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This is an essay I wrote about one and a half years ago. I don't ingest illegal substances. Totally clean. Here's to the day when Psilocybin Mushrooms are seriously institutionally evaluated for their purported healing properties.
‘Magic Mushrooms’ is a slang term for many species of fungus that contain the psychoactive chemical psilocybin (known to produce a dramatic hallucinogenic mind state generally classified as a ‘trip’
. Psilocybin was chemically isolated in 1958 by a chemist named Albert Hoffman, after which scientists conducted many studies concerning its psychological effects. Recreational use became somewhat widespread in the United States during the 1960s (Peden 417). By 1970, the United States Government designated Psilocybin as a Schedule I substance, meaning that it has no recognized medical potential and has a high potential for abuse (Vollenweider 642); but independent scientific research has called these assertions into question. While its true that this powerful drug can be quite hazardous, studies suggest that psilocybin could provide valuable functions for society.
Dr. Marie-Luare Espiard of The University of Paris describes Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (also known as HPPD: an uncomfortable mental disorder brought on by hallucinogen use in which people experience ‘spontaneous and recurrent unbidden images’ as a reason for keeping psilocybin in the Schedule I category. Furthermore, psilocybin use does not have to be chronic for someone to suffer from HPPD. The disorder is terrifying, and can also last for five years or more. One eighteen year old patient started experiencing HPPD after combining mushrooms with cannabis. He referred to the symptoms as ‘distressful and highly unpleasant. After being put on the psychoactive medications Sertraline (150mg) and Risperidol (two mg) his well-being appeared to improve, but he still feels uncomfortable in social situations. However, this patient did experience marked anxiety before taking any drugs (2-3).
The ‘bad trip’ is an intensely dysphoric hallucinogenic experience characterized by feelings of extreme dread and despair. Dr Norman Peden of Ninewells Hospital and Medical School in Scotland analyzed forty four patients who were admitted to the emergency department (most due to a ‘bad trip’ after ingesting psilocybin mushrooms (418).
Physical effects were ghastly: eleven patients ‘vomited prior to appearing at hospital’, twelve experienced nausea, nine patients had upper abdominal pain’, four were incontinent of urine, ten experienced tachycardia of over 100bpm, and seventeen ‘were significantly hypertensive’ (Peden 418).
Peden described mental effects similar in magnitude; seven were ‘aggressive and uncooperative’; five became hyper-kinetic; four expressed extreme euphoria, and four fell victim to catatonia. In all, twenty six described the experience as frightening (three patients even believed they were dying and one ‘wanted to commit suicide’ (419).
The effects of psilocybin overdose are blatantly serious, but Dr. Peden does note that none of the patients ‘returned to the hospital with late phenomena such as flashbacks, panic attacks or psychotic episodes’ (HPPD), and that ‘bad trips’ are ‘said to be uncommon’ when ingesting psilocybin.
This analysis concluded ‘no obvious dose response relationship between number of mushrooms ingested and effects’, which conforms with the postulation that psilocybin produces rapid biological tolerance (making it more safe). Also, treating a psilocybin overdose is neither ‘necessary or desirable since the effects of the mushrooms are usually short-lived’; and while the physical effects of psilocybin mushrooms (as demonstrated by this study) appear to be painful, Peden would be surprised it the ‘patients didn't accidentally consume other mushroom species’ at the same time (leading to more physical complications); in fact, many varieties of mushrooms produce extreme physical discomfort, some fatally so, but not any that contain psilocybin. The authors posit that the most hazardous risk of psilocybin use is due to the dramatic ‘alteration in behavior’. For instance, one patient was found walking completely naked along a train rail (420-423). Such a threat could surely be accounted for if the substance is taken in a scientific setting. Overall, Peden indicates that psilocybin can be used safely if taken under medical supervision.
In contrast to psilocybin causing mental derangement, D.F. Duncan, a prominent official at a drug abuse clinic in Texas, cites polar observations almost forty years ago. Even given the lack of knowledge regarding hallucinogenic drugs (which often led to poor settings and numerous ‘bad trips’, early studies indicated that such ‘drugs may have a useful and important role to play in modern correction’. Timothy Leary, professor at Harvard, ‘administered psilocybin to over four hundred volunteers’, reaching three broad conclusions: psilocybin ingestion leads to no long term malady, the setting in which the drug is taken substantially influences the drug effect, and the experience often leads to feelings of spiritual knowledge gained or dramatic insight. Interestingly, though less than ‘ten percent of [Leary’s] original sample were orthodox believers or churchgoers’, religious terms such as ‘G-d’ and ‘divine’ existed in over fifty percent of subject reports (291-292).
Leary’s study was revealing, but it has a major flaw. While the scientific community has established that psilocybin overdose is not threatening in a physical sense, Timothy Leary’s credibility is tarnished by his refusal to believe in negative effects of psilocybin use. However, despite Leary’s failings, it would be preemptive to entirely discount his findings (Duncan 291).
Duncan notes that Timothy Leary also conducted a similar study specifically within the prison population. Prisoners are typically resistant to clinical psychology and rarely have strong views of religion and morality (making them desirable participants). The study involved thirty six inmates who ingested the drug in a spacious hospital room with six cots, a large table, and a record player. Leary noted that there were often ‘common feelings of depression and fear encountered in the early stage of the experiment’. But while paranoid feelings and panic were present, they existed in rare moments, and ‘presented no real danger’. In retrospect, only five percent of prisoners returned to jail after being released (contrasted with an average of fifty to seventy percent at the facility in which he conducted his research). Though the prison study does provide insight, there was never a long term follow-up on those individuals; ‘the full value’ cannot be assessed (292-294).
In totality, within Leary’s experiments, everyone who took psilocybin described an experience ‘heavily laced with religious terms’. Additionally, subjects showed ‘statistically significant’ increases in social aptitude, responsibility, tolerance, and insight after their experience (Duncan 293). Duncan’s findings conclude that psilocybin could be of medical value.
Timothy Kirn reports that a child psychiatry expert at Harbor-UCLA Hospital in California somewhat concurs Leary’s findings, and hopes to open new venues in the form of psilocybin treating mental illness. Kirn notes that though psilocybin does elevate blood pressure and heart rate, one ‘would have to eat the equivalent of his or her body weight’ at once to kill themself with psilocybin mushrooms (making it exponentially more safe than many more legal drugs). He additionally references a study in which patients with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder were rated based on the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale before and after they were given psilocybin during four separate sessions; occasionally within a session ‘scores dropped to 0’, and many subjects ‘showed definite improvement’. Kirn hopes research continues in areas that indicate special promise: ‘alcoholics and patients suffering from cancer-related anxiety’ (2-3). This expert’s qualified support furthers the prospect of psilocybin being safely used for medicinal purpose.
Dr. Franz Vollenweider, nueropsychopharmacology expert at a psychiatric hospital in Zurich, is another professional who explicitly advocates for less than absolute restriction on psilocybin. He states that psilocybin mushrooms have been used ‘traditionally by many indigenous cultures in medical and religious practices for centuries, if not millennia’ (throughout South America, Central America, and Mexico), indicating that this substance isn’t inherently evil, but rather functions as a traditional sacrament for a plethora of human cultures (who have used it safely for generations). He also notes (as did Leary) that the effect of psychedelic drugs depends largely on biochemistry and the mental health of the one taking it, as well as their expectations and the setting in which the drug is taken; through these variables, one may experience anything from a feeling of complete unity to ‘full-blown panic’. Importantly, such factors could significantly manipulated to produce a favorable outcome; if someone isn’t proven to possess the mental cohesion to withstand probable (but by no means dominant) negative feelings throughout the ‘trip’, then they shouldn’t be allowed to take the substance. While testing this aspect can be difficult, artificially high standards (in terms of verifying mental health) could be employed to drastically lower any risk (642-644).
‘Magic Mushrooms’ is a slang term for many species of fungus that contain the psychoactive chemical psilocybin (known to produce a dramatic hallucinogenic mind state generally classified as a ‘trip’
. Psilocybin was chemically isolated in 1958 by a chemist named Albert Hoffman, after which scientists conducted many studies concerning its psychological effects. Recreational use became somewhat widespread in the United States during the 1960s (Peden 417). By 1970, the United States Government designated Psilocybin as a Schedule I substance, meaning that it has no recognized medical potential and has a high potential for abuse (Vollenweider 642); but independent scientific research has called these assertions into question. While its true that this powerful drug can be quite hazardous, studies suggest that psilocybin could provide valuable functions for society.Dr. Marie-Luare Espiard of The University of Paris describes Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (also known as HPPD: an uncomfortable mental disorder brought on by hallucinogen use in which people experience ‘spontaneous and recurrent unbidden images’
as a reason for keeping psilocybin in the Schedule I category. Furthermore, psilocybin use does not have to be chronic for someone to suffer from HPPD. The disorder is terrifying, and can also last for five years or more. One eighteen year old patient started experiencing HPPD after combining mushrooms with cannabis. He referred to the symptoms as ‘distressful and highly unpleasant. After being put on the psychoactive medications Sertraline (150mg) and Risperidol (two mg) his well-being appeared to improve, but he still feels uncomfortable in social situations. However, this patient did experience marked anxiety before taking any drugs (2-3).The ‘bad trip’ is an intensely dysphoric hallucinogenic experience characterized by feelings of extreme dread and despair. Dr Norman Peden of Ninewells Hospital and Medical School in Scotland analyzed forty four patients who were admitted to the emergency department (most due to a ‘bad trip’
after ingesting psilocybin mushrooms (418).Physical effects were ghastly: eleven patients ‘vomited prior to appearing at hospital’, twelve experienced nausea, nine patients had upper abdominal pain’, four were incontinent of urine, ten experienced tachycardia of over 100bpm, and seventeen ‘were significantly hypertensive’ (Peden 418).
Peden described mental effects similar in magnitude; seven were ‘aggressive and uncooperative’; five became hyper-kinetic; four expressed extreme euphoria, and four fell victim to catatonia. In all, twenty six described the experience as frightening (three patients even believed they were dying and one ‘wanted to commit suicide’
(419).The effects of psilocybin overdose are blatantly serious, but Dr. Peden does note that none of the patients ‘returned to the hospital with late phenomena such as flashbacks, panic attacks or psychotic episodes’ (HPPD), and that ‘bad trips’ are ‘said to be uncommon’ when ingesting psilocybin.
This analysis concluded ‘no obvious dose response relationship between number of mushrooms ingested and effects’, which conforms with the postulation that psilocybin produces rapid biological tolerance (making it more safe). Also, treating a psilocybin overdose is neither ‘necessary or desirable since the effects of the mushrooms are usually short-lived’; and while the physical effects of psilocybin mushrooms (as demonstrated by this study) appear to be painful, Peden would be surprised it the ‘patients didn't accidentally consume other mushroom species’ at the same time (leading to more physical complications); in fact, many varieties of mushrooms produce extreme physical discomfort, some fatally so, but not any that contain psilocybin. The authors posit that the most hazardous risk of psilocybin use is due to the dramatic ‘alteration in behavior’. For instance, one patient was found walking completely naked along a train rail (420-423). Such a threat could surely be accounted for if the substance is taken in a scientific setting. Overall, Peden indicates that psilocybin can be used safely if taken under medical supervision.
In contrast to psilocybin causing mental derangement, D.F. Duncan, a prominent official at a drug abuse clinic in Texas, cites polar observations almost forty years ago. Even given the lack of knowledge regarding hallucinogenic drugs (which often led to poor settings and numerous ‘bad trips’
, early studies indicated that such ‘drugs may have a useful and important role to play in modern correction’. Timothy Leary, professor at Harvard, ‘administered psilocybin to over four hundred volunteers’, reaching three broad conclusions: psilocybin ingestion leads to no long term malady, the setting in which the drug is taken substantially influences the drug effect, and the experience often leads to feelings of spiritual knowledge gained or dramatic insight. Interestingly, though less than ‘ten percent of [Leary’s] original sample were orthodox believers or churchgoers’, religious terms such as ‘G-d’ and ‘divine’ existed in over fifty percent of subject reports (291-292).Leary’s study was revealing, but it has a major flaw. While the scientific community has established that psilocybin overdose is not threatening in a physical sense, Timothy Leary’s credibility is tarnished by his refusal to believe in negative effects of psilocybin use. However, despite Leary’s failings, it would be preemptive to entirely discount his findings (Duncan 291).
Duncan notes that Timothy Leary also conducted a similar study specifically within the prison population. Prisoners are typically resistant to clinical psychology and rarely have strong views of religion and morality (making them desirable participants). The study involved thirty six inmates who ingested the drug in a spacious hospital room with six cots, a large table, and a record player. Leary noted that there were often ‘common feelings of depression and fear encountered in the early stage of the experiment’. But while paranoid feelings and panic were present, they existed in rare moments, and ‘presented no real danger’. In retrospect, only five percent of prisoners returned to jail after being released (contrasted with an average of fifty to seventy percent at the facility in which he conducted his research). Though the prison study does provide insight, there was never a long term follow-up on those individuals; ‘the full value’ cannot be assessed (292-294).
In totality, within Leary’s experiments, everyone who took psilocybin described an experience ‘heavily laced with religious terms’. Additionally, subjects showed ‘statistically significant’ increases in social aptitude, responsibility, tolerance, and insight after their experience (Duncan 293). Duncan’s findings conclude that psilocybin could be of medical value.
Timothy Kirn reports that a child psychiatry expert at Harbor-UCLA Hospital in California somewhat concurs Leary’s findings, and hopes to open new venues in the form of psilocybin treating mental illness. Kirn notes that though psilocybin does elevate blood pressure and heart rate, one ‘would have to eat the equivalent of his or her body weight’ at once to kill themself with psilocybin mushrooms (making it exponentially more safe than many more legal drugs). He additionally references a study in which patients with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder were rated based on the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale before and after they were given psilocybin during four separate sessions; occasionally within a session ‘scores dropped to 0’, and many subjects ‘showed definite improvement’. Kirn hopes research continues in areas that indicate special promise: ‘alcoholics and patients suffering from cancer-related anxiety’ (2-3). This expert’s qualified support furthers the prospect of psilocybin being safely used for medicinal purpose.
Dr. Franz Vollenweider, nueropsychopharmacology expert at a psychiatric hospital in Zurich, is another professional who explicitly advocates for less than absolute restriction on psilocybin. He states that psilocybin mushrooms have been used ‘traditionally by many indigenous cultures in medical and religious practices for centuries, if not millennia’ (throughout South America, Central America, and Mexico), indicating that this substance isn’t inherently evil, but rather functions as a traditional sacrament for a plethora of human cultures (who have used it safely for generations). He also notes (as did Leary) that the effect of psychedelic drugs depends largely on biochemistry and the mental health of the one taking it, as well as their expectations and the setting in which the drug is taken; through these variables, one may experience anything from a feeling of complete unity to ‘full-blown panic’. Importantly, such factors could significantly manipulated to produce a favorable outcome; if someone isn’t proven to possess the mental cohesion to withstand probable (but by no means dominant) negative feelings throughout the ‘trip’, then they shouldn’t be allowed to take the substance. While testing this aspect can be difficult, artificially high standards (in terms of verifying mental health) could be employed to drastically lower any risk (642-644).
