16 months on pods - Tapering completely in 4 weeks (log)

[Bojangles69]

You know when I first started posting in this thread is was more or less just a thing I did. I was very unsure of my future and I think to a degree I was somewhat disconnected to this thread.
But I really realized today how emotionally invested I've become over the last few weeks just learning about everyone on here and how its affected the regular course of my day. Like if I'm feeling bad, I will actually wonder what Quasi's doing, or Jay.. or Carl... or now even helpme lol, and its like the rawest power in the world just to KNOW that someone else is going through the same shit I am.
It really helps a lot just to know no matter how bad life can get at times, and how hard it can be to get off drugs, that there IS people who are battling through it. There IS people who will still invest in their futures when day after day they're not really reaping a whole lot of rewards. But they continue on with a blind faith and faith is really so much what this all comes down to I think.
When you can think of so many things you dont like about your life, but you keep on making the right decisions at the hope one day it will all have been worth it.
This thread is literally where I derive 100% of my faith from now.

Man life has just been so surreal lately its crazy. I have so many contemplative times through my day where I'll just look at the sky and wonder and I won't think anything at all I will just sit there and literally soak in life. Or I'll just close my eyes in the sun and feel how good it feels to be alive. Not a single though going through my head it just feels like I'm at peace with the world. Its a very strange but liberating feeling.

On pods I was ALWAYS thinking, always wondering things I knew I could never know for sure, and now I have no temptation to question things anymore. I've become very much a spectator lately just watching everyone and wondering how so many people in this world live their lives not tempted to use drugs at all. Almost like theres this human instinct most people are born with just keeps them away from drugs. And I wonder what happened to my instinct? Is it just now waking up? Why did I never really understand that drugs aren't the answer? Why did it take this long to feel like I know that now?

And there goes the thinking again lol.. ok I definitely still do it somewhat haha. But after this little event this morning I definitely feel better, just that today felt almost "too real", not in a bad way but in a way like I'm not realizing even when life happens when your high, its never really "real". I keep telling myself my family has changed so much this past month or 2.. and I have to remind myself its really me who's changing.
Like they seem so much more upbeat to see me now, we talk a lot more, theres intimacy and genuine concern for things that matter. Before I was just really killing time as fast as I could, and now I just kinda sit back and absord it all in... and sometimes it really does feel good.

Its good to see that those dreams seemed to have stopped for you Quasi. I mean I consider myself somewhat a mentally stable person for the most part but I did realize today at least how vulnerable a persons mind can be within hours of waking up. I notice dreams like that don't happen often at all but there are still days I wake up in the morning and feel completely lost with my life, but once I really wake up I'm strong and able to rationalize again. I guess its just hard to tell yourself when your half asleep that things aren't as bad as they seem.

And helpme that little frame shift you did was cool too. Thinking about it that way really almost makes me believe in god. Like maybe he knew that was the 1 thing that would get to me, and maybe that really was his way of reminding me why I need to stay focused now more than ever. The benadryl also DID help a lot, it seems to be having affects today as well because I'm not really feeling the bugs anymore. If it comes back tommorow I'll just take some more benadryl. And yes 3-4 grams is great to be down to. Its interesting like Quasi said that just a few weeks ago this amount would have me in a world of pain, but now its nearly holding me 100%.

So I have to take note that my body is still healing, and still somewhat vulnerable, but it IS definitely getting stronger by the day. And I have a lot of you guys to genuinely thank for that.
Unfortunately I had to order more pods because I only have 2 more days of dosing left from my last batch. And I thought about jumping off at that point but I'd feel better just to know I can taper even under a gm if I need to. The problem is obviously I couldn't just order only 10-20gms, so now I'm gonna have about 200gms of left over pods. Either way I'm not worrying about it its just another decision I have to make of whether I'll flush them, or keep them in my room to stare at everyday untill I relapse... so flushing sounds like a plan lol.
I think my final dose was 2gms, so tommorow is definitely close to 2.5 or 3, which means today was most likely under 4, but I'm gonna get the scale out just to see where it points with tommorows dose. I mean it literally just fills the corner of a plastic bag, about a dimebags worth of pods so for all I know it could be lower than I'm thinking. I actually prefer it to be that way so I'm not constantly reminding myself how low I am. Like I'll say in my mind "that looks like 4gms" when realistically it looks like 1 tablespoons worth. So I know I'm superlow I'm just honestly not trying to think of numbers because it seems to help. But I will have to measure tommorow just to get a better idea. I mean the scale I use is off but it still seems to be more accurate then me guessing by eye.

Ok I'm gonna get a bite to eat now, I'll prob be back again later but if not I'll update first thing tommorow! And thanks as always to everyone keeping me sane in this thread.

