• H&R Moderators: VerbalTruist

Been Clean off dope for 3 months

Yea it is a lack of motivation for me, and also nothing in my days triggers any happiness. Like i don't feel any spikes of dopamine or serotonin from normal sober events in my life, unless i'm high. And i know the brain rewires itself but sometimes i'm just like fuck this, i don't want to wait a year before i can achieve slight happiness from sober life again.
It takes time, but you'll heal back up and be happier than you were even before using.
 
It's always been pretty important for me to remember that it didn't take me just one week to make myself this way - utterly dependent on drugs and alcohol, frightened of other humans, ambivalent towards activities of daily living - and, thus, it surely won't take a short time in order to mend things.

I think of the course of my life over the past few years as a sine wave sloping downward. It's reached pretty far the fuck down the Y-axis and expanded over across the X-axis. This first year, for me, will be getting my datapoint back to the actual level line of the X-axis - in other words, back to "zero."

But I don't choose to see that as defeating. If it's going to take me one year to reset to a clean palate, a fresh sheet of paper on which to sketch my new existence, then so be it. Another poster was dead-on when he/she wrote that in the first year you will be experiencing such a flood of emotions. Allow yourself to feel them. Yep, all of them :) I'm in an intense anger spell at the moment and just let it out by shouting in my car. Haven't done that in years, and it felt fucking great.

My point is, to even really experience our basest and most aversive emotions can actually feel good. But it is a process; just as was the process of self-destruction we found ourselves having engaged in all these years.

It helps so much to have people to "suffer with," if that doesn't sound too sadistic. Hell, I'll suffer with ya anyday ;) It'll keep us both green and sober.

Peace&Love

~ Vaya
 
Today was good. checked out a new meeting. I liked it. Yesterday i chaired a meeting :D was exciting!!! i really enjoyed it. I went and skated at this different park today. Getting better ^_^ my hand is fuct up though ahhhhh. i keep falling on my palms :[ they are starting to get real fucking sore :|
 
"it takes time, but you'll heal back up and be happier than you were before using"

come on now, dont set the bar too high..lets be realistic here..this is the same things that the commercial for some addiction center advertise ..one former addict claimed he wakes up every day and feels like 'superman'...umm, NO, that is not realistic for the vast majority of people/addicts..at least not the ones i talk to ..i know people 10 years plus clean that still battle anhedonia and depression but they have good days too..thats the key to remember, there will be bad and good..u gotta find ways to hurry up or make the bad days a little better..

but yes probably the hardest thing to deal with during sobriety is the inability to feel much from regular life events..things that make most people excited or things most people enjoy fall flat to you..very difficult to deal with this problem..
 
Saying that you're happier than you were before you started using is not the same as saying you wake up everyday feeling like 'superman', not in the slightest. In my experience it just means that you no longer wish to go back into the past and be the person that you were before you got addicted, which is an issue that I know a lot of people deal with when they start getting clean. It means that you wouldn't trade off the experience, however negative, because you like yourself better as you are, not as you were at a different time.
 
Anom- i love your thread its before so motivational!!

Vays- Your post really helped me. I am trying so fckn hard but its like Ill do anything to feel normal. Since getting clean nothing seems enjoyable. I have had my mistakes since then but i am teying the best "I" can. I just wish there was a miracle buton to push and make my brain go back to the way it used to be......
 
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batmanplay-well when it coms to most addicts i think they would be overjoyed just to get back to 'normal, ie how they were before they started using..for most its a battle to just feel pleasure and joy again..i was just saying to tell someone they will be happier than they ever were before could be a little misleading..
 
I don't think it's misleading. Actually I think it's encouraging. It's definitely a battle, but if you are battling just to feel normal again then I think you are setting the bar too low.
 
Shit idk if i will ever be normal but i know that i am a lot happier then where i was at. And i can enjoy my old hobbies. So thats no big. I went to the skatepark today with my new board. Tore those rails up :p Man i was so beat i was about to leave and like right when i said i was about to leave so much euphoria suddenly hit me and my brain felt like it was getting a massage. Like everything was tingling. It was like a peak to a roll. It was fucking nuts man. It was like how those runners run like 15 miles and then all of a sudden they get this burst of euphoria. It beat any high. It was incredible. Idk if i ever had that before or at least i dont remember... was pretty bizarre. and of course i didnt leave cause it felt so good :p i just wanted it to last forever. hahaha. Man i was drenched of sweat. Was gross. My whole shirt was covered in sweat and my shorts -_- hahahahah.
 
That sounds awesome anomaly, i would like to get to that point. What else were you using man, just dope? The problem with dope is mainly getting addicted and going through withdrawals. As far as quitting i think you will still be able to be a happy person once you are off it, i think the main drugs that mess with your long term euphoria and happiness are the stimulants. Mainly ecstasy , meph, and meth etc. They are a recipe for long term depression as the really fuck up your serotonin / dopamine terminals. That's probably why so many of us can't feel happy even after staying off drugs for a while, i won't give up though.
 
batman-sure, its encouraging and thinking positive is needed BUT what happens when after a year or so of being clean, u still dont feel right?u arent close to being happy or content, you will be thinking that something is wrong..theres a reason many drug counselors hesitate to even mention PAWS to current addicts..they want to encourage the addicts to get clean but also feel they must be honest..im a realist so i think the brutal truth is needed..
 
im still going through that PAWS bullshit -_- but idk. i abused everything and anything. I was addicted to benzos before opiates, then opiates, then extacy, but i was always doing opiates. Opiates with mah benzos, benzos with mah opiates, Opiates and alcohol, pretty much anything + some opis. hahaha. But i rolled every weekend for a long time. lasted up to a year. That shit prolly fried me the most -_- hahahaha. It just takes time. Im not saying im 100% back to myself. Cause i dont even know what that was like. I was 9 years old when i started getting fuct up. Now im 19... so its like wtfffff? Who am i? haha
 
i was a heavy duty IV heroin user for several years. im almost 4 months sober except for taking 2mg suboxone and 1mg clonapin 3x a day. boredom is a sober drug addicts worst enemy... or atleast one of them. i am a guitar teacher and artist. i play guitar and paint while bored or craving the spike. i also meditate also on a daily basis. it helps clear my head of many stresses. use your hobbies and look into binaural beats/meditation... ive found this to be a big help as a nearly hopless junky who used to not know a damn thing aboug coping with feelings.
 
Thanks for the advice. I was never IV. I mean i tried it but it didnt register and i gave up thank god -_- but i think im good.. ive learned a lot of tools in NA to learn how to cope and luckily i havent had a using thought in over a month :) i paintball and skateboard on the side... go to community college. I try and keep pretty busy. Thanks for the post though. & welcome to bluelight! :D Not trying to get too ahead of myself though. I know that anything is possible. Even if i have a using thought or dream. I dont have to act on it ;) i just go with the flow.... Ive grown a lot these past 59 days :D
 
I just feel like 4 months ( for bdip) and 59 days (for you, Anomaly) should be in big bold beautiful color! Congratulations guys. :D <3
 
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