I feel like I live my life as a scared little wolf in a black room walled with thick slabs of black slate.
I am scared here, I hate the dark.
When life throws itself at me, and things go wrong, walls crack, and massive shelves of slate fracture off and splinter into the ground, threatening to cut me up, impale me, crush me.
Lately, it seems all the walls a sliding in, and falling.
I'm terrified.
I'm sober now, and the walls do not hold up to life any better.
I simply see the fear more clearly.
I am scared here, I hate the dark.
When life throws itself at me, and things go wrong, walls crack, and massive shelves of slate fracture off and splinter into the ground, threatening to cut me up, impale me, crush me.
Lately, it seems all the walls a sliding in, and falling.
I'm terrified.
I'm sober now, and the walls do not hold up to life any better.
I simply see the fear more clearly.
So, I was walking on St. Marks yesterday—just snatched a slice from Gino's—when I quite literally bumped into an old acquaintance of mine...and when I say acquaintance, I mean drug dealer, and when I say drug dealer, I mean one of the craziest dominican dope peddlers I've ever met in my life with 20 bags of uptown that would send you to the moon for a night. Moving on... He'd just gotten back from doing a few year bid at Five Points, (real classy joint by the way), and lets just say that when he left..well..we weren't exactly on the best of terms. So he sees me..I see him..we see eachother, and we just kind of stand there while the usual parade of east village types walk past us. Now, I've been clean for a while now..so he's not really used to seeing me looking..healthy. Of course, he was upstate so he's looking jacked and really fucking angry. Prison will do that to ya'.
Now, nothing has been said yet mind you. Maybe ten seconds have passed when suddenly, my brilliant mind comes up with this to say. "How was prison?" Really? I know. That was best I could do at this impetuous moment? This cross roads in life when old dealer and client see each other again on the street? Apparently so, because that's what I fucking said. Heres what he did: He clenched his jaw—hard. For a second I thought his molars might pop right out of his mouth. Then he spits on the sidewalk, the kind of spit where you do it through your teeth, and walks past me. As he's walking past me though, he say's this. "Just got some fire shit from BK. 80 a sack. Hit me up." And that's it. Now, I don't know what this exchange says about the dealer/user relationship..but there it is. Life coming full circle one day on St. Marks.
Now, nothing has been said yet mind you. Maybe ten seconds have passed when suddenly, my brilliant mind comes up with this to say. "How was prison?" Really? I know. That was best I could do at this impetuous moment? This cross roads in life when old dealer and client see each other again on the street? Apparently so, because that's what I fucking said. Heres what he did: He clenched his jaw—hard. For a second I thought his molars might pop right out of his mouth. Then he spits on the sidewalk, the kind of spit where you do it through your teeth, and walks past me. As he's walking past me though, he say's this. "Just got some fire shit from BK. 80 a sack. Hit me up." And that's it. Now, I don't know what this exchange says about the dealer/user relationship..but there it is. Life coming full circle one day on St. Marks.
So, I still won't be starting the very low dose naltrexone for a few days. I've decided to call it "very low dose" because it's probably going to be somewhere in between what some people refer to as "ultra low dose" (ULDN) and "low dose" (LDN) - the "___ dose" terms are poorly-defined and are used differently by different people/sources though. I might use the acronym LDN in this blog simply because it's easier. However, for "LDN" in people not currently or recently using opioids many sites recommend a dose of 4.5mg/day and no way am I going to start with that high a dose. Being in PAWS (post-acute withdrawal syndrome from opioids) I am too scared that too high a dose could induce/worsen withdrawal-like symptoms or side effects in me because my opioid receptors and endorphin levels are still screwed up, and I am very sensitive. So I'm going to start really low and gradually increase it if I feel increasing the dose is a good idea. I'll post precise details about the exact doses I take and whether I feel any effects.
I want to reiterate that:
What I am planning is NOT the same as taking the 50mg Revia naltrexone pills, or the injection (Vivitrol) or the implant. Those are very high full-blocking doses of naltrexone and it's no wonder people don't find them effective for opioid withdrawal or PAWS, they can easily induce precipitated withdrawal if used too soon after opioids and the primary way these high doses "help" with addiction is to prevent people from getting high if they do use opiates/opioids while on them (so they only work well for a very specific subset of people). Sorry, it's just that people have been bringing up those forms of naltrexone (and how people hate it) to me and in threads about LDN - and I have to admit I was one of them too back before I understood what LDN was
And: I will be taking naltrexone specifically for PAWS and not while actively taking opioids, but I will post some info on ULDN for concurrent use with opioids because I think it's relevant and something a lot of people have expressed interest in.
Links to research about low doses of naltrexone:
- Very low dose naltrexone addition in opioid detoxification: a randomized, controlled trial
- Oxytrex (oxycodone + ultralow-dose naltrexone) Minimizes Physical Dependence While Providing Effective Analgesia: A Randomized Controlled Trial
- Ultra-Low-Dose Naltrexone Decreases Dependence and Addictive Properties of Opioids
- Chronic very low dose naltrexone administration attenuates opioid withdrawal expression
- Ultra-low-dose naloxone suppresses opioid tolerance, dependence and associated changes in mu opioid receptor–G protein coupling and Gβγ signaling
- Early outcomes following low dose naltrexone enhancement of opioid detoxification
- Low-Dose Naltrexone Therapy Improves Active Crohn's Disease
- A pilot trial of low-dose naltrexone in primary progressive multiple sclerosis [found that β-endorphin levels were increased]
- Low-dose naltrexone for disease prevention and quality of life
- Pain Tolerance in Opioid Addicts On and Off Naltrexone Pharmacotherapy: A Pilot Study
- Fibromyalgia Symptoms Are Reduced by Low-Dose Naltrexone: A Pilot Study
- Ultra-low dose naltrexone attenuates chronic morphine-induced gliosis in rats
- Ultra-low dose naltrexone enhances cannabinoid-induced antinociception
- Low dose naltrexone administration in morphine dependent rats attenuates withdrawal-induced norepinephrine efflux in forebrain
- There is a source that I can't find right now that states that low doses of naltrexone raise endorphins just as much as high doses; I'll post it when I find it. (High doses of naltrexone might potentially block the endorphins from working properly on receptors, the theory is that low doses should not).
Tomorrow I will post:
- A list of the symptoms I am currently experiencing so I can easily compare if any improve or worsen after I start the naltrexone.
- More about my drug and health history.
- Links to other people's blogs or posts about using LDN for PAWS (these are very hard to find so I figured I'd share them).
So check back if you are interested. And feel free to ask any questions in the comments section below.
[EDIT: changed title to differentiate as I will use "Day 1" etc once I actually start the naltrexone; added categories]
I want to reiterate that:
What I am planning is NOT the same as taking the 50mg Revia naltrexone pills, or the injection (Vivitrol) or the implant. Those are very high full-blocking doses of naltrexone and it's no wonder people don't find them effective for opioid withdrawal or PAWS, they can easily induce precipitated withdrawal if used too soon after opioids and the primary way these high doses "help" with addiction is to prevent people from getting high if they do use opiates/opioids while on them (so they only work well for a very specific subset of people). Sorry, it's just that people have been bringing up those forms of naltrexone (and how people hate it) to me and in threads about LDN - and I have to admit I was one of them too back before I understood what LDN was
And: I will be taking naltrexone specifically for PAWS and not while actively taking opioids, but I will post some info on ULDN for concurrent use with opioids because I think it's relevant and something a lot of people have expressed interest in.
Links to research about low doses of naltrexone:
- Very low dose naltrexone addition in opioid detoxification: a randomized, controlled trial
- Oxytrex (oxycodone + ultralow-dose naltrexone) Minimizes Physical Dependence While Providing Effective Analgesia: A Randomized Controlled Trial
- Ultra-Low-Dose Naltrexone Decreases Dependence and Addictive Properties of Opioids
- Chronic very low dose naltrexone administration attenuates opioid withdrawal expression
- Ultra-low-dose naloxone suppresses opioid tolerance, dependence and associated changes in mu opioid receptor–G protein coupling and Gβγ signaling
- Early outcomes following low dose naltrexone enhancement of opioid detoxification
- Low-Dose Naltrexone Therapy Improves Active Crohn's Disease
- A pilot trial of low-dose naltrexone in primary progressive multiple sclerosis [found that β-endorphin levels were increased]
- Low-dose naltrexone for disease prevention and quality of life
- Pain Tolerance in Opioid Addicts On and Off Naltrexone Pharmacotherapy: A Pilot Study
- Fibromyalgia Symptoms Are Reduced by Low-Dose Naltrexone: A Pilot Study
- Ultra-low dose naltrexone attenuates chronic morphine-induced gliosis in rats
- Ultra-low dose naltrexone enhances cannabinoid-induced antinociception
- Low dose naltrexone administration in morphine dependent rats attenuates withdrawal-induced norepinephrine efflux in forebrain
- There is a source that I can't find right now that states that low doses of naltrexone raise endorphins just as much as high doses; I'll post it when I find it. (High doses of naltrexone might potentially block the endorphins from working properly on receptors, the theory is that low doses should not).
Tomorrow I will post:
- A list of the symptoms I am currently experiencing so I can easily compare if any improve or worsen after I start the naltrexone.
- More about my drug and health history.
- Links to other people's blogs or posts about using LDN for PAWS (these are very hard to find so I figured I'd share them).
So check back if you are interested. And feel free to ask any questions in the comments section below.
[EDIT: changed title to differentiate as I will use "Day 1" etc once I actually start the naltrexone; added categories]
I haven't been well lately. I don't know what else to say besides that or what to do that I haven't already been doing. I'm kind of stuck and wish I'd just get unstuck. 
![:\](https://bluelight.org/xf/BL_Images/Orig_Emoji/wrygrin.gif "wry grin :\")
Life is hard.
Life is hard.
A continuation...
I rarely post on Opiophile. It is almost entirely devoted to drugs and once a junkie reaches a certain point in life he no longer gets high, he simply maintains. Posting on Drugs Forums doesn't act as a "Trigger" for me. I simply find it boring to see basically the same questions asked over and over. I remain fairly active on BL because of this blog and because CE and P Forum is fairly well rounded.
Every once in a while though I check in at Opiophile. In its Lounge Forum there is a tiny sub-forum, "World Politics." It doesn't have very many threads but I examined it to see what had been posted since my last visit several months before. I was a bit suprised to see a thread relating to Israel's last campaign against Gaza, "Pillar of Defense." The poster discussed the Hacker Collective "Anonymous" and how it had shut down vital Israeli Government websites at thr height of Pillar of Defense.
The problem is, Anonymous did nothing of the sort. It claimed it had, yes, but other than a static Tourism page that had several minutes of on and off behavior Israel's intranet (as opposed to "internet") was uneffected. Anonymous claimed it was undertaking its endeavour because, according to Anonymous, an Israeli Government spokesperson allegedly threatened to shut down Gaza's internet. Aside from no Israeli official ever saying this, it would hurt Israel immensely were it to actually happen.
Israel owns the conduits that supply Gaza's internet service providers. In other words, Israeli SIGINT (Signals Intelligence) gains treasure troves of information via these conduits. Shutting it down would lead to Gazans accessing the internet via Egypt and would represent a catastrophic failure for Israel intelligence cabilities.
So I pointed all this out and predictably the conversation immediately shifted to Israel's "genocide" against "Palestinians" and how Jews (not Israelis) treat "Palestinians" in much the same way Nazi Germany treated Jews. I then pointed out that the Germans never allowed Jews water parks, equestrian clubs with lessons and polo matches, amusement parks, world class golfcourses, a 5 Star hotel, Olympic-sized swimming pools, Western-ste malls, Michelin-rated bistros and on and on- the way Israel has allowed for Gazans. I reminded posters that while Jews were being made into lampshades, wallets and book bindings and Jewish infants were being injected with antifreeze and placed in freezers, Gazans have gone from zero universities in 1967- the 1st year in which Israel controlled Gaza- to 7 in 2013, from zero primary health care facilities to roughly 260, from zero hospitals to 12 and so on and so forth.
Somehow the conversation segued to the "Armenian Genocide," the "Bosnian Genocide" and the "Rwandan Genocide." I replied that of the 3 only Rwanda qualifies as genocide. One poster, a Mod, took great exception over my denial of the so called "Armenian Genocide." I explained that before you can begin to weigh incidents or actions as to whether or not they do in fact constitute "genocide" there is a precursor that MUST be established, "Mens Rea." Literally translated as "Guilty Mind," which relates to premeditation. This must be proven via written orders, Government publications, officials' depositions.
In this case there are two strands of evidence that purport to contain this. The first is the "Memoir of Naim Bey" (London: Hodder and Stoughton) (1920) by Aram Andonian. The story goes that a leader of the Armenian Insurgency in Ottoman Turkey paid a small fortune for the handwritten memoir of an Ottoman official who had worked in Aleppo during the period in question. The memoir purportedly contained 31 telegrams and military orders personally signed by then-Minister of the Interior Enver Pasha in which Enver ordered the destriction of the Armenian People.
The Insurgency leader entrusted the purchased materiel to Aram Andonian for the latter to transport from Syria to Europe where it was to be published in Andonian's own name.
To be continued...
I rarely post on Opiophile. It is almost entirely devoted to drugs and once a junkie reaches a certain point in life he no longer gets high, he simply maintains. Posting on Drugs Forums doesn't act as a "Trigger" for me. I simply find it boring to see basically the same questions asked over and over. I remain fairly active on BL because of this blog and because CE and P Forum is fairly well rounded.
Every once in a while though I check in at Opiophile. In its Lounge Forum there is a tiny sub-forum, "World Politics." It doesn't have very many threads but I examined it to see what had been posted since my last visit several months before. I was a bit suprised to see a thread relating to Israel's last campaign against Gaza, "Pillar of Defense." The poster discussed the Hacker Collective "Anonymous" and how it had shut down vital Israeli Government websites at thr height of Pillar of Defense.
The problem is, Anonymous did nothing of the sort. It claimed it had, yes, but other than a static Tourism page that had several minutes of on and off behavior Israel's intranet (as opposed to "internet") was uneffected. Anonymous claimed it was undertaking its endeavour because, according to Anonymous, an Israeli Government spokesperson allegedly threatened to shut down Gaza's internet. Aside from no Israeli official ever saying this, it would hurt Israel immensely were it to actually happen.
Israel owns the conduits that supply Gaza's internet service providers. In other words, Israeli SIGINT (Signals Intelligence) gains treasure troves of information via these conduits. Shutting it down would lead to Gazans accessing the internet via Egypt and would represent a catastrophic failure for Israel intelligence cabilities.
So I pointed all this out and predictably the conversation immediately shifted to Israel's "genocide" against "Palestinians" and how Jews (not Israelis) treat "Palestinians" in much the same way Nazi Germany treated Jews. I then pointed out that the Germans never allowed Jews water parks, equestrian clubs with lessons and polo matches, amusement parks, world class golfcourses, a 5 Star hotel, Olympic-sized swimming pools, Western-ste malls, Michelin-rated bistros and on and on- the way Israel has allowed for Gazans. I reminded posters that while Jews were being made into lampshades, wallets and book bindings and Jewish infants were being injected with antifreeze and placed in freezers, Gazans have gone from zero universities in 1967- the 1st year in which Israel controlled Gaza- to 7 in 2013, from zero primary health care facilities to roughly 260, from zero hospitals to 12 and so on and so forth.