 

[Help me please]

Bojangles, do me a favor please! When you are ready to quit, take those pods and put them in a metal container and take them outside somewhere and burn them. Then take those ashes to the shore or someplace and scatter them. Have a funeral for them if you will. Put them to rest and also that part of your soul that fed off of them. That moment will be a defining one in your life and future

 

[Bojangles69]

Haha oh god I love your ideas! At first glance I was thinking that would be impossible but I imagined how good it would actually feel to walk away from and I'll tell you what, not only will I burn them but I will burn them on the beach right by my house and take a picture for you!

I will be looking forward to that day like nothing else now.

 

[QuasiStoned]

You know when I first started posting in this thread is was more or less just a thing I did. I was very unsure of my future and I think to a degree I was somewhat disconnected to this thread.
But I really realized today how emotionally invested I've become over the last few weeks just learning about everyone on here and how its affected the regular course of my day. Like if I'm feeling bad, I will actually wonder what Quasi's doing, or Jay.. or Carl... or now even helpme lol, and its like the rawest power in the world just to KNOW that someone else is going through the same shit I am.

Dude, I'm glad you started this thread too. It's crazy how all of this worked out, we used to talk about pods in PM's while we were both hooked. Then both of us, for different reasons, decided to end the pod abuse. This thread has been great for me as well as you because like you said, it was a reminder that I wasn't alone through this. I dunno I guess it just made me that much more inspired knowing that their were other people facing the same uncertainty as I was.

Man life has just been so surreal lately its crazy. I have so many contemplative times through my day where I'll just look at the sky and wonder and I won't think anything at all I will just sit there and literally soak in life. Or I'll just close my eyes in the sun and feel how good it feels to be alive. Not a single though going through my head it just feels like I'm at peace with the world. Its a very strange but liberating feeling.

Oddly enough I had one of those moments today at work. I was sitting outside smoking a cigarette and I was looking at the sky, admiring the concave look of it and thinking about life, the universe, and everything without even really thinking at all (if that makes sense, lol). This state of relaxation and contemplation persisted for a while and it was pretty cool, I haven't done that for a long time.

Its good to see that those dreams seemed to have stopped for you Quasi.

Yeah, I never really had dreams about drugs all that much, but poppy tea is something that invaded my dreams often enough to remind me how fucked I was. I used to think to myself "My god, do you see how badly this shit has got you by the balls? Even in my dreams I pursue that high." The worst experiences, hands down, were when I was miserably sick from withdrawals and unable to sleep all night. Then in the early morning hours I doze for 45 minutes and slip into an immediate dream where the poppy pods I so badly needed were right in front of me and I could relax because I was going to be fine. Then later I'd wake up to the horror that I'm not fine and I have another day of being sick as fuck ahead of me. Those dreams are the worst, lol.

lol bojangles if you burn your pods I want to see that picture! What a great idea by help me, very symbolic. Well, take care man. I'm sure we'll be in contact.

 

[JayJohnson]

I want a copy of the picture too! Doing damn good Bo. If you say it looks like a tablespoon worth, that sounds more like 2g to me. But anyway, 2 or 4, you are down looooooow. Nice.

Updated my taper plan/log, I just keep track of sober days in it now when I think of it:
"7.14- no booze 37 days, no pot 52 days, no opiates 51 days"

Damn the time goes fast. I'm slowly getting back into working out. Hit the gym 2 days in a row with today. Fucking hammered my triceps last Thurs and was having trouble bending my arms up until today. Typical, I want to hit it as hard as if I had been going to the gym for the past 8 months. Oh well, learn to warm up and ease into it.

Funny (well not funny, but coincidentally) - I smoked my first Nord Lead 2 in crack. Eventually got one, but always think about what a waste that was. No use regretting the past, just move forward. I'm not bothered that some people think it insane to smoke crack, shoot meth or snort oxycontin. I take risks, and I've felt things those people can't imagine (for better or for worse.)

But the drugs and booze just ruin me now. They don't have the answer anymore, it's time to just live life on life's terms. (Fuck, sorry, I hate spouting `those` sAAyings.)

Anyways... been thinking after I've hit the gym for a few more months and lose some weight, and been sober along with the way money magically accumulates when I'm sober 8) - I'm going to get myself started on skydiving again. Yeah baby, time to put a goal out there for me to stay sober and have a little reward waiting.

(Help Me Now, that was a nice re-frame with the dream.)

 

[Bojangles69]

Thanks Jay thats great buddy. Smoking the Nord Lead really put a smile on my face, I was going back and forth myself for a while between the Nord and Access and wound up going with Access because of the usb ability to connect w/out a digital interface.

