.

The hard part really seems acclimating back to normal life. It's such a different life style and mind set when you're addicted. I miss the faced paced lifestyle, everything seems so mundane. I need to work on adding healthy levels of excitement to my life.

 

[Joey]

It's impressive how well we can hide an addiction from others, but it's always surprising how well we hide it from ourselves. The addicts famous words are always "one last time" "one more time" or "only one time", and it rarely ever is.

For me, it wasn't my last until I couldn't anymore. I went a little over 7 months and now I'm smoking weed every day again. It's not that I think smoking weed is a gateway drug or that it is bad(if done in moderation, like anything else), but just the way it's slowly crept back into my habits and nearly every day I've been telling myself it's the last one scares me. It's surprising how quickly how much time can disappear.

Getting off harder drugs has really helped, but it hasn't solved everything. It's definitely much easier living without the drug induced manic episodes, blacking out, coming down/withdrawing. Life seems simpler, but it still doesn't seem easy.

The hard part really seems acclimating back to normal life. It's such a different life style and mind set when you're addicted. I miss the faced paced lifestyle, everything seems so mundane. I need to work on adding healthy levels of excitement to my life.

I see a lot of myself here. Gonna say one thing before I start. The weed's not a big deal. I had a medical card for this at one point over 3 months recently which I've now dropped as a personal choice towards getting clean. By a corporate "drug test the machine OP in safety sensitive position" virtue. It helped, I wouldnt give a shit if it werent for my career path. Hoping to be more the machinist eventually. I'm not in a "safety senisitive" thing like forklift driving as a mode moving shit around, lets say now. It gave me a record with work as someone who cant be on anything "safety sensitive" until I drop the weed". Not in those words. The specifics are with me and the company doctor.

Might be better for me to be 100% clean in the end anyway. It's a small step. But I digress.... forgot to mention I'm on methadone too which work doesnt know about... or the meth or the dope or booze too much. Its scary trying to live that balance but I did for a long, long while considering.

Anyway....

My story above is very condensed, would have to be I guess. When I was screened to get my true mental health diagnoses while I was still sober I was 6 months clean (totally) sober. I moved from my last rehab into the family home leading up to that. I had big plans and basically went infirm. So.. so low I felt. I know exactly how you feel about not being able to adjust to a kind of normal "boring" lifestyle.

In that time and just months after the diagnoses, after relapsing, losing my shit again. I took off into the dark one night (I literally hitchhiked to stay at a friends place temporarily), hoping to build a new life. I couldnt live with myself anymore, not in my Grandmas house with my Dad and Uncle. I couldn't live with myself because doing this there, I could never have fended for myself either getting better or worse like I had before. They were too close to me and it was too upsetting to them, especially my grandma... I used to hold down jobs and pay my own way without that extent of support from them. Not that much to the point I'm housed, fed, driven around, up and down go, Why Alex why? You know?

I built up my life here.. I also rekindled a very abusive relationship Id kept over the years. Same "friend" (in quot not because romantic, but believe me he IS an abuser and a BAD sociopath). I mentioned earlier I had a friend to take me in briefly. As he always and I sort of knew this too, being with him was too risky. I'm not gonna blame him for my addictions existence, but I will always feel If not for my life with him I would NOT have wound up shooting heroin every day therein and thereafter for awhile.

I'm on methadone maintenance since Jan 2017, and though that HELPED I finally quit H and pills 100% in April. He really helped push me along, as in abusive and useless sociopath he is I was "asked nicely" to buy and "share" what I had forever and ever and ever because he just LOVES me, "little brother".

He's gone since August last year. Stayed around still after dropping the H and i didnt drink too much anymore for money and my willingness to maybe rink more booze under his heel, and other resources as I actually did build that new life I wanted. Really did, got a good job and a place and made over 50k last year (gone).