Somehow the conversation segued to the "Armenian Genocide," the "Bosnian Genocide" and the "Rwandan Genocide." I replied that of the 3 only Rwanda qualifies as genocide. One poster, a Mod, took great exception over my denial of the so called "Armenian Genocide." I explained that before you can begin to weigh incidents or actions as to whether or not they do in fact constitute "genocide" there is a precursor that MUST be established, "Mens Rea." Literally translated as "Guilty Mind," which relates to premeditation. This must be proven via written orders, Government publications, officials' depositions.
In this case there are two strands of evidence that purport to contain this. The first is the "Memoir of Naim Bey" (London: Hodder and Stoughton) (1920) by Aram Andonian. The story goes that a leader of the Armenian Insurgency in Ottoman Turkey paid a small fortune for the handwritten memoir of an Ottoman official who had worked in Aleppo during the period in question. The memoir purportedly contained 31 telegrams and military orders personally signed by then-Minister of the Interior Enver Pasha in which Enver ordered the destriction of the Armenian People.
The Insurgency leader entrusted the purchased materiel to Aram Andonian for the latter to transport from Syria to Europe where it was to be published in Andonian's own name.
To be continued...
i haven't a clue about a decent title. i UA'd most of my recent blog posts. i still want to write and post here but i realized that our mutual friends can read them. and a few of them have started to noticed that something isn't quite right... prolly cause unglued suck at lying and suck at being tactful.
it still seems like breaking up/divorcing is inevitable. we've gone thru all the stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
a few people seem to think this is sudden and out of nowhere. but if one has known us for a long time (or read my blog/journal), they would realize that these issues aren't really new. and that this is more like we finally admitted things aren't right. i've been asked why we don't want to fix things. and i think it is because once we get used to the idea of not being unglued and a_c, nothing is changing.
i've seen other couples break up where they remain good friends. they occasionally have some resentment and dislikes about the relationship. but overall, they just realized it wasn't working.
the first time i saw a break up like this was when i was nanny. the mom had recently split from her ex and moved to ohio. she and the ex still owned a ski house and vacationed there together at xmas (that was a really strange trip at first. but after i got over my initial shock, it was a fun trip even tho i spent most of it taking care of the kid). the mom visited the ex on a pretty regular basis and they still professed to love each other. i suppose it is working, because both the mom and the ex are remarried with kids (and have been remarried for 8-10 years). another random tidbit, the mom and new husband got married at the ski house jointly owned by the mom and ex. and the ex and his wife attended the small wedding (i think there were maybe 30 people there total).
another long time couple recently broke up because one half wanted to move away. the other person did not so they split up. as far as i know, they are still on good terms, altho it is hard to remain close when you are living in separate continents. the last couple i know of that split amicably reminded me a lot of unglued and myself. the end of their relationship seemed similar to ours too.
or maybe this isn't the end. maybe it is break? or maybe we are fooling ourselves by thinking we can divorce while preserving our friendship? maybe i am too focused on moving and not enough on the end of the relationship?
i sorta pity the few people i trust to talk to in RL. those people have gotten a fairly steady stream of texts about my thoughts on the matter. but they are all very patient and encouraging. as for talking to unglued, we just keep asking each other a lot of unanswerable questions. are we making the right decision? why in the world do we feel closer now after the talk than before? will our friends still remain both our friends? won't the apartment be rather lonely when i move out? why don't we feel so sure about this anymore?
it still seems like breaking up/divorcing is inevitable. we've gone thru all the stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.
a few people seem to think this is sudden and out of nowhere. but if one has known us for a long time (or read my blog/journal), they would realize that these issues aren't really new. and that this is more like we finally admitted things aren't right. i've been asked why we don't want to fix things. and i think it is because once we get used to the idea of not being unglued and a_c, nothing is changing.
i've seen other couples break up where they remain good friends. they occasionally have some resentment and dislikes about the relationship. but overall, they just realized it wasn't working.
the first time i saw a break up like this was when i was nanny. the mom had recently split from her ex and moved to ohio. she and the ex still owned a ski house and vacationed there together at xmas (that was a really strange trip at first. but after i got over my initial shock, it was a fun trip even tho i spent most of it taking care of the kid). the mom visited the ex on a pretty regular basis and they still professed to love each other. i suppose it is working, because both the mom and the ex are remarried with kids (and have been remarried for 8-10 years). another random tidbit, the mom and new husband got married at the ski house jointly owned by the mom and ex. and the ex and his wife attended the small wedding (i think there were maybe 30 people there total).
another long time couple recently broke up because one half wanted to move away. the other person did not so they split up. as far as i know, they are still on good terms, altho it is hard to remain close when you are living in separate continents. the last couple i know of that split amicably reminded me a lot of unglued and myself. the end of their relationship seemed similar to ours too.
or maybe this isn't the end. maybe it is break? or maybe we are fooling ourselves by thinking we can divorce while preserving our friendship? maybe i am too focused on moving and not enough on the end of the relationship?
i sorta pity the few people i trust to talk to in RL. those people have gotten a fairly steady stream of texts about my thoughts on the matter. but they are all very patient and encouraging. as for talking to unglued, we just keep asking each other a lot of unanswerable questions. are we making the right decision? why in the world do we feel closer now after the talk than before? will our friends still remain both our friends? won't the apartment be rather lonely when i move out? why don't we feel so sure about this anymore?
And this is the other myth - addiction is not a discrete state. Addiction is a lengthy progression into unsustainable use. And drug users will find genuinely perceiving themselves as addicted as very difficult. They will say it because it is expected of them, because it is a label that will be put on them, and eventually you begin to perceive yourself as such. Addiction, too, seems like a very final statement of submission: you are beholden to your drug, you are to be treated as an untrustworthy, pitiable, dangerous creature, capable of nothing worthwhile and everything questionable. The key is self-belief. I am willing to admit I am addicted, but I am one of the many, many functioning addicts. I am an addict but I am not desperate, broken, hopeless, useless, dangerous. I can still operate in society's system despite being addicted. It's not the end of the road.
But the insidious nature means the end of that road, once stretching into the horizon and clearly signposted, becomes unclear and indistinguishable. You alter your reality to suit your initial vision of the impossibly far-off cliff face at the end of the road, from which you fall sharply to rock bottom. You change your rules. "I'll never..." god knows how many times I have broken that promise to myself; never gratuitously, always with justification. Have I justified it because I realise I can still function despite it? Or because my mind refuses me to think of my behaviour as unacceptable and unconscionable? All I know is that by the time I come to doing them, I cannot recall just how or why I felt so strongly against it. I'll never get high without this particular friend that first introduced me. I'll never get high around non-using friends who don't approve. I'll never get high on a weekday. I'll never get high for longer than a night. I'll never get high in the daytime. I'll never get high at home. I'll never get high alone. I'll never be high around my family. Listing them all now I marvel at the notion of my stringentness. I can no longer fathom the logic behind it: I've pushed the boat out. I've been high pretty much everywhere.
Of course, certain milestones stand out amongst what I have thus far expressed as as one singular event -growing in magnitude only through the tiniest of increments - which were perhaps seismic. It is interesting that these events are vivid, because just how the mechanisms of many drugs alter our conscious perceptions, it feels as if the craving for them alters my memories, as if my subconcious is subverting me. After 3-4 day binges your spirit is well and truly broken. In those hideously low moments I can recall vowing to never get high again. And even though when I wake up after finally resting I feel immeasurably better I cling to that feeling. I motivate myself with it. But it quickly dissipates. I only have the memory of having a memory of being utterly desolate, hopeless and avowed to quit. Suddenly I am left feeling amusingly trivial, hyterical even - oh how pathetic! I feel absolutely fine. I can't believe I reallhy felt like that; I couldn't have! You're exaggerating the harm... it's really nothing. You just need to take it easy next time!
I remember doing it at home, alone, in the daytime for the first time. This was a big mistake. I was having friends over later that night and thought, why not a little early? My friends were vehemently anti-drug and I used to chop lines pre-prepared, my very own "And here's one I made earlier", sadly Blue Peter never catered to surreptitious drug use. I actually did an Andre Agassi and just went on a cleaning binge. I was the same. Tidied the room, danced to music, generally felt great. And in that mundane two hours I had normalised the feeling I craved but had confined to social events. I was always addicted to the confidence. I didn't need the calming effects of weed. I didn't mind alcohol but I required such great amounts to enjoy it that it was such a knockout: no-one likes the shambolic delirium of being drunk, but you do enjoy not caring.
The unique effect I found with stimulants was that it removed inhibitions but instead of detracting from processes of thought, it enhanced them. I felt sharper, wittier, funnier, more interesting, more able to articulate how I felt and what I thought. In fact, I could express myself better than I ever had done before. For someone with a tendency for relentless ruminations who could maintain no better than a chaotic link between full complexity of thoughts and verbalisation of them, it was a feeling of unbridled happiness. I no longer felt boring. I no longer felt embarrassed to speak up, or plagued by self-doubts and self-loathings that would manifest as a reticence to ever offer up a thought in unfamiliar surroundings lest I be misinterpreted and ostracized: suddenly everything was clear. I feared no one and nothing, and I embraced everyone and everything. I suddenly wanted to talk to people and just bask in what empathy we could generate, not be ever fearful of what awkwardness or disconnection might arise. I made friends. I strengthened friendships I had. I opened up to people I'd never opened up to before, and vice versa. Every night out I would stroll, pupils dilated, jaw gyrating, thoughts endlessly spilling. I would cogitate on every interest I had or issue I felt important, and as my mind raced my heart would soar. No matter what happens in my life - not just with regards to drugs, but generally - I will always cherish that series of nights. I wouldn't trade them for anything. Each and every one was a self-contained joy.
I came to associate excitement with every single aspect of my experiences. I loved moving the powder into smaller packets in my room beforehand, I loved cutting the straw up, I loved choosing an old card to chop it with. I loved the whole process of snorting. Chopping the line up would bring immense satisfaction and a brief pause to look down upon my creation with pride before snorting. I loved the feeling of it thrashing the nasal passages, rarely without at leats a faint sting; some stoppd by one of the body's natural defences, mucus, dripping down the back of my throat in a mix and burning on the way down. I'd often use the inside of my passport as a 'snorting pad'. The smell lingers even now, and did even when I stopped for months. Every time I had to use my passport I'd smell it, a weird chemical vanilla of a scent, but absolutey intoxicating. I'd take a deep breath of the surface every now and then and the smell alone would induce excitement. For a moment or two that wonderful soar would return to my heart before it was gone again. I have read that the olfactory system has a very direct link with memory, and can elicit some of the most powerful memories; I can certainly attest to that. Whilst my mind was a never ending spiral of emotions and I could never unquestionably associate the drug with happiness and good times, that scent lingering on my passport was like a direct route to the purest memory my mind had recorded.
They say "you're always chasing that first high". It is another well-rehearsed drug 'fact' that people like to trot out. Whilst the statement is definitely inaccurate, I would concede that the underlying principle is valid. I am so jealous of my own early (the first 6-8 months or so) enjoyment; I could snort gram after gram without repurcussion, I also needed less to get going, and the stuff was undoubtedly of a higher quality. Now every line leaves a bloodied, mucusy mess behind in my nasal passages. The stuff is cut with some kind of awful corrosive element, and I need so much more of it just to get a feeling of anything.
And then it became less of a typical tale of enjoyable youthful excess. Some of the humour was lost. I could tell people about debating the meaning of life with a taxi driver or getting home at 6am still completely sped and concluding it's a good time to walk the dog and elicit easy laughs, but I doubt they would laugh so openly and so freely at being told I was not only still awake after 48 hours and losing all grip on reality, but still dosing. I experienced delusions and paranoia - this is no effect of the drug, but of lack of sleep. Typically you could not eat or sleep for 18 hours and feel perfectly fine. Indeed chewing and swallowing became an unpleasant difficulty and I had no appetite. I would perhaps eat a bowl or two of cereal over a few days. I'd be awake and still feeling good, but there is only so long the body can sustain such a deception and the paranoia and delusions where the manifestations of a fractured mind losing control of all its faculties. I cannot overestimate the reality of these incidents: I would be convinced people were coming to get me. I was about to exposed as this reckless, dangerous drug user. Being in public in that state is unbearable, given you are convinced everyone is talking about you. It's very odd: you catch the odd sliver of a snippet, it's actually almost nothing other than the sound of muffled whispers, but your brain interprets those sound waves as nefarious conspiracies to either threaten or judge you. In my case it was often the latter: I was convinced that the everyday furtive glances public transport passengers are sometimes forced to exchange were indeed heartless and knowing sneers, subtle expressions of the fact that they knew I was crazed, sleep-deprived, drugged, dishevelled, a mess. Every sound became suspicious.
But the insidious nature means the end of that road, once stretching into the horizon and clearly signposted, becomes unclear and indistinguishable. You alter your reality to suit your initial vision of the impossibly far-off cliff face at the end of the road, from which you fall sharply to rock bottom. You change your rules. "I'll never..." god knows how many times I have broken that promise to myself; never gratuitously, always with justification. Have I justified it because I realise I can still function despite it? Or because my mind refuses me to think of my behaviour as unacceptable and unconscionable? All I know is that by the time I come to doing them, I cannot recall just how or why I felt so strongly against it. I'll never get high without this particular friend that first introduced me. I'll never get high around non-using friends who don't approve. I'll never get high on a weekday. I'll never get high for longer than a night. I'll never get high in the daytime. I'll never get high at home. I'll never get high alone. I'll never be high around my family. Listing them all now I marvel at the notion of my stringentness. I can no longer fathom the logic behind it: I've pushed the boat out. I've been high pretty much everywhere.
Of course, certain milestones stand out amongst what I have thus far expressed as as one singular event -growing in magnitude only through the tiniest of increments - which were perhaps seismic. It is interesting that these events are vivid, because just how the mechanisms of many drugs alter our conscious perceptions, it feels as if the craving for them alters my memories, as if my subconcious is subverting me. After 3-4 day binges your spirit is well and truly broken. In those hideously low moments I can recall vowing to never get high again. And even though when I wake up after finally resting I feel immeasurably better I cling to that feeling. I motivate myself with it. But it quickly dissipates. I only have the memory of having a memory of being utterly desolate, hopeless and avowed to quit. Suddenly I am left feeling amusingly trivial, hyterical even - oh how pathetic! I feel absolutely fine. I can't believe I reallhy felt like that; I couldn't have! You're exaggerating the harm... it's really nothing. You just need to take it easy next time!