Anyway you are a mad man quitting 3 drugs all around the same time, I was very much wondering if you were still holding strong and it sounds like you're doing real good. Bodybuilding has always been an addiction for me in my sober days, even for a good part of my addictions I was into it.
If you're going to get into that I suggest you start eating clean and go visit the diet forums over at steroid.com. Theres tons of great guys over there who have fixed my diet countless times and tweaked it to perfection. But as much as lifting can make me feel like superman sometimes the REAL fun is in the diet imo. FORGET maintaining a friggn addiction, the amount of effort you need to put in to eating every 3 hours, the right amounts of carbs/protien/fat would really make it impossible to maintain an addiction on the side imo.

Thats what I'm doing again today.
Oats in the morning with 5 eggs today at 9am (I eat yolks and suggest other people eat them too they are not bad for you at all its a myth)

Sweet potato with 8 ozs of tilapia at noon

Then I got a salad with crab meat and a protien shake for after I work out, and about 2 meals planned after that.
It just really feels amazing to get back into eating right again and I felt SO MUCH energy at the gym yesterday EVEN TAPERING just because I'm getting the perfect amount of carbs. But trying to lift without getting the right carbs (oats, brown rice and yams) can sometimes be very tiring.
I think I may have been blaming my taper before which was possible, but just from switching to the right foods I noticed a huge improvement in my overall energy.

And hell yeh with the skydiving I've always wanted to do those indoor skydiving tunnels where you get blown by the fan and just kinda hangout spinning in the air as it looks too friggn cool not to. But I have issues with planes so the idea of jumping out one doesn't settle well with me. Although the tunnel diving would seem like something I could do lol.

Ok quick morning update on the taper

Withdrawals seem to have started for real for real.
Not severe at all I did have RLS last night which is usually a sign I'm not getting enough pods. Not to mention I couldn't fall asleep last night and was tired as all shit, I also woke up super early so my sleep is def taking a hit.
Its actually quite odd because the RLS is rather consistent and obvious, but no chills or hot sweats which I'm thanking the immodium for.

I haven't took my dose today as I'm still contemplating whether I should throw in an extra gm or not for the legs but in all seriousness I was thinking about just saying fuck my dose. If this is as bad as the RLS is getting its really a joke, it just can get a bit aggravating at times because you always have to be moving your legs.
Whatever the case I'll update later today to note the dose and I also wanted to measure it to to get a better idea.

 

[Help me please]

Wow! I'm saying a prayer for you Bojangles. I really hope the WD is as mild as it seems to be so far! That would be so cool.

 

[Bojangles69]

Ok so I noted I was having some annoying wds this morning and they got worse and worse throughout the day even AFTER having my daily taper dose which measured exactly 3gms on the scale before taking it (scale is somewhat unaccurate I believe but it could have been 3gms for all I know).

After I took the dose, it didn't do anything at all. This might seem normal to most people but thats definitely not how it should have been because every dose I've ever taken I've been able to feel the transition out of sickness. After I noticed it didn't do ANYTHING, I started going crazy wondering if its the immodium, wondering if maybe my receptors just decided to give up for whatever reason.

This happened once before where I started having wds for no real reason and the last time I figured out it was due to my scale being a spring scale and not being accurate at low doses. But because I wasn't using the scale and had carefully done these doses by hand there was no real reason to be experiencing wds like I was. I mean they weren't bad but I was still getting pissed as to why it was going on.

So I'm about to go workout and put on some deodorant, and there sitting in my cabinet is the huge bag of pods I had JUST BOUGHT to finish this taper with. And just like that it hit me, "its a different supplier I bought from this time". For some reason I hadn't even thought about it as I've ordered from the same company everytime through my addiction but just this last time I used a different place because I didn't wanna get huge amounts.

After realizing that I mixed up roughly 1 more gram, made a very small cup of tea and drank it. I waited a half hour (which is usually how long it takes to kick in for me) and wound up taking another gm, RLS is still going and I'm feeling pretty anxious at this point. I was up to 5gms and it still wasn't holding me.
So I take 1 final gm and about 20mins later the RLS stops, the anxiety fades, and I realized I had matched my old dose.
I wasn't expecting this new batch to be that weak, but it appears they are literally half as strong as w/e I was taking before.
I was somewhat pissed at first to have doubled my dose, but I realized this is a blessing in disguise. I've heard about people switching at the end of their tapers from pods to stems, as stems have about half the amount of alkaloids and allow you to get lower in your taper and jump off with overall less bs.

So even though I'm at 6gms now it should still be the same, except that when I to 1gm, I should be at half the amount I would have been at with 1gm of the old pods. So in a weird way I kinda like the idea.

