I've been on these forums right from the start and for one year and one month now I have been clean of every type of drug including caffeine and tobacco.
1 Year clean - Tobacco and Coffee/Tea -Addicted to for 13 years
3.4 Years clean - Alcohol - Abused for 3 years
4.9 Years clean - Marijuana - Addicted/Abused for 13 years
All quitting was cold turkey.
Yes, it's a great feeling to not be a slave to ANY drug. I can now experience levels of joy I once felt only as a kid and it's a great reward for such a sacrifice.. I know the drugs i've quit are nothing compared to some of the others people take but they are addictive drugs and in my opinion, if you can't use them in moderation, are not worth taking at all. I was extremely excessive with all of the drugs I had quit, for example at their peaks they were 9 coffee's a day, 35 cigarettes a day, an ounce of weed a week (long joints) and a bottle of scotch whiskey per night (always drunk with water).
The worst drugs to quit for me were marijuana and coffee. Quitting coffee I literally couldn't leave my apartment for 2 days and had to stay in bed, just rolling around in pain. Marijuana was shitty, not being able to eat well, or sleep and the night sweats were bad for months. Alcohol was not bad at all, but I put this down to always drinking it after 4pm and always with lots of water. Tobacco was a bit edgy for three days, but after that it was such a relief to not have to smoke, the euphoria of not going through with it was remedy for any craving felt.
There is a gap to fill after quitting each drug but it's much easier than people let on. I took long walks, moved house, ate more food, chocolate, cooked more, exercised more, had sex and masturbated more, sat on the internet more. Everything I do, I do to extremes and drugs were no different, what changed was my values. I valued not being a slave more than anything else. Also I became interested in people I admired who were not addicted to drugs and tried to emulate them. Instead of being really enamoured by musicians and druged out creative types, my attention swung to academics and historical figures that were not slaves to their addictions. Again, this is just a simple and cost effective technique that worked for me, and is not a panacea for anyone wishing to quit drugs but a gimmick. At the end of the day it comes down to you not doing them again, that's it.
I also came to terms with the fact that i'm not that smart, i'm not the one who's going to get away with having these addictions and coming out fine on the other side; I realised I was destined to fail at all attempts to maintain these addictiosn and rationalised that pulling the chord was the wisest decision before shit really turned bad. I miss weed the most, particularly smoking at night and listening to music in bed, but i've had my fair share of that.
Life is hard enough just living day to day, being part of the human condition, it's annoying to be part of the daily grind but sadly it's necessary to survive and live - and any additions on top are just burdons. If you can maintain drug use in a controlled moderated fashion then best of luck to you, and I envy your control, but for me this quote of St Augustine not on sums up everything for me, but proves that addiction has been an ongoing burden of man for millennia "Total abstinence is easier than perfect moderation'.
I'm not into fitness or have any religious affiliation, I'm just a lazy, passive but self contained person with normal desires that sometimes got out of control. They say you always replace an addiction with an addiction, I didn't but I do eat out in restaurants a lot more and have much more sex. I don't want to brag, and my life is far from perfect for many reasons but I accept that it will never be perfect. And realising that quitting drugs is much easier and also euphoric than you think is something that should be promoted.
I do things in extremes and this is just another outlet for me to indulge myself in, but the joy and relief I now find so easily on a daily basis, that was once so elusive when addicted is much greater than any drug combination, that I would never consider going back to that former bleak life I lived for so long.
So to anyone out there who read this thank you and good luck with your own journey, it's easier than they tell you.
1 Year clean - Tobacco and Coffee/Tea -Addicted to for 13 years
3.4 Years clean - Alcohol - Abused for 3 years
4.9 Years clean - Marijuana - Addicted/Abused for 13 years
All quitting was cold turkey.
Yes, it's a great feeling to not be a slave to ANY drug. I can now experience levels of joy I once felt only as a kid and it's a great reward for such a sacrifice.. I know the drugs i've quit are nothing compared to some of the others people take but they are addictive drugs and in my opinion, if you can't use them in moderation, are not worth taking at all. I was extremely excessive with all of the drugs I had quit, for example at their peaks they were 9 coffee's a day, 35 cigarettes a day, an ounce of weed a week (long joints) and a bottle of scotch whiskey per night (always drunk with water).
The worst drugs to quit for me were marijuana and coffee. Quitting coffee I literally couldn't leave my apartment for 2 days and had to stay in bed, just rolling around in pain. Marijuana was shitty, not being able to eat well, or sleep and the night sweats were bad for months. Alcohol was not bad at all, but I put this down to always drinking it after 4pm and always with lots of water. Tobacco was a bit edgy for three days, but after that it was such a relief to not have to smoke, the euphoria of not going through with it was remedy for any craving felt.
There is a gap to fill after quitting each drug but it's much easier than people let on. I took long walks, moved house, ate more food, chocolate, cooked more, exercised more, had sex and masturbated more, sat on the internet more. Everything I do, I do to extremes and drugs were no different, what changed was my values. I valued not being a slave more than anything else. Also I became interested in people I admired who were not addicted to drugs and tried to emulate them. Instead of being really enamoured by musicians and druged out creative types, my attention swung to academics and historical figures that were not slaves to their addictions. Again, this is just a simple and cost effective technique that worked for me, and is not a panacea for anyone wishing to quit drugs but a gimmick. At the end of the day it comes down to you not doing them again, that's it.
I also came to terms with the fact that i'm not that smart, i'm not the one who's going to get away with having these addictions and coming out fine on the other side; I realised I was destined to fail at all attempts to maintain these addictiosn and rationalised that pulling the chord was the wisest decision before shit really turned bad. I miss weed the most, particularly smoking at night and listening to music in bed, but i've had my fair share of that.
Life is hard enough just living day to day, being part of the human condition, it's annoying to be part of the daily grind but sadly it's necessary to survive and live - and any additions on top are just burdons. If you can maintain drug use in a controlled moderated fashion then best of luck to you, and I envy your control, but for me this quote of St Augustine not on sums up everything for me, but proves that addiction has been an ongoing burden of man for millennia "Total abstinence is easier than perfect moderation'.
I'm not into fitness or have any religious affiliation, I'm just a lazy, passive but self contained person with normal desires that sometimes got out of control. They say you always replace an addiction with an addiction, I didn't but I do eat out in restaurants a lot more and have much more sex. I don't want to brag, and my life is far from perfect for many reasons but I accept that it will never be perfect. And realising that quitting drugs is much easier and also euphoric than you think is something that should be promoted.
I do things in extremes and this is just another outlet for me to indulge myself in, but the joy and relief I now find so easily on a daily basis, that was once so elusive when addicted is much greater than any drug combination, that I would never consider going back to that former bleak life I lived for so long.
So to anyone out there who read this thank you and good luck with your own journey, it's easier than they tell you.