I remember doing it at home, alone, in the daytime for the first time. This was a big mistake. I was having friends over later that night and thought, why not a little early? My friends were vehemently anti-drug and I used to chop lines pre-prepared, my very own "And here's one I made earlier", sadly Blue Peter never catered to surreptitious drug use. I actually did an Andre Agassi and just went on a cleaning binge. I was the same. Tidied the room, danced to music, generally felt great. And in that mundane two hours I had normalised the feeling I craved but had confined to social events. I was always addicted to the confidence. I didn't need the calming effects of weed. I didn't mind alcohol but I required such great amounts to enjoy it that it was such a knockout: no-one likes the shambolic delirium of being drunk, but you do enjoy not caring.
The unique effect I found with stimulants was that it removed inhibitions but instead of detracting from processes of thought, it enhanced them. I felt sharper, wittier, funnier, more interesting, more able to articulate how I felt and what I thought. In fact, I could express myself better than I ever had done before. For someone with a tendency for relentless ruminations who could maintain no better than a chaotic link between full complexity of thoughts and verbalisation of them, it was a feeling of unbridled happiness. I no longer felt boring. I no longer felt embarrassed to speak up, or plagued by self-doubts and self-loathings that would manifest as a reticence to ever offer up a thought in unfamiliar surroundings lest I be misinterpreted and ostracized: suddenly everything was clear. I feared no one and nothing, and I embraced everyone and everything. I suddenly wanted to talk to people and just bask in what empathy we could generate, not be ever fearful of what awkwardness or disconnection might arise. I made friends. I strengthened friendships I had. I opened up to people I'd never opened up to before, and vice versa. Every night out I would stroll, pupils dilated, jaw gyrating, thoughts endlessly spilling. I would cogitate on every interest I had or issue I felt important, and as my mind raced my heart would soar. No matter what happens in my life - not just with regards to drugs, but generally - I will always cherish that series of nights. I wouldn't trade them for anything. Each and every one was a self-contained joy.
I came to associate excitement with every single aspect of my experiences. I loved moving the powder into smaller packets in my room beforehand, I loved cutting the straw up, I loved choosing an old card to chop it with. I loved the whole process of snorting. Chopping the line up would bring immense satisfaction and a brief pause to look down upon my creation with pride before snorting. I loved the feeling of it thrashing the nasal passages, rarely without at leats a faint sting; some stoppd by one of the body's natural defences, mucus, dripping down the back of my throat in a mix and burning on the way down. I'd often use the inside of my passport as a 'snorting pad'. The smell lingers even now, and did even when I stopped for months. Every time I had to use my passport I'd smell it, a weird chemical vanilla of a scent, but absolutey intoxicating. I'd take a deep breath of the surface every now and then and the smell alone would induce excitement. For a moment or two that wonderful soar would return to my heart before it was gone again. I have read that the olfactory system has a very direct link with memory, and can elicit some of the most powerful memories; I can certainly attest to that. Whilst my mind was a never ending spiral of emotions and I could never unquestionably associate the drug with happiness and good times, that scent lingering on my passport was like a direct route to the purest memory my mind had recorded.
They say "you're always chasing that first high". It is another well-rehearsed drug 'fact' that people like to trot out. Whilst the statement is definitely inaccurate, I would concede that the underlying principle is valid. I am so jealous of my own early (the first 6-8 months or so) enjoyment; I could snort gram after gram without repurcussion, I also needed less to get going, and the stuff was undoubtedly of a higher quality. Now every line leaves a bloodied, mucusy mess behind in my nasal passages. The stuff is cut with some kind of awful corrosive element, and I need so much more of it just to get a feeling of anything.
And then it became less of a typical tale of enjoyable youthful excess. Some of the humour was lost. I could tell people about debating the meaning of life with a taxi driver or getting home at 6am still completely sped and concluding it's a good time to walk the dog and elicit easy laughs, but I doubt they would laugh so openly and so freely at being told I was not only still awake after 48 hours and losing all grip on reality, but still dosing. I experienced delusions and paranoia - this is no effect of the drug, but of lack of sleep. Typically you could not eat or sleep for 18 hours and feel perfectly fine. Indeed chewing and swallowing became an unpleasant difficulty and I had no appetite. I would perhaps eat a bowl or two of cereal over a few days. I'd be awake and still feeling good, but there is only so long the body can sustain such a deception and the paranoia and delusions where the manifestations of a fractured mind losing control of all its faculties. I cannot overestimate the reality of these incidents: I would be convinced people were coming to get me. I was about to exposed as this reckless, dangerous drug user. Being in public in that state is unbearable, given you are convinced everyone is talking about you. It's very odd: you catch the odd sliver of a snippet, it's actually almost nothing other than the sound of muffled whispers, but your brain interprets those sound waves as nefarious conspiracies to either threaten or judge you. In my case it was often the latter: I was convinced that the everyday furtive glances public transport passengers are sometimes forced to exchange were indeed heartless and knowing sneers, subtle expressions of the fact that they knew I was crazed, sleep-deprived, drugged, dishevelled, a mess. Every sound became suspicious.
I joined Urban 75 in 2004, as I recall, and Opiophile in 2005. Urban 75 is a London-based website slash forum that is quite similar to BL. There is a very weak Drugs Forum which encompasses ALL psychoactives. However, the World Politics Forum had a sub-forum concerning the Middle East and this was basically the reason I joined.
I didn't realise when I joined that it was almost entirely Leftist, in fact Hard Left, and so almost immediately I began catching shit over my views concerning Israel. If you are familiar with my posting on BL's CE and P Forum you might imagine that I am some sort of Israeli Apologist, never seeing Israel at fault on any issue. The truth is, like any rational adult I have plenty of problems with my country but unlike most on BL I know the country quite well and have been dealing with the same accusations for decades. While BLers repeat the same tired propaganda over and over ad naseum, I simply respond with factual and almost entirely unemotional explanations. If you tell me that Israel is committing genocide against "Palestinians" I will correctly tell you that since 1948 their life expectany rose from 44 to 78 and their infant mortality decreased more than 5-fold. Moreover, their population has risen from 1 million to nearly 18 millon! The endgame in genocide is the extermination of a people, not to help them increase 17-fold.
If instead, BLers chose to focus on how the Hate Law is unevenly applied with only Jews being charged, or how the Government is dead wrong to give religious Jews military exemptions simply because they study Scripture, I will say "yepper doodle" all day long. This never happens. All that is produced is the same redundant propaganda soundbites over and over.
On Urban 75 there were disgusting people (aren't there some on all sites?). I remember once discussing the "Ramallah Lynching." In this event, which took place in 2000 during Intifadeh II, 2 IDF Reservists were driving to their post near Ramallah, the "Palestinian" capital, located in the so called "West Bank." Not familiar with Ramallah they made a wrong turn and found themselves smack dab in the middle of a street demonstration which was in front of Ramallah's Central Police Station.
As always, International Media outlets were covering the event, and Israeli TV stations were running live feeds. Israel, and to a lesser degree the world watched in horror as the mob dragged the two men, wearing civilian clothes, from a personal automobile of one of the Reservists. Beating the men terribly the crowd dragged both into the police station. Shortly thereafter, they were lynched from a second floor window by putting nooses around their necks and throwing each one out the window. After killing them they brought the bodies back inside the windows and began mutilating the 2 corpses. As cameras rolled a young "Palestinian" stood in the window beaming, arms bathed in blood he showed both palms, bloody, as the crowd roared their approval.
The corpses were then thrown to the street below where one had all his bones literally pulverised. If you ever see a disintegrated skull, the head, the face, it turns flat like a pancake.The world saw it (funny how those actions never enter Western public consciousness).
On Urban 75 the argument was that the Reservists caused their own deaths because they were undercover. We have a Special Forces unit, "Mista'ar'veem," which dresses as and acts like Arabs. The accusation was nonsense. They were Reservists, with the fellow Reservists in their battalion appearing publicly and on television. This is besides the fact that the undercover unit in question only ever operates with an entire squad at a time, 7 men- not 2. Anyway, that person was a typical Urban 75 member.
One day, in 2007 I believe, someone called me a "Fascist." Uneducated people tend to believe it is an insult. The racist bullshit from the WWII Axis was an aberration. In a nutshell, without the exonomic component, it is an ideology in which the state is paramount to everything. I explained this to the poster while stating that I am NOT a Fascist (I was at the time a Centrist, neither Right nor Left). The next day I was banned for being a Fascist. It was such nonsense.
Before it had happened I had experienced some difficulties logging in and so I created an alternate ID. My original ID, the one that was banned, was "Rachamim 18." The alternate ID was simply "Rachamim."
About a month ago I was laying in bed and decided to see if the alternate ID was still in existence. To my suprise it was and so I posted. That same day a petty motherfucker ran to a Mod who banned me again, this time for having "multiple IDs". Hahahaha such nonsense. I immediately wrote to the site owner slash administrator. I explained that I had originally been banned for being a Fascist and asked if the site only catered to those on the Hard Left, and if so was there a disclaimer that I might have overlooked.
He responded promptly and nastily as he told me that I was playing games because I knew why I was banned, for having multiple IDs. I explained that I wouldn't have had to utilise that ID if I hadn't been banned for being a Fascist. Gosh it was such a waste of time. I was disgusted for even caring but I felt that the site, which like BL solicits money, was being unfair to its donors if it didn't reveal a narrow political agenda that it represented. Nothing came of it.
On the other hand, I've never had problems at Opiophile, save an infraction- a warning- for offering to give a dozen members 1 kilo of kratom leaf as a free sample. I figured that it would generate good word of mouth. A girl who was a Mod at the time cried foul and I got the warning, in 2008. Other than nothing.
I will continue soon...
I didn't realise when I joined that it was almost entirely Leftist, in fact Hard Left, and so almost immediately I began catching shit over my views concerning Israel. If you are familiar with my posting on BL's CE and P Forum you might imagine that I am some sort of Israeli Apologist, never seeing Israel at fault on any issue. The truth is, like any rational adult I have plenty of problems with my country but unlike most on BL I know the country quite well and have been dealing with the same accusations for decades. While BLers repeat the same tired propaganda over and over ad naseum, I simply respond with factual and almost entirely unemotional explanations. If you tell me that Israel is committing genocide against "Palestinians" I will correctly tell you that since 1948 their life expectany rose from 44 to 78 and their infant mortality decreased more than 5-fold. Moreover, their population has risen from 1 million to nearly 18 millon! The endgame in genocide is the extermination of a people, not to help them increase 17-fold.
If instead, BLers chose to focus on how the Hate Law is unevenly applied with only Jews being charged, or how the Government is dead wrong to give religious Jews military exemptions simply because they study Scripture, I will say "yepper doodle" all day long. This never happens. All that is produced is the same redundant propaganda soundbites over and over.
On Urban 75 there were disgusting people (aren't there some on all sites?). I remember once discussing the "Ramallah Lynching." In this event, which took place in 2000 during Intifadeh II, 2 IDF Reservists were driving to their post near Ramallah, the "Palestinian" capital, located in the so called "West Bank." Not familiar with Ramallah they made a wrong turn and found themselves smack dab in the middle of a street demonstration which was in front of Ramallah's Central Police Station.
As always, International Media outlets were covering the event, and Israeli TV stations were running live feeds. Israel, and to a lesser degree the world watched in horror as the mob dragged the two men, wearing civilian clothes, from a personal automobile of one of the Reservists. Beating the men terribly the crowd dragged both into the police station. Shortly thereafter, they were lynched from a second floor window by putting nooses around their necks and throwing each one out the window. After killing them they brought the bodies back inside the windows and began mutilating the 2 corpses. As cameras rolled a young "Palestinian" stood in the window beaming, arms bathed in blood he showed both palms, bloody, as the crowd roared their approval.
The corpses were then thrown to the street below where one had all his bones literally pulverised. If you ever see a disintegrated skull, the head, the face, it turns flat like a pancake.The world saw it (funny how those actions never enter Western public consciousness).
On Urban 75 the argument was that the Reservists caused their own deaths because they were undercover. We have a Special Forces unit, "Mista'ar'veem," which dresses as and acts like Arabs. The accusation was nonsense. They were Reservists, with the fellow Reservists in their battalion appearing publicly and on television. This is besides the fact that the undercover unit in question only ever operates with an entire squad at a time, 7 men- not 2. Anyway, that person was a typical Urban 75 member.
One day, in 2007 I believe, someone called me a "Fascist." Uneducated people tend to believe it is an insult. The racist bullshit from the WWII Axis was an aberration. In a nutshell, without the exonomic component, it is an ideology in which the state is paramount to everything. I explained this to the poster while stating that I am NOT a Fascist (I was at the time a Centrist, neither Right nor Left). The next day I was banned for being a Fascist. It was such nonsense.
Before it had happened I had experienced some difficulties logging in and so I created an alternate ID. My original ID, the one that was banned, was "Rachamim 18." The alternate ID was simply "Rachamim."
About a month ago I was laying in bed and decided to see if the alternate ID was still in existence. To my suprise it was and so I posted. That same day a petty motherfucker ran to a Mod who banned me again, this time for having "multiple IDs". Hahahaha such nonsense. I immediately wrote to the site owner slash administrator. I explained that I had originally been banned for being a Fascist and asked if the site only catered to those on the Hard Left, and if so was there a disclaimer that I might have overlooked.
He responded promptly and nastily as he told me that I was playing games because I knew why I was banned, for having multiple IDs. I explained that I wouldn't have had to utilise that ID if I hadn't been banned for being a Fascist. Gosh it was such a waste of time. I was disgusted for even caring but I felt that the site, which like BL solicits money, was being unfair to its donors if it didn't reveal a narrow political agenda that it represented. Nothing came of it.
On the other hand, I've never had problems at Opiophile, save an infraction- a warning- for offering to give a dozen members 1 kilo of kratom leaf as a free sample. I figured that it would generate good word of mouth. A girl who was a Mod at the time cried foul and I got the warning, in 2008. Other than nothing.
I will continue soon...