I'm not sure exactly how I'm gonna handle it but I think I'm just gonna go down to 5 tommorow, then 4, then 3.5, 3, 2.5, 2, 1.5, 1 and off for good. Thats the tentative final plan right now. If I feel like I can drop a full gm on certain days I def will but I'm also trying to not up my immodium as I'm tapering that as well. Like I could drop to 1gm right now and up my immodium intake, but then I'm just gonna have to do a longer taper with the immodium when I stop the pods. So for these next few days I'm just gonna gauge my body and this should be the final landing. Either way wds are NOTHING like they use to be and I'm pretty confident I could prob handle them fine stopping now. But I like just how I've been on a stable routine lately and I have no real need to stop this second, so it looks like another 5-6 days and I'm gonna try jumping off for good at that point.

 

[Carl Landrover]

WOWWWW. Wow wow wow just wow.
That paragraph got me right to the core like nothing else.

That is one of most concentrated, refined, statements I’ve ever read about opiates my whole life.
And they definitely do not teach that shit in school or NA.

The 5-10% analogy you used. In school teachers tell you basically “drugs will ruin your life, you will spend all you money to get high, become homeless, and die a lonely life on the streets”.
NA tells people “if you ever use again because you’re a drug addict for life you will get sucked right back into addiction and lose all control over yourself”.

Its that **5-10%** analogy that has been a reality for me.
That is the TRUE evil of drugs imo. Sure they can make you sick, they can make you steal money, but its that 5-10% reduction in productivity that very slowly and elusively comes to take over your whole life.
THAT is the snaky heart of addiction.
I almost wanna get a frame for that paragraph and hang it on my wall just so I don’t forget.
I don’t lose ALL my motivation. I don’t drop out of school or quit my job and just start doing horrible shit. Very slowly things around me start to fade away. I sloowwwwly lose the ability to keep my life glued together.
I slowly stop hanging out with friends. I SLOWLY become a desolate recluse. One day you wake up, and although you may still have a house, or food, or be capable of paying your bills… EVERYTHING has changed.

People don’t trust you. People don’t call you because you care more about getting high than going out. You stop interacting with people and doing things. But MOST OF ALL you lose your drive to evolve in life. That’s really what does it for me. Between now and the first time I used this time around, I have been frozen in a block of ice. I haven’t evolved or brought anything new into my life. I haven’t accomplished anything. NOTHING has improved or gotten better. And just because of that, it makes your life so much worse. I can relate to that statement in so many different ways its appalling. I genuinely think instead of teaching kids the crap they are learning in schools about drugs, all they really need to do is a lesson on that 5-10% drop in productivity. That seems to be what always winds up doing me in. You literally just pick your head out of the sand one day and look at your life like “how the fuck did this happen?.. I didn’t rob any banks or shoot anyone this time around… why does my life suck so badly” … “oh I guess it was that sneaky 5-10% drop again… mfkr always gets me” lol.

Glad you were able to relate. I figured some people would. I just hate thinking how much time I lost. I often am very curious about the person I am off of opiates. I think I just need to drill it into my head how much better it can be if I can get clean.

I think that girl could still be the reason you’re having issues with staying clean (I *think I could obviously be very wrong). You could have got over a large deal of it, but her lying or whatever it was could have def planted a bitter seed in your mind that is still affecting you today.

It just seems hard to get over a breakup at all when you’re using any drug on a daily basis. You still feel the pain and anguish but its almost like delayed wds. Just because you’re on drugs you’re still delaying a lot of the natural torment you should have prob experienced all at once when it happened. It would obviously depend a lot on you but I know how I am with breakups myself and how those general emotions work.

I just don’t see how someone can “properly” move on (if theres such a thing) when they’re using drugs. I purposely avoid relationships now just because of that. Getting over a lover involves being able to feel a consistent natural low of which drugs can obviously fuck with. Again its very well possible you’re completely over that whole situation, but if you think you’re not, I’d really like to try to help you be done with that shit. And I have a lot of different things you can do to help you be at peace with whatever that bitch did. Not talking about you’re feelings or anything lol, but I do happen to have a few nukes in my arsenal just for the purpose of getting over and done with breakups fast.

I definitely agree with you here. I'm not over her and I've never had proper closure. It's funny, I don't think about her until I start getting on lower doses. Like all of a sudden once I get to very low doses she just starts invading my mind. I was WDing last night and fell asleep a bit and I dreamt about her. Definitely need to get clean to get over her. I noticed just in general I have a harder time moving past things when I'm on opiates. I sort of think it's a weird off-shoot of the complacency thing.

I need to start getting some counseling. I got the number of a counselor from my old suboxone doctor (who is now my regular PCP), but everytime I called I just got the machine. I called at least 10 times on at least 8 different days. ONE time someone picked up and they told me to call back later if I didn't hear from the receptionist. I left at least EIGHT messages. I stopped calling because I felt like a psycho or something. It kind of sucked feeling like I was being rejected from counseling. I need to try some other places I guess since they're clearly not for me.