Interestingly enough I started smoking meth leading up to that end with him in August to cope with the trauma of it. I can get that myself easily and he isn't into it.. too much only very little to top his booze and heroin if around. After being robbed and assaulted both at one occasion he was escorted out of my apartment by police. So with that I detoxed from meth hard.

After that.... well I'm still coping with that and everything else too. Used here and there, more often around december into Jan, now I'm a full on meth head. I decided to find a doctor to deal with the mental health around his leave as my mind really started to slip badly then. I just knew.. I started looking for a family doc cause going in and out of crisis in hospital desperate to get a med and / or a psychiatrist.. I was always get "get a family doc".

I couldn't find one until Feb, this month we are in now.

AFTER I couldn't work anymore due to meth use. AFTER I totally snapped and I've been covering under a blanket of meth to hold myself together...

So now I'm on a workplace disability leave, going through complications trying to get that income in to pay ANYTHING like my bills fo next month. I have a last months rent..half of March paid which I did when I had nearly lost myself. I geared up for hell as much as I could before I lost it completely which I now have..

But I am finally able to start focusing more on my issues again. No more 6 shifts by 8 hour to a 48 hour work week while I look for a doctor and fall apart. I have both time and I know whats going on and have the doc and others getting help I so badly need. I'm very experienced in the aspect of dealing with addiction. I'm towards the last phase of that, detox is Tuesday. So now I can go back into "recovery".. giving myself a chance to... and for the first time I'll be able to continue tackling the shitty brain I have. Pound some sense into it. Meds effectiveness, and commitment to them, focus, the next phase my doc has planned for me cannot start til I detox.

Stressful right? I think life was actually simpler just as it was before. Felt horrible but there only one road to go down living so bad. This is uncertain.

This will lead me back to the slow and normal life I want to have but I may not cope with easy.. hoping tackling the mental health will alleviate that depression now that I think about it that way to that situation. What's next? This isn't the same cycle I'm looking at in my earlier posts. I'm starting with a new approach this time.

Crazier than I am (maybe haha).

 

[Joey]

I know I'm multi-posting. This is quality posting though trust me.

Something I wrote about myself recently. It's called "Alex". Simple yeah.

26 years old, so young was the man.
In his short life, so long he'd struggled.
He didn't know why, so then he went out.
To find an answer, that was in himself.

In flights of panic, so far he went,
He still remained, so stuck in place.
The sky the limit, so far he went
Down and down. So deep was he rooted..

So troubled a nature, he carried within,
No sense of direction, to help himself.
Again and again, he'd look out for help.
To find the answer, that was in himself.

So deep was he rooted in his own little hell.

A long lived life pattern full of running starts
From an early age, it seemed he'd go far.
He slipped, he slipped, he would fall he'd foreseen.
An Inevitability, he had then, he would fall.

So then he fell down - down into a pit
A bottle, a pipe, and later a needle.
Feeling so ashamed, down in there he'd stay.
As all they are one and all are the same.

This could be a day, a few months, more.
He'd get out to come back, in the years throughout.
Wound up down in there, he would wind up he'd stay.
In the end down in there - therein to the end.

 

[Ds]

I laugh when looking back at some of the threads i made over the years. It really makes me smile, not the fact that i was more then likely on drugs when I made them,just some of the responses i got from others has me laughing.

 

[Joey]

I laugh when looking back at some of the threads i made over the years. It really makes me smile, not the fact that i was more then likely on drugs when I made them,just some of the responses i got from others has me laughing.

Only a few ever really stand out in that state, if any yeah. This is as much a practice in journalism (my dear diary journal..memoir?) thread as it is asking for advice. I've been writing a lot more than I had a chance to the last couple years. Majority of it I wont copy here like that little poem there, wont do that shit. It just felt suitable at the time.


FIRST AMENDMENT : If that's where you were coming from. I don't feel I got anything in response that isn't what I would probably think looking at it now from someone else.

SECOND: Guns are fucking cool like totally so....... kidding. Man am I ever finding I need to edit, then re-edit everything I'm writing for simple shit too much smoking meth like I am.