I am damaged. I am burnt. I am clouded. I am broken. I am a penny at the bottom of the ocean. I am worthless. I am a felon. I am unwanted. I am a fuck up. I am a loser. But I can honestly say that at some point I loved every single one of you. Every human being on this planet, no matter what the fuck you might have done to not deserve it. Call me crazy, but it's probably the only reason i'm alive.
this has been an interesting two days. it seems like the inevitable is happening. i went from being angry to apathetic to just sort of sad. i feel like i am somehow disappointing other people. but relieved at the same time. the only thing that seems to be changing is the label. i don't think the (lack?) of relationship is changing much
it is kinda funny, i wrote a letter stating many things that the thing i am married to and i chatted about since thursday. how we have been more and more like friends. more and more like roommates. the normal married stuff just isn't there. and it hasn't been for a long time. it isn't that we don't love each other. but we both have been seeking things outside the relationship for a long time now.
we talked about if i moved, and we stayed married, would it feel weird? no. if we saw other people more openly, would it feel weird? no. if we separated and both continued to live in so cal? yes. if we broke up and i moved? kinda sorta.
we talked about flipping things around. instead of going to seattle all the time to get away. why not live there. enjoy just being me (instead of me and unglued). visit here when i want. i could stay with friends in LA or stay with unglued. he could still come visit in seattle. we joked about how to make super awkward thanksgiving meals at vgroaz's place. and how all that is changing is the way we label what we have.
we are both scared how to tell other people. when we got engaged, we just sorta informed people if it came up. i am thinking breaking up should be the same way. eventually, people will figure out that we aren't living together and they can draw their own conclusions. i suppose we ought to tell our families.
the few RL life people i have talked to, asked if this has much to do with fucktwat. i suppose he is intertwined. but i want to move to seattle to start over. i already have a "single" life there. unglued has never really been a part of it. i have "my" friends (even some who aren't friends with fucktwat!). i know the area and i feel comfortable there. i've been asked why not go back to ohio? because there is too much baggage there. i can't deal with my family and our friends are so overlapped and intertwined that it would be weird. plus i hate the weather.
it is kinda funny, i wrote a letter stating many things that the thing i am married to and i chatted about since thursday. how we have been more and more like friends. more and more like roommates. the normal married stuff just isn't there. and it hasn't been for a long time. it isn't that we don't love each other. but we both have been seeking things outside the relationship for a long time now.
we talked about if i moved, and we stayed married, would it feel weird? no. if we saw other people more openly, would it feel weird? no. if we separated and both continued to live in so cal? yes. if we broke up and i moved? kinda sorta.
we talked about flipping things around. instead of going to seattle all the time to get away. why not live there. enjoy just being me (instead of me and unglued). visit here when i want. i could stay with friends in LA or stay with unglued. he could still come visit in seattle. we joked about how to make super awkward thanksgiving meals at vgroaz's place. and how all that is changing is the way we label what we have.
we are both scared how to tell other people. when we got engaged, we just sorta informed people if it came up. i am thinking breaking up should be the same way. eventually, people will figure out that we aren't living together and they can draw their own conclusions. i suppose we ought to tell our families.
the few RL life people i have talked to, asked if this has much to do with fucktwat. i suppose he is intertwined. but i want to move to seattle to start over. i already have a "single" life there. unglued has never really been a part of it. i have "my" friends (even some who aren't friends with fucktwat!). i know the area and i feel comfortable there. i've been asked why not go back to ohio? because there is too much baggage there. i can't deal with my family and our friends are so overlapped and intertwined that it would be weird. plus i hate the weather.
wtf is wrong with you? we don't talk all that often to begin with, so i don't understand the point of you deciding to cease all communication with me. for starters, it is silly because you still hang out with other people i am friends with, so it isn't like i will forget you exist. secondly, i've lost count of the number of times you have done this. it obviously doesn't work...
this cycle has repeated so many times that i can tell you how it will end up. you will ignore me for a few weeks or so until i am back in town visiting. we will inevitably hang out (that whole same friends issue. which if we are being picky were my friends before they were your friends). we will end up sneaking back to your place and playing around. all will be grand in the moment until you realize i will never be your girlfriend. then you will decide we shouldn't play. shortly after that, you will decide to not talk to me. then the entire thing will repeat until you get another girlfriend in your life.
i like you. you are fun play with. i love how we can argue and debate about the most trivial things and how curious you are to learn about things you don't understand. i find your moomin obsession cute even tho i can't stand the show. we get along rather well and know how to push each other's buttons. not to mention i find you attractive.
BUT i am never going to date you. i know it wouldn't work. i am not the sort that can be in a monogamous relationship. i like being free to run around and do what i want. besides the fact that i am not in the mood to leave my life here. i tried that once. we both know how that turned out.
it isn't that i haven't thought about being in a serious relationship with you. i recall having a long conversation with you before i got married. where i laid out how i felt about you. you agreed that we should leave things the way they were. i've often wondered what things would be like if that conversation went differently. what if i had stayed up in seattle?
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this is a letter i want to send to my friend. but i know better. it wouldn't accomplish anything. this has been a mess for almost the better part of a decade. it is the same dude i have been writing about since i started a journal here years ago.
the letter also took a weird turn. i intended on just venting about how annoying the way he is treating me is. i am kinda surprised how it ended with me questioning being in a relationship with him. i guess i've never fully resolved that question in my head. and i suspect that is part of the reason he isn't talking to me.
but that is why i like writing my thoughts out sometimes. it usually helps me organize my thoughts better. except this raises some other interesting questions that i might write about later.
this cycle has repeated so many times that i can tell you how it will end up. you will ignore me for a few weeks or so until i am back in town visiting. we will inevitably hang out (that whole same friends issue. which if we are being picky were my friends before they were your friends). we will end up sneaking back to your place and playing around. all will be grand in the moment until you realize i will never be your girlfriend. then you will decide we shouldn't play. shortly after that, you will decide to not talk to me. then the entire thing will repeat until you get another girlfriend in your life.
i like you. you are fun play with. i love how we can argue and debate about the most trivial things and how curious you are to learn about things you don't understand. i find your moomin obsession cute even tho i can't stand the show. we get along rather well and know how to push each other's buttons. not to mention i find you attractive.
BUT i am never going to date you. i know it wouldn't work. i am not the sort that can be in a monogamous relationship. i like being free to run around and do what i want. besides the fact that i am not in the mood to leave my life here. i tried that once. we both know how that turned out.
it isn't that i haven't thought about being in a serious relationship with you. i recall having a long conversation with you before i got married. where i laid out how i felt about you. you agreed that we should leave things the way they were. i've often wondered what things would be like if that conversation went differently. what if i had stayed up in seattle?
--------------
this is a letter i want to send to my friend. but i know better. it wouldn't accomplish anything. this has been a mess for almost the better part of a decade. it is the same dude i have been writing about since i started a journal here years ago.
the letter also took a weird turn. i intended on just venting about how annoying the way he is treating me is. i am kinda surprised how it ended with me questioning being in a relationship with him. i guess i've never fully resolved that question in my head. and i suspect that is part of the reason he isn't talking to me.
but that is why i like writing my thoughts out sometimes. it usually helps me organize my thoughts better. except this raises some other interesting questions that i might write about later.
they eat a lot of strange animals... there was baby horse, kangaroo, whale, shark (that rots for 6 months because it is poisonous when fresh), puffin, goose, reindeer, lamb on the menus... i ate puffin which was a bit chewy, gamey and salty. kangaroo was tasty and i am not sure why restaurants serve it since iceland is nowhere near kangaroo land. my reindeer burger was ruined by blue cheese. the shark tasted better than the blue cheese on my burger. i like the whale when it was cooked or smoked, i wasn't a fan of it seared/raw (it was minke whale for anyone who cares). i also ordered a quiche one day that i never got because of "technical difficulties" which i think meant it got burnt. but the phrasing made me laugh.
this is the shark. it came in a sealed jar cause it smells really bad. i described it as really chewy fish flavored gum that smells like bathroom cleaner.
driving was an adventure. for starters, gas was pretty expensive. it was about $100 to fill up the tank in our tiny ford fiesta. its only around reykjavik and the airport that the highways are divided and have shoulders and lights. otherwise the main road on the island is one lane each direction, no shoulders or anything. i think the street i live on is wider than what we drove on. it was really scary when we got into the mountains and couldn't see where the road was going.
most of the island is really desolate. there were times where we would be driving for an hour without seeing another car. and the geography is a mixture of mountains, lakes and rivers, lava fields and farm land.
outdoor swimming pools are also very prevalent. almost every "town" of more than a few hundred people has their own swimming pool usually complete with waterslides and hot tubs (if you don't believe me, look at this website that lists all the pools on the island). this is because the country has a lot of hot water. most places run on geothermal power and several places we stayed were heated thru the floor tiles. the rest of the places were heated with steam radiators.
this is the shark. it came in a sealed jar cause it smells really bad. i described it as really chewy fish flavored gum that smells like bathroom cleaner.
driving was an adventure. for starters, gas was pretty expensive. it was about $100 to fill up the tank in our tiny ford fiesta. its only around reykjavik and the airport that the highways are divided and have shoulders and lights. otherwise the main road on the island is one lane each direction, no shoulders or anything. i think the street i live on is wider than what we drove on. it was really scary when we got into the mountains and couldn't see where the road was going.
most of the island is really desolate. there were times where we would be driving for an hour without seeing another car. and the geography is a mixture of mountains, lakes and rivers, lava fields and farm land.
outdoor swimming pools are also very prevalent. almost every "town" of more than a few hundred people has their own swimming pool usually complete with waterslides and hot tubs (if you don't believe me, look at this website that lists all the pools on the island). this is because the country has a lot of hot water. most places run on geothermal power and several places we stayed were heated thru the floor tiles. the rest of the places were heated with steam radiators.
i've decided that i should go back to school. to finish a graduate degree this time... people say 3rd times the charm, right? 
i am debating if i want to go back to school in seattle or quickly get a master's around here. i found a program here where i can get a degree online in about a year. with the prevalence of for profit and non-profit schools churning out degrees, i don't see the point in going to a traditional university. i think most school districts just look for the letters after my name anyhow.
the annoying part is, the degree/certification i want requires a massive 1,000+ hours long internship. that is a long time to be working and not making much money. but on the plus side, it gives me an excuse to be working part time while in school.
i am debating if i want to go back to school in seattle or quickly get a master's around here. i found a program here where i can get a degree online in about a year. with the prevalence of for profit and non-profit schools churning out degrees, i don't see the point in going to a traditional university. i think most school districts just look for the letters after my name anyhow.
the annoying part is, the degree/certification i want requires a massive 1,000+ hours long internship. that is a long time to be working and not making much money. but on the plus side, it gives me an excuse to be working part time while in school.
related song/video (i was at that show )
i've been feeling rather blah lately as well as rather stressed from work. so my brain has been in a pretty hardcore "hate on a_c" mood. it is immensely frustrating because part of me realizes i am being irrational, yet i can't stop the thoughts. i can ignore them well enough to function on a day to day basis. altho it is fairly annoying and tiring.
i want to hurt myself. i want to punish myself for all the imagined transgressions i am obsessing about. but i've actually done a fairly good job avoiding that. unfortunately, i have been drinking every night to kind of shut off my head and be able to pass out at an early hour. to my credit, i've been able to keep it to 4-5 drinks a night as opposed to getting utterly shitfaced.
but that still isn't good. it has been fucking up with my personal training. i've pretty much been stuck at the same weight for the last few months. but the fact that i keep drinking and not losing weight just feeds into the whole "hate on a_c" mood. it is almost like my head has decided that since i won't physically hurt myself, drinking is an alright substitution.
i was feeling pretty good for awhile so i put off seeking out therapy. now i prolly could really benefit from it but i have no time/money. sooner or later, i need to learn that when i am not feeling like shit, i should still attempt to talk to someone. that way i can learn to deal with these moods in a more constructive fashion.
the funny thing is, most people think i am a fairly happy, easy going person. so i know this all in my head. with the except of a few people in RL and those who read this blog, i never tell people how i feel. i don't know how i can portray a persona that is so different from how i feel. it is just kinda weird.
)i've been feeling rather blah lately as well as rather stressed from work. so my brain has been in a pretty hardcore "hate on a_c" mood. it is immensely frustrating because part of me realizes i am being irrational, yet i can't stop the thoughts. i can ignore them well enough to function on a day to day basis. altho it is fairly annoying and tiring.
i want to hurt myself. i want to punish myself for all the imagined transgressions i am obsessing about. but i've actually done a fairly good job avoiding that. unfortunately, i have been drinking every night to kind of shut off my head and be able to pass out at an early hour. to my credit, i've been able to keep it to 4-5 drinks a night as opposed to getting utterly shitfaced.
but that still isn't good. it has been fucking up with my personal training. i've pretty much been stuck at the same weight for the last few months. but the fact that i keep drinking and not losing weight just feeds into the whole "hate on a_c" mood. it is almost like my head has decided that since i won't physically hurt myself, drinking is an alright substitution.
i was feeling pretty good for awhile so i put off seeking out therapy. now i prolly could really benefit from it but i have no time/money. sooner or later, i need to learn that when i am not feeling like shit, i should still attempt to talk to someone. that way i can learn to deal with these moods in a more constructive fashion.
the funny thing is, most people think i am a fairly happy, easy going person. so i know this all in my head. with the except of a few people in RL and those who read this blog, i never tell people how i feel. i don't know how i can portray a persona that is so different from how i feel. it is just kinda weird.
How best to explain drug addiction? What I give is only - or should I say merely - the anectodally-fuelled offerings of my individual perceptions and my individual analysis of those perceptions. I will inevitably end up presenting my own theories on many things related to my own particular story and I know I am approaching from a handicapped angle. I don't have great academic knowledge of pharmacology, psychiatry or any of the other pertinent fields. I hope they make as much sense in print as they do in my head. So I will begin.
I can actually recall once upon a time living in painful ignorance of the reality of drugs. Looking back I am shocked at how little I knew and how much I took at face value from terrible sources - friends, family, newspapers worst of all. It only takes a moderate interest to uncover the discrepancy between the media smokescreen and the genuine reality. Once I'd developed a significant interest in drugs I was left disgusted with the at times laughable, at times infuriating and entirely false image that was perpetuated not just by overzealous parents and schools, but by pretty much the entire mainstream media and most damagingly by the highest levels of international government, from the UN downwards to the national states of almost every country in the world. The 'War on Drugs' is hopeless moral crusade that is, at its core, unfeasible and unsustainable. I say this because the moral argument - "drugs should be banned because drugs are bad" - is a gross oversimplification and no longer matters. We pride ourselves on undertaking costly moral causes: the patient requiring 20+ operations and endless appointments, prescriptions, meetings, check-ups and everything in-between. The cost can run into millions merely on one individual. Simply in economic terms, resources could be better allocated helping a large number of people in moderate trouble, making incremental improvements to many lives. But that's not how we work. We can turn a blind eye to the most effective solution in favour of the 'right' one. And just as no-one is willing to stand up and say "The cost of treatment for society outweighs your value to them" to a hopeless case, yet all too happy to complain about NHS waiting lists, it's the same with drugs. Governments simply refuse to engage in debate about drugs. I have spoken to many people that, simply as a point of principle, won't engage in a discussion about drugs. That's a whole lot of instantly misplaced votes.
How about some popular myths about drugs and addiction then? Reasons frequently given for not wanting to try drugs "I don't want to lose control of myself/get out of my head" theres a real fear that EVERY drug is a psychedelic; that they all have hallucinogenic properties and cause fantastic visions and crazy 'trips'. That you'll get addicted as soon as you try any drug. That most drugs have a good chance of killing you the first time you take them. That taking drugs is inherently 'dirty'. Drugs are something for a feral underclass to dabble in: I'm far too good for that. Well these are the types of conclusions you come to without information. There is never any definition of what 'dirty' means. Never any explanation to me why they feel so uncomfortable snorting a line but not having a smoke. The route of administration is definitely a factor, with injecting and snorting being something people definiterly look down on. I tried flipping the conversation: OK then, well, how about putting some speed in a drink? Just like you would vodka, mix it with some juice, you won't even taste anything. The "I don't want to go out of my mind" reason belies a total lack of knowledge. Stimulant drugs enhance thought processes and sharpness of mind, unlike alcohol which dulls those functionings, and certainly not like LSD which creates an entirely new field of perception. You're easily more aware of yourself and more in control on coke than drunk.