This thread is just as much yours as it is mine man so talk about yourself all you want. I am one of those people who finds other people way more interesting than myself so its also very rewarding to read.
And about the pressure thing lol, I honestly think I feel enough pressure by myself that it doesn’t really add much strain knowing you’re depending on me too. I WILL get off this fucking crap I guarantee that. Its just going to turn into a battle of time and sobriety afterwards. If after I get clean I become complacent with my life in anyway I can be back using very quickly. I’m also expecting for some reason something bad to happen the first year I get clean (if I make it that long) I’m not sure why, but it just seems like god is always testing us no matter what.
So I need to make sure I’m in a good frame of mind when I AM clean just encase anything comes my way that I’m not ready for. But I’d very much like to see you, me, quasi, and everyone else in this thread on the other side. And I’d like for this part of our lives to be nothing more than a dark distant memory in the future.

Cool man, thanks! This thread has really grown on me over the last few weeks. I definitely don't feel like I'm in a good frame of mind for quitting.

Like I was saying in another post when I got off of suboxone in the fall it sucked balls for a month, but it was worth doing because I KNEW it would be worth it once I got through and got off. However, then all that shit with my now ex happened and I went from feeling empty from WD/PAWS to empty because my life had suddenly changed and I was now all alone. Now it's just this feeling inside where I'm just going to be empty when I get off. I can think otherwise, but for some reason I can't convince myself to believe it.

Me too man, when I think of the THOUSANDS of dollars I have spent on pot and PPT it's kind of depressing. I've been working for years and have nothing to show for it.

I remember when I was young I used to always have hundreds of dollars to spare. Now times are tough and I live paycheck to paycheck, and I still am paying for the mistake I made on drugs. I don't even buy them much anymore, I've been getting by on $10 dollars worth of weed for the last month, a few packs of cigarettes per week, and bought a bottle of liquor this week. Sometimes I feel I'll never have a positive income.

Definitely depressing thinking of the money spent. I was awesome at saving money when I was younger. I always saved my allowance and any other money I earned or got for holidays/birthdays/etc. If there was something I wanted, I would either wait for Christmas, birthday, or some other holiday OR I would use a gift certificate that I got at Christmas, birthday, or holiday. It sort of backfired once I first got addicted since I had a nice bank account to deplete 80% of. I'm still good at saving now, except my whole concept of money is WHACK because of drugs. The times where I'm good for a few weeks/months I save it back up, but then it quickly drops during binges.

My concept of money is so messed up. I'd have to put some serious consideration into spending $50 on a material item or on a meal or event or something, but I'll easily throw that or much more down on oxy or heroin. Won't even think twice about it. Fucking ridiculous.

I see myself eventually giving up the pot, but at this point it sounds ludicrous. It's probably the only thing that brings me any sense of relaxation and pain relief. Quitting pot will not happen until I've long moved on from opiates. Cigs, well those will have to go someday too. But not right now, lol.

I'd like to actually get completely sober, but pot is going to be the last to go (if I have any say in it). Trying to quit opiates first, then stop the adderall usage I've taken up in the last several months, and then if I get through those 2 I'll try to stop smoking (vaporizing) weed. I don't have a problem with herb. It helps my stomach (which I've had issues with since I was little), I can afford it, and I can still go to work and school fine with using it.

 

[mack_theknife]

I'm new here, but am no stranger to the pod. I've been a heavy user for 18 months, and really would like to quit. Bojangles, do you think you could post a comprehensive list of do's, dont's, etc?

Due to the nature of my job, tapering is really my only option. If you had to do it over again, what would you do different?

 

[Help me please]

Mack, Bojangles is at a delicate place in his taper right now so I did a search on Bluelight for you. This is the link which has oodles of threads related to pod tapering which you will find helpful. I am sure Bojangles will help you as well.

http://www.google.com/cse?cx=009513296995230692334:yo-c3aa2fy4&cof=FORID:1&q=tapering+off+pods&as_sitesearch=bluelight.ru

 

[panic in paradise]

iam switching from pods, to an actual prescription finally. i like the security of having 15 opiates fighting for me naturally all together, as they should be, but, after so long its rediculous.

i feel some and show limited signs of w/d, switching from pods to oxycodone, the efficientcy of the pods is obvious. 10 mg oxy suffices for 3 to 4 hours, with remaining breakthrough pain, but ive had a much lower ( and much needed) then average mmj intake also, from +,- 2 grams a day, to like .5 g.

i have a pod left, but am waiting for the pain to become too much, or the more complex withdrawls i am expecting to sneak up. i have been using them constantly for a year plus also, but kept my intake as i mentioned to around 3 paps or gigs a day.

 

[sid3]

How do you intend to control the tolerance PIP?