 

[Joey]

I just decided fuck Tuesday. I fnished my stuff anf scrapped the pipe. Detox NOW. Ive had a bad day. Really rough.

Hopefully tomorrow is better. I'll wake up feeling pretty rough, but in a better way. The way that says I can make it, so long as I keep this shit down. No more meth. No more warm blanket, hiding away. By Tuesday, I'll nearly be there already. On my own ability to survive. I will survive. I have to. For me. For the people I love. So I can look back on this one day and say hey I did it. No more looking back. No more feeling as if I'm gonna be taken down like I'm some evil person. I'm a hurt person, I'm ill. I was abused in childhood. I wasnt shown how to live. I was shown how to run away. No more running. Not waiting til Tuesday for someone to save me either or I cant be ready. I am ready. I'm gonna live my life on my own terms and everything which has made me sick and held me back. Its over. No more shit. No more sickness.

I'm so tired. I've been asleep. Time to end the nightmare. Wake up, start living the dream.

I'll be clean and sober. I'll address my mental health. I'll work and succeed. I need to be here to I can be better, to me and to the ones I love. See the new cycle? I believe it. II believe in myself. I just took the curtains off my windows for the first time since I bought them just days after moving here. NO more hiding. No more fear. No more. I love myself and I'm gonna be there for those I love too. It's a new day.

 

[herbavore]

Alex, you've got quite a struggle to deal with but you are strong and you are motivated. Just remember there is no one simple spot to get to. Life is always going to be stressful and sometimes throws you literally to your knees but resilience is what we are all after. When something knocks me down I know I will be able to get back up again. I did not used to have that faith in myself. You've been knocked down many times already in your short life and have gotten up every time. Make note of that! You are right, it's a new day.....every day.:D

 

[Recoveringfinally]

Alex you sound strong willed! I believe you can do this to! I know personally sometimes we feel like giving up but realize there is better out there. I was on meth as a teen for 2 years and got it together you got this! I wish I wasn't back to this spot where I am today but I know we both will be over our hurdle together just know your not alone and your strong when you feel weak!

 

[Joey]

Well life isn't beautiful but I'm 12 or 13 days clean or something like that. Best I've done in awhile.

 

[herbavore]

Well life isn't beautiful but I'm 12 or 13 days clean or something like that. Best I've done in awhile.

Life is what it is, which is everything and nothing at the same time. When it looks dismal, feels dismal, it usually has less to do with life than what particular aspects of it are in the forefront of perception. A really good exercise to do is to mentally picture life (nature, time, vastness and abundance, cyclical, random, etc, etc) as something holding little old you. More is out there for you, but accessing it from the narrowness of depression, PAWS, unsettled state of early sobriety can convince you otherwise. Try to ride these feeling out like a wave. I hope today brings you some inspiring moments at the very least. You are doing great so keep the faith and keep your goal front and center. Big changes are never easy but always the most rewarding.

 

[Joey]

edited

 

[Mafioso]

Keep on going man, recovery happens one day at a time.

Music sounded good, I like the song about half way through where the chorus goes something like "you don't understand...." Makes me wish I still had my studio set up. I need to get back into writting and recording music again.

 

[Jabberwocky]

Hey Alex, I merged them but it unfortunately it always merges to the first post sorry man.

 

[Joey]

Still going strong!

 

[herbavore]

Alex, I love the guitar demo. It is rich and soulful. Artists can create little pools of existence for themselves--maybe despite themselves--when in the process of creating. Hold onto those spaces. Everything you need is in them.

 

[Xorkoth]

I also love the guitar demos, your songwriting is beautiful. I'm a musician too, I play keys, and music is a huge part of how I stayed off opiates, because I rediscovered it after a long time of being estranged from it and I put all of that energy I was spending acquiring opiates and lying to myself and others to cover it up into music, ended up forming a band and we released our first EP recently.