There are a few addiction myths. The easiest myth I can dispel is that addictions is instant. That is just not true. Most initial drug experiences are difficult, disappointing, or generally mild. I imagine the vast majority of first time drug experimenters never go beyond this initial stage... those of us that do revisit with the allure of great promise; I would say like a moth to the flame but that is to denigrate the many, many people who - once they break the 'barrier' - go on to have a manageable and healthy relationship with drugs. But there will always be a relationship with them once you break the barrier. That relationship will be binding. You may not take drugs all the name, you may not think about them all the time, they may not be the most important thing in your life, they may not feel like they matter at all, when you think about them they may not even be hugely - let alone compulsively - appealing, but you will think about them. At stages, when triggered, your mind will drift to the thought of them. The frequency of that drifting and the triggers for it may determine much about how your 'relationship' proceeds.
The barrier I'm talking about is that first great drug experience. I have only taken a narrow scope of drugs but I imagine the experience is universal, and can apply to any drug: that breakthrough moment, that defining experience. The truth is - that not many people, I imagine, are willing to admit for how addictive this statement alone sounds - is that once experienced, your perspective on the world changes. Nothing you have ever experienced in your life, no matter how meaningful, will come close. It will be the best thing you have ever done, the greatest feeling you have ever felt. The memories - foggy, hazy, nondescript, malformed as they may be, it doesn't matter, even the memory of having a memory of the experience is enough - will become crystallised in whatever part of your brain controls pleasures and drives. The association will be insidious
I can actually recall once upon a time living in painful ignorance of the reality of drugs. Looking back I am shocked at how little I knew and how much I took at face value from terrible sources - friends, family, newspapers worst of all. It only takes a moderate interest to uncover the discrepancy between the media smokescreen and the genuine reality. Once I'd developed a significant interest in drugs I was left disgusted with the at times laughable, at times infuriating and entirely false image that was perpetuated not just by overzealous parents and schools, but by pretty much the entire mainstream media and most damagingly by the highest levels of international government, from the UN downwards to the national states of almost every country in the world. The 'War on Drugs' is hopeless moral crusade that is, at its core, unfeasible and unsustainable. I say this because the moral argument - "drugs should be banned because drugs are bad" - is a gross oversimplification and no longer matters. We pride ourselves on undertaking costly moral causes: the patient requiring 20+ operations and endless appointments, prescriptions, meetings, check-ups and everything in-between. The cost can run into millions merely on one individual. Simply in economic terms, resources could be better allocated helping a large number of people in moderate trouble, making incremental improvements to many lives. But that's not how we work. We can turn a blind eye to the most effective solution in favour of the 'right' one. And just as no-one is willing to stand up and say "The cost of treatment for society outweighs your value to them" to a hopeless case, yet all too happy to complain about NHS waiting lists, it's the same with drugs. Governments simply refuse to engage in debate about drugs. I have spoken to many people that, simply as a point of principle, won't engage in a discussion about drugs. That's a whole lot of instantly misplaced votes.
How about some popular myths about drugs and addiction then? Reasons frequently given for not wanting to try drugs "I don't want to lose control of myself/get out of my head" theres a real fear that EVERY drug is a psychedelic; that they all have hallucinogenic properties and cause fantastic visions and crazy 'trips'. That you'll get addicted as soon as you try any drug. That most drugs have a good chance of killing you the first time you take them. That taking drugs is inherently 'dirty'. Drugs are something for a feral underclass to dabble in: I'm far too good for that. Well these are the types of conclusions you come to without information. There is never any definition of what 'dirty' means. Never any explanation to me why they feel so uncomfortable snorting a line but not having a smoke. The route of administration is definitely a factor, with injecting and snorting being something people definiterly look down on. I tried flipping the conversation: OK then, well, how about putting some speed in a drink? Just like you would vodka, mix it with some juice, you won't even taste anything. The "I don't want to go out of my mind" reason belies a total lack of knowledge. Stimulant drugs enhance thought processes and sharpness of mind, unlike alcohol which dulls those functionings, and certainly not like LSD which creates an entirely new field of perception. You're easily more aware of yourself and more in control on coke than drunk.
There are a few addiction myths. The easiest myth I can dispel is that addictions is instant. That is just not true. Most initial drug experiences are difficult, disappointing, or generally mild. I imagine the vast majority of first time drug experimenters never go beyond this initial stage... those of us that do revisit with the allure of great promise; I would say like a moth to the flame but that is to denigrate the many, many people who - once they break the 'barrier' - go on to have a manageable and healthy relationship with drugs. But there will always be a relationship with them once you break the barrier. That relationship will be binding. You may not take drugs all the name, you may not think about them all the time, they may not be the most important thing in your life, they may not feel like they matter at all, when you think about them they may not even be hugely - let alone compulsively - appealing, but you will think about them. At stages, when triggered, your mind will drift to the thought of them. The frequency of that drifting and the triggers for it may determine much about how your 'relationship' proceeds.
The barrier I'm talking about is that first great drug experience. I have only taken a narrow scope of drugs but I imagine the experience is universal, and can apply to any drug: that breakthrough moment, that defining experience. The truth is - that not many people, I imagine, are willing to admit for how addictive this statement alone sounds - is that once experienced, your perspective on the world changes. Nothing you have ever experienced in your life, no matter how meaningful, will come close. It will be the best thing you have ever done, the greatest feeling you have ever felt. The memories - foggy, hazy, nondescript, malformed as they may be, it doesn't matter, even the memory of having a memory of the experience is enough - will become crystallised in whatever part of your brain controls pleasures and drives. The association will be insidious
And this is the other myth - addiction is not a discrete state. Addiction is a lengthy progression into unsustainable use. And drug users will find genuinely perceiving themselves as addicted as very difficult. They will say it because it is expected of them, because it is a label that will be put on them, and eventually you begin to perceive yourself as such. Addiction, too, seems like a very final statement of submission: you are beholden to your drug, you are to be treated as an untrustworthy, pitiable, dangerous creature, capable of nothing worthwhile and everything questionable. The key is self-belief. I am willing to admit I am addicted, but I am one of the many, many functioning addicts. I am an addict but I am not desperate, broken, hopeless, useless, dangerous. I can still operate in society's system despite being addicted. It's not the end of the road.
But the insidious nature means the end of that road, once stretching into the horizon and clearly signposted, becomes unclear and indistinguishable. You alter your reality to suit your initial vision of the impossibly far-off cliff face at the end of the road, from which you fall sharply to rock bottom. You change your rules. "I'll never..." god knows how many times I have broken that promise to myself; never gratuitously, always with justification. Have I justified it because I realise I can still function despite it? Or because my mind refuses me to think of my behaviour as unacceptable and unconscionable? All I know is that by the time I come to doing them, I cannot recall just how or why I felt so strongly against it. I'll never get high without this particular friend that first introduced me. I'll never get high around non-using friends who don't approve. I'll never get high on a weekday. I'll never get high for longer than a night. I'll never get high in the daytime. I'll never get high at home. I'll never get high alone. I'll never be high around my family. Listing them all now I marvel at the notion of my stringentness. I can no longer fathom the logic behind it: I've pushed the boat out. I've been high pretty much everywhere.
Of course, certain milestones stand out amongst what I have thus far expressed as as one singular event -growing in magnitude only through the tiniest of increments - which were perhaps seismic. It is interesting that these events are vivid, because just how the mechanisms of many drugs alter our conscious perceptions, it feels as if the craving for them alters my memories, as if my subconcious is subverting me. After 3-4 day binges your spirit is well and truly broken. In those hideously low moments I can recall vowing to never get high again. And even though when I wake up after finally resting I feel immeasurably better I cling to that feeling. I motivate myself with it. But it quickly dissipates. I only have the memory of having a memory of being utterly desolate, hopeless and avowed to quit. Suddenly I am left feeling amusingly trivial, hyterical even - oh how pathetic! I feel absolutely fine. I can't believe I reallhy felt like that; I couldn't have! You're exaggerating the harm... it's really nothing. You just need to take it easy next time!
I remember doing it at home, alone, in the daytime for the first time. This was a big mistake. I was having friends over later that night and thought, why not a little early? My friends were vehemently anti-drug and I used to chop lines pre-prepared, my very own "And here's one I made earlier", sadly Blue Peter never catered to surreptitious drug use. I actually did an Andre Agassi who, on first taking crystalmeth - a drug of similar properties, but far greater potency - said he went on a cleaning binge. I was the same. Tidied the room, danced to music, generally felt great. And in that mundane two hours I had normalised the feeling I craved but had confined to social events. I was always addicted to the confidence. I didn't need the calming effects of weed. I didn't mind alcohol but I required such great amounts to enjoy it that it was such a knockout: no-one likes the shambolic delerium of being drunk, but you do enjoy not caring.
The unique effet I found with stimulants was that it removed inhibitions but instead of detracting from processes of thought, it enhanced them. I felt sharper, wittier, funnier, more interesting, more able to articulate how I felt and what I thought. In fact, I could express myself better than I ever had done before. For someone with a tendency for relentless ruminations who could maintain no better than a chaotic link between full complexity of thoughts and verbalisation of them, it was a feeling of unbridled happiness. I no longer felt boring. I no longer felt embarrassed to speak up, or plagued by self-doubts and self-loathings that would manifest as a reticence to ever offer up a thought in unfamiliar surroundings lest I be misinterpreted and ostracized: suddenly everything was clear. I feared no one and nothing, and I embraced everyone and everything. I suddenly wanted to talk to people and just bask in what empathy we could generate, not be ever fearful of what awkwardness or disconnection might arise. I made friends. I strengthened friendships I had. I opened up to people I'd never opened up to before, and vice versa. Every night out I would stroll, pupils dilated, jaw gyrating, thoughts endlessly spilling. I would cogitate on every interest I had or issue I felt important, and as my mind raced my heart would soar. No matter what happens in my life - not just with regards to drugs, but generally - I will always cherish that series of nights. I wouldn't trade them for anything. Each and every one was a self-contained joy.
I came to associate excitement with every single aspect of my experiences. I loved moving the powder into smaller packets in my room beforehand, I loved cutting the straw up, I loved choosing an old card to chop it with. I loved the whole process of snorting. Chopping the line up would bring immense satisfaction and a brief pause to look down upon my creation with pride before snorting. I loved the feeling of it thrashing the nasal passages, rarely without at leats a faint sting; some stoppd by one of the body's natural defences, mucus, dripping down the back of my throat in a mix and burning on the way down. I'd often use the inside of my passport as a 'snorting pad'. The smell lingers even now, and did even when I stopped for months. Every time I had to use my passport I'd smell it, a weird chemical vanilla of a scent, but absolutey intoxicating. I'd take a deep breath of the surface every now and then and the smell alone would induce excitement. For a moment or two that wonderful soar would return to my heart before it was gone again. I have read that the olfactory system has a very direct link with memory, and can elicit some of the most powerful memories; I can certainly attest to that. Whilst my mind was a never ending spiral of emotions and I could never unquestionably associate the drug with happiness and good times, that scent lingering on my passport was like a direct route to the purest memory my mind had recorded.
They say "you're always chasing that first high". It is another well-rehearsed drug 'fact' that people like to trot out. Whilst the statement is definitely inaccurate, I would concede that the underlying principle is valid. I am so jealous of my own early (the first 6-8 months or so) enjoyment; I could snort gram after gram without repurcussion, I also needed less to get going, and the stuff was undoubtedly of a higher quality. Now every line leaves a bloodied, mucusy mess behind in my nasal passages. The stuff is cut with some kind of awful corrosive element, and I need so much more of it just to get a feeling of anything.
And then it became less of a typical tale of enjoyable youthful excess. Some of the humour was lost. I could tell people about debating the meaning of life with a taxi driver or getting home at 6am still completely sped and concluding it's a good time to walk the dog and elicit easy laughs, but I doubt they would laugh so openly and so freely at being told I was not only still awake after 48 hours and losing all grip on reality, but still dosing. I experienced delusions and paranoia - this is no effect of the drug, but of lack of sleep. Typically you could not eat or sleep for 18 hours and feel perfectly fine. Indeed chewing and swallowing became an unpleasant difficulty and I had no appetite. I would perhaps eat a bowl or two of cereal over a few days. I'd be awake and still feeling good, but there is only so long the body can sustain such a deception and the paranoia and delusions where the manifestations of a fractured mind losing control of all its faculties. I cannot overestimate the reality of these incidents: I would be convinced people were coming to get me. I was about to exposed as this reckless, dangerous drug user. Being in public in that state is unbearable, given you are convinced everyone is talking about you. It's very odd: you catch the odd sliver of a snippet, it's actually almost nothing other than the sound of muffled whispers, but your brain interprets those sound waves as nefarious conspiracies to either threaten or judge you. In my case it was often the latter: I was convinced that the everyday furtive glances public transport passengers are sometimes forced to exchange were indeed heartless and knowing sneers, subtle expressions of the fact that they knew I was crazed, sleep-deprived, drugged, dishevelled, a mess. Every sound became suspicious.
But the insidious nature means the end of that road, once stretching into the horizon and clearly signposted, becomes unclear and indistinguishable. You alter your reality to suit your initial vision of the impossibly far-off cliff face at the end of the road, from which you fall sharply to rock bottom. You change your rules. "I'll never..." god knows how many times I have broken that promise to myself; never gratuitously, always with justification. Have I justified it because I realise I can still function despite it? Or because my mind refuses me to think of my behaviour as unacceptable and unconscionable? All I know is that by the time I come to doing them, I cannot recall just how or why I felt so strongly against it. I'll never get high without this particular friend that first introduced me. I'll never get high around non-using friends who don't approve. I'll never get high on a weekday. I'll never get high for longer than a night. I'll never get high in the daytime. I'll never get high at home. I'll never get high alone. I'll never be high around my family. Listing them all now I marvel at the notion of my stringentness. I can no longer fathom the logic behind it: I've pushed the boat out. I've been high pretty much everywhere.
Of course, certain milestones stand out amongst what I have thus far expressed as as one singular event -growing in magnitude only through the tiniest of increments - which were perhaps seismic. It is interesting that these events are vivid, because just how the mechanisms of many drugs alter our conscious perceptions, it feels as if the craving for them alters my memories, as if my subconcious is subverting me. After 3-4 day binges your spirit is well and truly broken. In those hideously low moments I can recall vowing to never get high again. And even though when I wake up after finally resting I feel immeasurably better I cling to that feeling. I motivate myself with it. But it quickly dissipates. I only have the memory of having a memory of being utterly desolate, hopeless and avowed to quit. Suddenly I am left feeling amusingly trivial, hyterical even - oh how pathetic! I feel absolutely fine. I can't believe I reallhy felt like that; I couldn't have! You're exaggerating the harm... it's really nothing. You just need to take it easy next time!
I remember doing it at home, alone, in the daytime for the first time. This was a big mistake. I was having friends over later that night and thought, why not a little early? My friends were vehemently anti-drug and I used to chop lines pre-prepared, my very own "And here's one I made earlier", sadly Blue Peter never catered to surreptitious drug use. I actually did an Andre Agassi who, on first taking crystalmeth - a drug of similar properties, but far greater potency - said he went on a cleaning binge. I was the same. Tidied the room, danced to music, generally felt great. And in that mundane two hours I had normalised the feeling I craved but had confined to social events. I was always addicted to the confidence. I didn't need the calming effects of weed. I didn't mind alcohol but I required such great amounts to enjoy it that it was such a knockout: no-one likes the shambolic delerium of being drunk, but you do enjoy not caring.