 

[panic in paradise]

the same way i always have, ebb & flood.

there is still much greater pain to come years from now... i also take a tnf pain blocker, but 3 up 5, then suffer some cold symptoms for a few days, then repeat. it is unnecessary to keep upping and upping your dose. i personally have been able to do this, routinely for 18 years.

was i able to do this with alcohol, or cocaine, no.

my pain level is what it is, later, instead of more, ill take less of something stronger, that lasts longer, and again from there so many years later.

my doc at a university pain clinic agreed to this schematic with out hesitating, just agreeing and taking notes. iam very unfortunate to have these diagnoses, indeed, but must consider my self fortunate to have the faith and care from the med pros i have, and the oh so vital painkillers, that work. its an easy choice in my shoes.

 

[Help me please]

Panic, one of my reasons for getting off the opiates now was due to tolerance. I started on vicodin and wound up on oxymorphone (Opana ER). Dr upped my Opana dose a few months back as well. I had no clue what oxymorphone was and after looking it up wondered what the hell I would be taking 20 years from now! I mean there are people who could easily OD on one of those pills I was taking. At this point, I think a knee replacement is the way to go. The pain is no worse (and at times less) on the low doses of Morphine sulfate I am taking now than it was on the Opana and norco. I suspect my head is trying to help me along here too.

I really believe that if I lived my life on pain meds I would not live as long as without them. Just my opinion for my own body

 

[panic in paradise]

yeah, out absolutely does feel like a life or death situation.

it is scary how simple, easy, ready, and justifiable it can become on those sleep deprived long nights weeks months, of pure unexplainable, agonizing, helpless, stretches that lead up to that moment of 'clarity', where suicide is humane.

i went to the er once, in utter agony, & omg inner horror. they wanted to commit me, and put me in a room with what sounded like a shastakovich piano viola duet and what sounded like miles or coltraine playing a solo, that fucking fine with me, they all riddle my i tunes.

so i sat there zoning under a 150 w high pressure sodium lamp, for five six hours waiting for the psych, ive been some what trained in med school to keep the soft professionalism the psych nurses were exhibiting, so watching them work was interesting. i have a much much more powerful lighting system, and the fine music and time, but. when the psych got there and saw me at 8am, she said he is in pain..! wtf.

the docs said okay they'll call my rheumi to see how she would treat me, she didn't answer, and they left a message, on a saturday morning, then my wife walks in and we go home... i have been falsely detained in a psych ward once, that was enough...

it is at least amazing how different each and every doctor is, they should be more like attorneys, studiously trained to answer only to fact, especially with all the facts i can present as far as my treasure chest of shiny chronic progressive diagnoses... and the recorded lack of pain management, and clear ua.

this song with some healthy detachment or ' trancing'
to this has been of invaluable assistance on so many aforementioned nights, please do listen, down load, put on repeat, find peace, a tens unit, and a mindfold.

please do listen. i know iam about to. there are many versions i finally d/l a readers digest ' classics version'.
i like it most with the clarinet, but play and adore the viola, also "my heart is in the highlands" - like woah...

 

[Help me please]

Panic, I am listening to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYypmgIYOVQ&feature=youtube_gdata now. It is beautiful and I have been smiling from the first note. It gives me such a warm feeling...no tens unit needed. Thanks!

Sorry about your bad trip to the hospital. Trained in medical school? Are you a physician?

 

[unsettled]

I definitely agree with you here. I'm not over her and I've never had proper closure. It's funny, I don't think about her until I start getting on lower doses. Like all of a sudden once I get to very low doses she just starts invading my mind. I was WDing last night and fell asleep a bit and I dreamt about her. Definitely need to get clean to get over her. I noticed just in general I have a harder time moving past things when I'm on opiates. I sort of think it's a weird off-shoot of the complacency thing.



Damn, this is so true for me and it took me so long to figure out the connection! I'm currently physically dependent on about one jumbo pod a day and 2mgs of Klonopin a day, when I take my regular daily doses of these drugs everything is fine, I'm not high, but I can function. Some days I'll start to feel a little extra depressed, I know depression all too well but I will often relate it to my last girlfriend. I'll start thinking of her and how I miss her and if I just had her back everything would be fine, blah blah blah cry me a river....., I'd continue along with this kind of thinking until I'm seconds away from calling her ...... but then I'll remember I hadn't taken my full dose of meds that day, when I take them this feeling of dread over my last break up goes away almost immediately!

It's gotten to the point where I look at these painful longing feelings for my ex as withdrawal symptoms, usually the first withdrawal symptom.

When I think back I never really got completely sober since that break up, the closest I got was taking just wellbutrin and my rx'd dose of xanax everyday.

I think there is some definite truth to what you're saying here, it's hard if not impossible to move on emotionally when you're always medicated, even if it's just what the doctor's rx'ing that you're taking.

Of course the problem is every time I really feel over this girl she'll call me so I've never gotten the proper distance and closure (she's an ex H addict and recently found out she has hep c and is going through treatment, we've remained closer due to this unfortunate situation), and of course I haven't gotten completely sober either..

Anyway, back to the subject of pod tapering, I really didn't want to taper off of my small daily dose but the things are just too fucking expensive right now so I'm slowly decreasing my dose out of necessity, I refuse to pay that much for pods, for the price they're charging these days it'd be almost cheaper to go on subs even with my small habit. Hopefully my habit won't require a sub rx since it's not that big, only problem is I haven't taken a real break in over a year. I also have about 50mgs of Subutex that I can use if I need it.

Best of luck to all you guys getting off opiates! I think the only real deciding factor in successfully abstaining is how bad you want it. If you want off the opies bad enough you'll do it. Personally I'm on the fence and just tapering out of necessity.

 

[panic in paradise]

Panic, I am listening to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYypmgIYOVQ&feature=youtube_gdata now. It is beautiful and I have been smiling from the first note. It gives me such a warm feeling...no tens unit needed. Thanks!

Sorry about your bad trip to the hospital. Trained in medical school? Are you a physician?

awesome, My Heart is in the High Land is, equal? *searches to play


heh, yeah the empi is necessary sometimes, but im not putting it on my ribs hah.
no, i started phlebotomy, and intro classes, then, i had a schizoeffective relapse that lasted 3-4 months. yeah, a seronegative spondoapathy, ankylosing spondylitis, remicaid induced chronic dry pleurisy!!!(FTW) bilateral sacroiliitis, osteoarthritis, leukocytosis, anemia(left a week ago maybe, doubt it) merging back into hypoglycemia(please please no thank you!!) and, yeah yeah yeah damnit. all this became noticed and diagnosed after a horrendous alcohol binge in a post psychotic depressive state. then, the pain came.

i would be in school again, but i cant to get medicaid, and $+ food assistance which is only adds insult to injury, besides the 3000+ a month prescription bill, mostly due to Humira, $1.2k per injection every 10 days... which will be the least amount for the rest of my natural life, specialists, ers, PTs, etc. i would be FUCKED w/o the medicaid. but i have the medicaid for f'n schizoeffective bipolar lol, oh man. what a life.



more music.


now, my focus has been directed firmly towards fashion, corset building, dress making, ill give myself a year or two of practice, then, try and be utterly constructive with all this fucked free time.

physiology, nutrition, and psychology is what is most important to me though. i have to stay fascinated,and learn as much as i can about medicine, and whats going on in there!
those crazy neutrophils and phagos... sighs.
you are eating me alive, stop!
my ligaments are not infection!
8)

 

[Bojangles69]

Its crazy how it appears school triggered your schizoeffective relapse. I remember meeting a fair deal of people in the psychward who were schizoeffective but not having symptoms untill going to or back to school.
I actually think the education has a weird influence on the mind, how its processes information, and ultimately can bring disorders out of hibernation. I know for one thing my panic disorder after speed got exponentially worse in school. I mean one time I was walking up a stair well and out of no wear I was sitting down on the stairs sweating, shaking, couldn't breathe and started getting those white dots in my vision from hyperventilation. Luckily only a week later I had my breakdown and was able to finally get some proper help for it.
I'm so happy today that I can at least go to school now and not worry about panic attacks anymore, but I couldn't imagine the stress you must feel in that type of situation dealing with all those issues.. I can only hope the more you learn about yourself the more you are able to help yourself. And it is SO WEIRD the role that music seems to play in some of our lives on this forum. I actually got my first sequencer about 10 years ago when I was just getting off speed and wanted nothing but to die day after day for many years.

But somehow, I believe through the strength of emotion in music, I was able to continue on breathing.
I'm not sure I mentioned this but because music alone had had such a profound impact on my wellbeing, I wound up doing my thesis on the Mediated Influences of Musical Key on emotion. I realized in some very weird aspect years later, producing music had become such a powerful outlet for me to actually relieve a lot of neurotic stress.
I never produced anything brilliant (some tracks better than others lol) but between all the antianxiety pills I was on at one point I still actually felt like music was stronger than all that crap.
That was also around the same point in my life I wound up taking a classical course and falling in love with classical music. I realized the strong parallel between classical and trance, the overexagerated chords and melodies, the powerful emotive build ups and drops, it was all very much mirroring my own emotions inside and it made me feel human once again.

W/out music and being able to just sit in my studio and vent, I can't say I'd be as stable a person as I am today. And I still have the dream of somehow transfering my emotions to the masses, if even its just 1 song my whole life. At least there would be some kind of inlet into how it feels to be me. Yet at the sametime it feels kinda selfish like "who the hell cares what it feels like to be you?", and that was when I realized music is not about our individual feelings as isolated human beings, its about a universal bond we share through emotion.