The unique effet I found with stimulants was that it removed inhibitions but instead of detracting from processes of thought, it enhanced them. I felt sharper, wittier, funnier, more interesting, more able to articulate how I felt and what I thought. In fact, I could express myself better than I ever had done before. For someone with a tendency for relentless ruminations who could maintain no better than a chaotic link between full complexity of thoughts and verbalisation of them, it was a feeling of unbridled happiness. I no longer felt boring. I no longer felt embarrassed to speak up, or plagued by self-doubts and self-loathings that would manifest as a reticence to ever offer up a thought in unfamiliar surroundings lest I be misinterpreted and ostracized: suddenly everything was clear. I feared no one and nothing, and I embraced everyone and everything. I suddenly wanted to talk to people and just bask in what empathy we could generate, not be ever fearful of what awkwardness or disconnection might arise. I made friends. I strengthened friendships I had. I opened up to people I'd never opened up to before, and vice versa. Every night out I would stroll, pupils dilated, jaw gyrating, thoughts endlessly spilling. I would cogitate on every interest I had or issue I felt important, and as my mind raced my heart would soar. No matter what happens in my life - not just with regards to drugs, but generally - I will always cherish that series of nights. I wouldn't trade them for anything. Each and every one was a self-contained joy.
I came to associate excitement with every single aspect of my experiences. I loved moving the powder into smaller packets in my room beforehand, I loved cutting the straw up, I loved choosing an old card to chop it with. I loved the whole process of snorting. Chopping the line up would bring immense satisfaction and a brief pause to look down upon my creation with pride before snorting. I loved the feeling of it thrashing the nasal passages, rarely without at leats a faint sting; some stoppd by one of the body's natural defences, mucus, dripping down the back of my throat in a mix and burning on the way down. I'd often use the inside of my passport as a 'snorting pad'. The smell lingers even now, and did even when I stopped for months. Every time I had to use my passport I'd smell it, a weird chemical vanilla of a scent, but absolutey intoxicating. I'd take a deep breath of the surface every now and then and the smell alone would induce excitement. For a moment or two that wonderful soar would return to my heart before it was gone again. I have read that the olfactory system has a very direct link with memory, and can elicit some of the most powerful memories; I can certainly attest to that. Whilst my mind was a never ending spiral of emotions and I could never unquestionably associate the drug with happiness and good times, that scent lingering on my passport was like a direct route to the purest memory my mind had recorded.
They say "you're always chasing that first high". It is another well-rehearsed drug 'fact' that people like to trot out. Whilst the statement is definitely inaccurate, I would concede that the underlying principle is valid. I am so jealous of my own early (the first 6-8 months or so) enjoyment; I could snort gram after gram without repurcussion, I also needed less to get going, and the stuff was undoubtedly of a higher quality. Now every line leaves a bloodied, mucusy mess behind in my nasal passages. The stuff is cut with some kind of awful corrosive element, and I need so much more of it just to get a feeling of anything.
And then it became less of a typical tale of enjoyable youthful excess. Some of the humour was lost. I could tell people about debating the meaning of life with a taxi driver or getting home at 6am still completely sped and concluding it's a good time to walk the dog and elicit easy laughs, but I doubt they would laugh so openly and so freely at being told I was not only still awake after 48 hours and losing all grip on reality, but still dosing. I experienced delusions and paranoia - this is no effect of the drug, but of lack of sleep. Typically you could not eat or sleep for 18 hours and feel perfectly fine. Indeed chewing and swallowing became an unpleasant difficulty and I had no appetite. I would perhaps eat a bowl or two of cereal over a few days. I'd be awake and still feeling good, but there is only so long the body can sustain such a deception and the paranoia and delusions where the manifestations of a fractured mind losing control of all its faculties. I cannot overestimate the reality of these incidents: I would be convinced people were coming to get me. I was about to exposed as this reckless, dangerous drug user. Being in public in that state is unbearable, given you are convinced everyone is talking about you. It's very odd: you catch the odd sliver of a snippet, it's actually almost nothing other than the sound of muffled whispers, but your brain interprets those sound waves as nefarious conspiracies to either threaten or judge you. In my case it was often the latter: I was convinced that the everyday furtive glances public transport passengers are sometimes forced to exchange were indeed heartless and knowing sneers, subtle expressions of the fact that they knew I was crazed, sleep-deprived, drugged, dishevelled, a mess. Every sound became suspicious.
How best to explain drug addiction? What I give is only - or should I say merely - the anectodally-fuelled offerings of my individual perceptions and my individual analysis of those perceptions. I will inevitably end up presenting my own theories on many things related to my own particular story and I know I am approaching from a handicapped angle. I don't have great academic knowledge of pharmacology, psychiatry or any of the other pertinent fields. I hope they make as much sense in print as they do in my head. So I will begin.
I can actually recall once upon a time living in painful ignorance of the reality of drugs. Looking back I am shocked at how little I knew and how much I took at face value from terrible sources - friends, family, newspapers worst of all. It only takes a moderate interest to uncover the discrepancy between the media smokescreen and the genuine reality. Once I'd developed a significant interest in drugs I was left disgusted with the at times laughable, at times infuriating and entirely false image that was perpetuated not just by overzealous parents and schools, but by pretty much the entire mainstream media and most damagingly by the highest levels of international government, from the UN downwards to the national states of almost every country in the world. The 'War on Drugs' is hopeless moral crusade that is, at its core, unfeasible and unsustainable. I say this because the moral argument - "drugs should be banned because drugs are bad" - is a gross oversimplification and no longer matters. We pride ourselves on undertaking costly moral causes: the patient requiring 20+ operations and endless appointments, prescriptions, meetings, check-ups and everything in-between. The cost can run into millions merely on one individual. Simply in economic terms, resources could be better allocated helping a large number of people in moderate trouble, making incremental improvements to many lives. But that's not how we work. We can turn a blind eye to the most effective solution in favour of the 'right' one. And just as no-one is willing to stand up and say "The cost of treatment for society outweighs your value to them" to a hopeless case, yet all too happy to complain about NHS waiting lists, it's the same with drugs. Governments simply refuse to engage in debate about drugs. I have spoken to many people that, simply as a point of principle, won't engage in a discussion about drugs. That's a whole lot of instantly misplaced votes.
How about some popular myths about drugs and addiction then? Reasons frequently given for not wanting to try drugs "I don't want to lose control of myself/get out of my head" theres a real fear that EVERY drug is a psychedelic; that they all have hallucinogenic properties and cause fantastic visions and crazy 'trips'. That you'll get addicted as soon as you try any drug. That most drugs have a good chance of killing you the first time you take them. That taking drugs is inherently 'dirty'. Drugs are something for a feral underclass to dabble in: I'm far too good for that. Well these are the types of conclusions you come to without information. There is never any definition of what 'dirty' means. Never any explanation to me why they feel so uncomfortable snorting a line but not having a smoke. The route of administration is definitely a factor, with injecting and snorting being something people definiterly look down on. I tried flipping the conversation: OK then, well, how about putting some speed in a drink? Just like you would vodka, mix it with some juice, you won't even taste anything. The "I don't want to go out of my mind" reason belies a total lack of knowledge. Stimulant drugs enhance thought processes and sharpness of mind, unlike alcohol which dulls those functionings, and certainly not like LSD which creates an entirely new field of perception. You're easily more aware of yourself and more in control on coke than drunk.
There are a few addiction myths. The easiest myth I can dispel is that addictions is instant. That is just not true. Most initial drug experiences are difficult, disappointing, or generally mild. I imagine the vast majority of first time drug experimenters never go beyond this initial stage... those of us that do revist with the allure of great promise; I would say like a moth to the flame but that is to denigrate the many, many people who - once they break the 'barrier' - go on to have a manageably healthy relationship with drugs. But there will always be a relationship with them once you break the barrier. That relationship will be binding. You may not take drugs all the name, you may not think about them all the time, they may not be the most iimportant thing in your life, they may not feel like they matter at all, when you think about them they may not even be hugely - let alone compulsively - appealing, but you will think about them. At stages, when triggered, your mind will drift to the thought of them. The frequency of that drifting and the triggers for it may determine alot about how your 'relationhip' proceeds.
The barrier I'm talking about is that first great drug experience. I have only taken a narrow scope of drugs but I imagine the experience is universal, and can apply to any drug: that breakthrough moment, that defining experience. The truth is - that not many people, I imagine, are willing to admit for how addictive this statement alone sounds - is that once experienced, your perspective on the world changes. Nothing you have ever experienced in your life, no matter how meaningful, will come close. It will be the best thing you have ever done, the greatest feeling you have ever felt. The memories - foggy, hazy, nondescript, malformed as they may be, it doesn't matter, even the memory of having a memory of the experience is enough - will become crystallised in whatever part of your brain controls pleasures and drives. The association will be insidious.
I can actually recall once upon a time living in painful ignorance of the reality of drugs. Looking back I am shocked at how little I knew and how much I took at face value from terrible sources - friends, family, newspapers worst of all. It only takes a moderate interest to uncover the discrepancy between the media smokescreen and the genuine reality. Once I'd developed a significant interest in drugs I was left disgusted with the at times laughable, at times infuriating and entirely false image that was perpetuated not just by overzealous parents and schools, but by pretty much the entire mainstream media and most damagingly by the highest levels of international government, from the UN downwards to the national states of almost every country in the world. The 'War on Drugs' is hopeless moral crusade that is, at its core, unfeasible and unsustainable. I say this because the moral argument - "drugs should be banned because drugs are bad" - is a gross oversimplification and no longer matters. We pride ourselves on undertaking costly moral causes: the patient requiring 20+ operations and endless appointments, prescriptions, meetings, check-ups and everything in-between. The cost can run into millions merely on one individual. Simply in economic terms, resources could be better allocated helping a large number of people in moderate trouble, making incremental improvements to many lives. But that's not how we work. We can turn a blind eye to the most effective solution in favour of the 'right' one. And just as no-one is willing to stand up and say "The cost of treatment for society outweighs your value to them" to a hopeless case, yet all too happy to complain about NHS waiting lists, it's the same with drugs. Governments simply refuse to engage in debate about drugs. I have spoken to many people that, simply as a point of principle, won't engage in a discussion about drugs. That's a whole lot of instantly misplaced votes.
How about some popular myths about drugs and addiction then? Reasons frequently given for not wanting to try drugs "I don't want to lose control of myself/get out of my head" theres a real fear that EVERY drug is a psychedelic; that they all have hallucinogenic properties and cause fantastic visions and crazy 'trips'. That you'll get addicted as soon as you try any drug. That most drugs have a good chance of killing you the first time you take them. That taking drugs is inherently 'dirty'. Drugs are something for a feral underclass to dabble in: I'm far too good for that. Well these are the types of conclusions you come to without information. There is never any definition of what 'dirty' means. Never any explanation to me why they feel so uncomfortable snorting a line but not having a smoke. The route of administration is definitely a factor, with injecting and snorting being something people definiterly look down on. I tried flipping the conversation: OK then, well, how about putting some speed in a drink? Just like you would vodka, mix it with some juice, you won't even taste anything. The "I don't want to go out of my mind" reason belies a total lack of knowledge. Stimulant drugs enhance thought processes and sharpness of mind, unlike alcohol which dulls those functionings, and certainly not like LSD which creates an entirely new field of perception. You're easily more aware of yourself and more in control on coke than drunk.
There are a few addiction myths. The easiest myth I can dispel is that addictions is instant. That is just not true. Most initial drug experiences are difficult, disappointing, or generally mild. I imagine the vast majority of first time drug experimenters never go beyond this initial stage... those of us that do revist with the allure of great promise; I would say like a moth to the flame but that is to denigrate the many, many people who - once they break the 'barrier' - go on to have a manageably healthy relationship with drugs. But there will always be a relationship with them once you break the barrier. That relationship will be binding. You may not take drugs all the name, you may not think about them all the time, they may not be the most iimportant thing in your life, they may not feel like they matter at all, when you think about them they may not even be hugely - let alone compulsively - appealing, but you will think about them. At stages, when triggered, your mind will drift to the thought of them. The frequency of that drifting and the triggers for it may determine alot about how your 'relationhip' proceeds.
The barrier I'm talking about is that first great drug experience. I have only taken a narrow scope of drugs but I imagine the experience is universal, and can apply to any drug: that breakthrough moment, that defining experience. The truth is - that not many people, I imagine, are willing to admit for how addictive this statement alone sounds - is that once experienced, your perspective on the world changes. Nothing you have ever experienced in your life, no matter how meaningful, will come close. It will be the best thing you have ever done, the greatest feeling you have ever felt. The memories - foggy, hazy, nondescript, malformed as they may be, it doesn't matter, even the memory of having a memory of the experience is enough - will become crystallised in whatever part of your brain controls pleasures and drives. The association will be insidious.
Today started beautifully, if you ignore the threat of drought and the fact that every plant in this climate zone is flummoxed by alternating hard frosts and balmy spring days. Buds swell in the afternoon one day and shrivel and drop off the next night in bitter cold. I woke to lemony light and that always cheers me so I got up, went outside in my robe and snuggled into a chair to watch the day brighten and feel it warm. There were cedar waxwings in the bare branches of the plum and the mockingbirds and sparrows were filling the persimmon---an avian chorus of spring in January. I closed my eyes. Big mistake.
The best I can describe it is this: it is as if there were a sniper. He was there the whole time, letting me settle into his cross-hairs, finger on the trigger but in no hurry to shoot. His aim is perfect. He can wait, he always finds his mark. His mark is my brain. I wonder if when that first deafening roar of grief welled up and spilled out my eyes, and choked my throat, if all the birds scattered? Whether they did or not, I have no way of knowing. All I hear is a clatter, all I see is a red sea behind my eyelids. What is this pain? Is it loneliness? Is it dying?
It is a remembering. It is the memory of my hand reaching down the wooly tunnel of a sleeve for your little hand, pulling it up and kissing the fingers and, because it is our game, gently biting the thumb. It is watching you wear long sleeves all one summer to hide the needle marks. It is the memory of smoothing your hair back from your forehead to check for fever, to look you fully in the eyes when you are telling me one of your earnest stories, or, later just because you would still let me. It is the last gesture I did to your lifeless body. I smoothed your hair back from your cold forehead so that I could press my forehead against yours.
Remember when Pele died? We called the vet and she came to the house and you and your brother both stayed home from school. We petted him, we murmured to him, we dripped our tears onto his fur and promised him that we would never forget him. Your brother was stoic, slightly embarrassed by your choking sobs, but you didn't care. You cried so freely, you talked just to Pele. You told him how much you loved him, how you would never forget how he always slept with you, how he played Legos and even read books. No other cat will ever, ever be like you, you told him desperately. When the vet gave him the shot, I told you to pet him, pet him all the way out of his body. I told you to watch his eyes, that you would be able to see the light leave the eyes and you were amazed and even stopped crying for a minute when you exclaimed: I saw it! I saw him leave!