No other creature in this planet can experience the same highs and lows that we do, and music is a continual memory of that. As bad as life can sometimes hurt, (the drops) there are also incredibly beautiful moments for all of us to experience (the build) and the break to me just respresents change, or the continual state of evolution we are in.

Thats what makes music universal to me. When we're sad we play the break up songs, and we feel good to know that at one point in life someone was hurting just as much as us. We don't feel their pain through the actual words but the emotions that sang the words, and it makes us feel like theres so much more to life than just our individual lives and realities.

Not everyone is a music nut thats for sure, but after the study I ran on music I DID at least realize there was true universal effects due to key, timing, pitch, and all that stuff. People would come into the room and we'd measure their emotions as sad or angry, we'd play some major keyed fast paced classical music and EVEN IF they weren't fond of it, there moods always increased by the second measure.
So I realized even for people who don't talk about music, they are just as susceptible as us.

Anyway theres a lot of things going on in this thread I wanna address. Especially about the breakup topic because that was actually gonna be my original thesis till it was replaced with music.
But for men especially, drugs are such a trap in the event of a break up just due to how we are socialized.
When we get dumped or dump someone else for w/e reason we can't go to our "boys" and cry on their shoulder quite the same way a woman can.

We are taught that we JUST SHOULD NOT feel certain emotions. Its not attractive for a woman to see a man cry as it sissifies your masculinity and all that bullshit. Its always being signaled to us that we shouldn't behave in certain ways, yet noone ever really explains a logical reason why.
So I believe do to this fact alone, A LOT of men can turn to drugs after their first break up and continue turning to drugs for break ups down the road.

I'm so fucking tempted now to do a second thesis on this because this topic interests me like nothing else. I've seen SO MANY guys bounce back and forth over the years between *relationships and acting healthy and happy* to *breakups and drugs*.

My one buddy has been on oxy for such a large part of his life. But everytime he finds a girl he lowers his use to "hide it" (which is what it would seem like to us but in reality the girl is just subsituting the drug) and the second he breaks up he's back to using extraordinary amounts of oxy.
This is WHY I have realized one cold hard fact about opiates, there is NOTHING in this world as powerful for a breakup than opiates. Alcohol often depresses people further, but opiates literally just cut the emotion off by the neck. This can create HUGE problems down the road if everytime we break up, we are so afraid to show emotions, that we just drown them in drugs.

My first habit ever was triggered by a break up. And oddly enough it was pot. The craziest part is the break up was 100% due to my actions (cheating) and I actually started smoking pot everynight for the first time in my life to get over it.
Its like I first didn't even think I was worthy of a partner, so I cheated to avoid them doing it to me first (when realistically things were going better then they ever had) and then I adopt a drug habit to get over the whole situation.

It allowed years to pass by w/out me ever really needing to deal with the break up. It wasn't till I took my first trip to prison that I was forced to deal not only with the breakup (from being sober again), but doing time as well which kind of trumped everything in my life.

I was sober for about 4 years after that. Guess what happened again?
I met a wonderful girl, than about a year later sabatoged the whole relationship, cheated, and went back to using drugs.

WHAT THE FUCK! At that point in my life was when I realized I was gonna suffer from this issue for life unless I did something about it. So I got into the whole seduction community at that point. And I stayed in it for about 3 years.
I was forced to meet and breakup with so many different women over those years that I finally believe I became desensitized to it.

Its just that I have a very weird concept of love compared to a lot of relationships I see. My idea was to give the woman everything you could, give her the world, life and happiness, emotions, adventure, excitement... to bond on a level you've never bonded with someone before.
And the seduction community basically taught me that the only reason I wanted to do that is because every movie I've ever watched since I was young has adopted that same model of love. But that movies are FAKE, and giving yourself THAT MUCH to one person is often more naaive than anything you can think of.

Life became depressing for a while after I accepted that new belief, that love should be earned just as much as its given, and that just because your with someone doesn't always mean they are deserving of all the love in the world you have to offer. But I also realized how much of a game love really is. Not in a bitter way but more a functional way. You can always deduce a relationship into what the womans getting from the guy and what the guy is specifically getting from the woman.
Like trading sex for resources, trading the trophy image wife for status, trading your husbands sense of humor for the blowjobs you give him (that was unintentionally sexist I should note it could have def been gender balanced better), trading something as simple as time for a pair of ears. Because so much bartering occurs in relationships I've come to believe you need to treat them AS MUCH as a business as you do a social construct of love. If you ever treat it too much like a business you lose the love, if you ever treat it too much like the movies or books you read you lose your mind.

And I havent even started whoring on this topic yet lol. I still wanna make that list for the newguy who came in here but I got somethings to do and I'll be back later to do some more whoring. Take care all!