Afterwards we carried him to the grave I had dug in the garden and we wrapped him in his blue blanket and you put a blue Lego in the hole and your brother put a blue marble in and we put the pictures you drew and the letters you wrote on top of him before we scooped in the soil. We said goodbye over and over and over and when your brother had enough, you stayed and needed to be held and rocked and told a story. I told you that Pele was on a journey with no body now. I made it sound beautiful for you. You asked if he could hear you and see you and though I can remember your question, I don't remember how I answered.
I did not watch the light leave your eyes. The light left your eyes hours before my key turned in the lock. I did not get to hold you or to tell you over and over again how much we loved you. I did not get to murmur words of comfort to you as your soul began to unpin itself from your body. When I got there you were hours into your journey.
These little deaths of mine never last. The sniper's bullet turns out to be a stun gun. The paralyzing drug wears off and I open my eyes. The bare branches are once again full of birds, and the day is already warm. I can hear sounds from inside the house. My other two boys. The ones I still have. Traffic sounds are picking up. Thoughts of work come crowding in and I am briefly panicked that I am late. "Where are you?" I ask. But i know that the question is flawed. You are here with me, in ashes, in memory, in little stabs and huge assaults and quiet smiles and boys flying by on skateboards and the feeling of a body gone to stone and the sound of a bike being thrown to ground and laughter coming in the door and the terrified eye of the rabbit and the langourous stretch of the cat. But you are also gone; you are also the one that memory cannot reconstruct. The you that was the light leaving your eyes, the you that I can neither hold nor follow. The one for whom the word where has no meaning at all.
The best I can describe it is this: it is as if there were a sniper. He was there the whole time, letting me settle into his cross-hairs, finger on the trigger but in no hurry to shoot. His aim is perfect. He can wait, he always finds his mark. His mark is my brain. I wonder if when that first deafening roar of grief welled up and spilled out my eyes, and choked my throat, if all the birds scattered? Whether they did or not, I have no way of knowing. All I hear is a clatter, all I see is a red sea behind my eyelids. What is this pain? Is it loneliness? Is it dying?
It is a remembering. It is the memory of my hand reaching down the wooly tunnel of a sleeve for your little hand, pulling it up and kissing the fingers and, because it is our game, gently biting the thumb. It is watching you wear long sleeves all one summer to hide the needle marks. It is the memory of smoothing your hair back from your forehead to check for fever, to look you fully in the eyes when you are telling me one of your earnest stories, or, later just because you would still let me. It is the last gesture I did to your lifeless body. I smoothed your hair back from your cold forehead so that I could press my forehead against yours.
Remember when Pele died? We called the vet and she came to the house and you and your brother both stayed home from school. We petted him, we murmured to him, we dripped our tears onto his fur and promised him that we would never forget him. Your brother was stoic, slightly embarrassed by your choking sobs, but you didn't care. You cried so freely, you talked just to Pele. You told him how much you loved him, how you would never forget how he always slept with you, how he played Legos and even read books. No other cat will ever, ever be like you, you told him desperately. When the vet gave him the shot, I told you to pet him, pet him all the way out of his body. I told you to watch his eyes, that you would be able to see the light leave the eyes and you were amazed and even stopped crying for a minute when you exclaimed: I saw it! I saw him leave!
Afterwards we carried him to the grave I had dug in the garden and we wrapped him in his blue blanket and you put a blue Lego in the hole and your brother put a blue marble in and we put the pictures you drew and the letters you wrote on top of him before we scooped in the soil. We said goodbye over and over and over and when your brother had enough, you stayed and needed to be held and rocked and told a story. I told you that Pele was on a journey with no body now. I made it sound beautiful for you. You asked if he could hear you and see you and though I can remember your question, I don't remember how I answered.
I did not watch the light leave your eyes. The light left your eyes hours before my key turned in the lock. I did not get to hold you or to tell you over and over again how much we loved you. I did not get to murmur words of comfort to you as your soul began to unpin itself from your body. When I got there you were hours into your journey.
These little deaths of mine never last. The sniper's bullet turns out to be a stun gun. The paralyzing drug wears off and I open my eyes. The bare branches are once again full of birds, and the day is already warm. I can hear sounds from inside the house. My other two boys. The ones I still have. Traffic sounds are picking up. Thoughts of work come crowding in and I am briefly panicked that I am late. "Where are you?" I ask. But i know that the question is flawed. You are here with me, in ashes, in memory, in little stabs and huge assaults and quiet smiles and boys flying by on skateboards and the feeling of a body gone to stone and the sound of a bike being thrown to ground and laughter coming in the door and the terrified eye of the rabbit and the langourous stretch of the cat. But you are also gone; you are also the one that memory cannot reconstruct. The you that was the light leaving your eyes, the you that I can neither hold nor follow. The one for whom the word where has no meaning at all.
I hate to feel. Ever since shit hit the fan, it's been unbearable. Norcos and this forum are my only escape right now. 5 days clean, want to take some Norcos but I don't want to be dependent. FUCK! Haven't smoked because I'm trying to get a job, alcohol is so depressing, yet somehow better than nothing. FUCK! I feel like I'm losing my mind. I'm too lonely.
I'm feeling so empty right now.
I feel like every single day has no meaning and like I'm just pointlessly drifting through life. I smile and I see people and I pretend to be enjoying my time with them but really I just wish it would all end.
I wish I weren't so far from home and I could just squeeze my little sister whenever I felt like this and remind myself that there are some good things in this world. But I even had to mess that up. Moving away from home was the biggest mistake I've ever made. I hate it here. I've got no one and nothing to hold onto. I don't like the atmosphere and I just want to be back home where I know how things work and where everything is familiar and makes sense.
Fuck I hate myself. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing with my life. It's just not worth it. What's the point of living when you've got no one? I've got no friends here, no boyfriend, nothing. Why the hell would I go on.
I think I'm going to go to the hospital tomorrow and tell them I'm afraid I might try to kill myself. I feel like a mess and like I'm not in control anymore. I'm just so fucking terrified.
I feel like every single day has no meaning and like I'm just pointlessly drifting through life. I smile and I see people and I pretend to be enjoying my time with them but really I just wish it would all end.
I wish I weren't so far from home and I could just squeeze my little sister whenever I felt like this and remind myself that there are some good things in this world. But I even had to mess that up. Moving away from home was the biggest mistake I've ever made. I hate it here. I've got no one and nothing to hold onto. I don't like the atmosphere and I just want to be back home where I know how things work and where everything is familiar and makes sense.
Fuck I hate myself. I don't know what the fuck I'm doing with my life. It's just not worth it. What's the point of living when you've got no one? I've got no friends here, no boyfriend, nothing. Why the hell would I go on.
I think I'm going to go to the hospital tomorrow and tell them I'm afraid I might try to kill myself. I feel like a mess and like I'm not in control anymore. I'm just so fucking terrified.
Although initially pissed getting talked into renting this motel room cause he didnt have half the $ to put up, I must admit this is my 3rd an final night, but it has been a blessed respite. I have an actual bed to sleep in. I dont get yelled at for not keepin the damn room spotless at all times. I can go on the net in peace. I can be left alone in peace without constant, never ending criticisms. And while knowing and accepting part of the blame, ever since my latest bust that as far as I'm concerned was illegal search and seizure of my property.
Its been made quite clear I am no longer welcome in her home. Ive never had charges of theft or been a clepto and have been way worse off habit wise, kicking, yet during my worst phase robbed moms place. I could easily if i wanted. I dont. Changing the locks wasnt necessary. Not even lettn me borrow a key an hr, a day ect. Hell, I had more trust WAY MORE at a house full of dope fiends, dealers, and strangers and mom behaves as if I might go on a burg bender an rob her blind. At 50 yrs old, never having done that craziness, especially in a deminished capacity physically, Im hardly a threat.
It is what it is. Ive never been violent or motivated to scam an turn stolen goods into cash for mega more dope. If anything, my biggest sin noticed by others and myself is simple laziness. Ive never been ambitious and lacking in energy an motivation. I want to keep my chin up. Sometimes I succeed. Like two nights ago here when my friend was company 1st night, I remembered one tool was to meditate,breathe, send out 4givness vibes to the world, pray asking for the willingness to help me help myself out of a mindset that no matter how much I try, I will always remain stuck and bogged down restrained from lack of money.
An inner voice filled me with compassion and that just forgive an let the baggage go, that who was or wasnt at fault, if it was all my fault or if so called enemies did as much as possible to make life difficult or painful. Just be willing to let it go. Forgive. There was alot of violence an fighting outside motel room that night. My friend Joey kept frettn the cops are gonna come, they are gonna hurt us outside blah blah. "Joey. Wotever gonna hapn is gona hapn. Dont trip. What harm do we really need to fear? Angry people or cops overcome by rage an kill us? If we die tonight, how bad can the end of this transient life of gd an bad be if fate made us give up life, "life" that is nothing but constant change. Got $? That will change. Got a luxury car? Job u love? Job u hate?That will change. Pain? That too will pass.
If death then came knockn that night, seeing myself sending out love, forgivness, aware of about to leave behind a world that is perishable, oppressive sadness laying heavy on others they long ago conssciencly aware of it no more. For me, for Joey, should death come then leave behind the falseness of this place give up pain for a much better deal, no duality, simply The Source. IT is all and love is all there is. A guiltless mind cannot suffer as The Course elaborates forgive, be forgiven, be healed. On the level of form guiltless minds can override pain even when the flesh riddled with disease that had been imposed by self, or by Mind.
The conflict outside by others mimicked my own internal conflict and shattered psych, interesting. No coincidence. I sent out love, desire healing to those in pain. So this is my landscape, a mirror of my sickness. My chemical addictions Im not sure if I will ever again be without. I felt pity instead of fear of those outside. I told Joey no point to fear. We have lights out, we're quiet, Im sending out forgivness outside and then to my shattered spirit within. "we are not bad, just sick." Forgive us anyway. I forgive the demons within and without real an imagined."
"I want you for my friend forever," Joey said. Thats sweet. I will share the
only thing I have to offer, I said an friendship is all I got. Still, Im a drug addict like you and we accept each other anyway. Its not much, but powerful enough. It was no coincidence an hour it took to calm the internal conflict within, peace and silence replaced the fighting, shouts, and violence that had been outside.
Its been made quite clear I am no longer welcome in her home. Ive never had charges of theft or been a clepto and have been way worse off habit wise, kicking, yet during my worst phase robbed moms place. I could easily if i wanted. I dont. Changing the locks wasnt necessary. Not even lettn me borrow a key an hr, a day ect. Hell, I had more trust WAY MORE at a house full of dope fiends, dealers, and strangers and mom behaves as if I might go on a burg bender an rob her blind. At 50 yrs old, never having done that craziness, especially in a deminished capacity physically, Im hardly a threat.
It is what it is. Ive never been violent or motivated to scam an turn stolen goods into cash for mega more dope. If anything, my biggest sin noticed by others and myself is simple laziness. Ive never been ambitious and lacking in energy an motivation. I want to keep my chin up. Sometimes I succeed. Like two nights ago here when my friend was company 1st night, I remembered one tool was to meditate,breathe, send out 4givness vibes to the world, pray asking for the willingness to help me help myself out of a mindset that no matter how much I try, I will always remain stuck and bogged down restrained from lack of money.
An inner voice filled me with compassion and that just forgive an let the baggage go, that who was or wasnt at fault, if it was all my fault or if so called enemies did as much as possible to make life difficult or painful. Just be willing to let it go. Forgive. There was alot of violence an fighting outside motel room that night. My friend Joey kept frettn the cops are gonna come, they are gonna hurt us outside blah blah. "Joey. Wotever gonna hapn is gona hapn. Dont trip. What harm do we really need to fear? Angry people or cops overcome by rage an kill us? If we die tonight, how bad can the end of this transient life of gd an bad be if fate made us give up life, "life" that is nothing but constant change. Got $? That will change. Got a luxury car? Job u love? Job u hate?That will change. Pain? That too will pass.
If death then came knockn that night, seeing myself sending out love, forgivness, aware of about to leave behind a world that is perishable, oppressive sadness laying heavy on others they long ago conssciencly aware of it no more. For me, for Joey, should death come then leave behind the falseness of this place give up pain for a much better deal, no duality, simply The Source. IT is all and love is all there is. A guiltless mind cannot suffer as The Course elaborates forgive, be forgiven, be healed. On the level of form guiltless minds can override pain even when the flesh riddled with disease that had been imposed by self, or by Mind.
The conflict outside by others mimicked my own internal conflict and shattered psych, interesting. No coincidence. I sent out love, desire healing to those in pain. So this is my landscape, a mirror of my sickness. My chemical addictions Im not sure if I will ever again be without. I felt pity instead of fear of those outside. I told Joey no point to fear. We have lights out, we're quiet, Im sending out forgivness outside and then to my shattered spirit within. "we are not bad, just sick." Forgive us anyway. I forgive the demons within and without real an imagined."
"I want you for my friend forever," Joey said. Thats sweet. I will share the
only thing I have to offer, I said an friendship is all I got. Still, Im a drug addict like you and we accept each other anyway. Its not much, but powerful enough. It was no coincidence an hour it took to calm the internal conflict within, peace and silence replaced the fighting, shouts, and violence that had been outside.
Well, I've got myself a new sort of job... freelancing book tour coordination... sounds good, eh? I think so. Let's see what happens... it's definitely something I can get behind.
My brain is pretty fried from Monday-Sunday...I've done almost every drug I like to do...fucking ludicrous, actually, but I've gotten myself a nice bit of Suboxone so I can be functional. I need to get my own script because right now I have to rely on this manipulative motherfucker...but it's whatever, really. I took some dextroamphetamine earlier so I'm motivated but also distracted a bit. Bleh. Can't write too much here, I have a tendency of oversharing EVERYTHING... not cool.
My brain is pretty fried from Monday-Sunday...I've done almost every drug I like to do...fucking ludicrous, actually, but I've gotten myself a nice bit of Suboxone so I can be functional. I need to get my own script because right now I have to rely on this manipulative motherfucker...but it's whatever, really. I took some dextroamphetamine earlier so I'm motivated but also distracted a bit. Bleh. Can't write too much here, I have a tendency of oversharing EVERYTHING... not cool.
Well I am back in my home city on spring break. All my connects are gone and im in desperation mode. Im gonna hit up the city tommorow some areas I know dealers work in and try to score some way somehow. Its gonna be dangerous as hell but I gotta do what I gotta do to get my high. Wish me luck guys if you dont hear from me again you know I got jammed up or murdered.
In these times of trouble
of wrath and misery
of imbecile mumble,
of quite a tragedy
Now come times of forgiveness
before death we're to pit
Or is it that dosing
Gives us the freedom we need
Dire needs low quality expensive cut
Better do the synthetic part, won't hurt
Triple combo'd- game over
You know the saying:
The best leave us first.
of wrath and misery
of imbecile mumble,
of quite a tragedy
Now come times of forgiveness
before death we're to pit
Or is it that dosing
Gives us the freedom we need
Dire needs low quality expensive cut
Better do the synthetic part, won't hurt
Triple combo'd- game over
You know the saying:
The best leave us first.