I think maybe I've finally had enough.

[motiv311]

Its because they want all the junkies to hurry up and die so they won't have to look at us/them

 

[JessFR]

you need to take drastic steps to get yourself out of this huge mess you've thrown yourself into.... just going on methadone and not being a prostitute isn't going to save you... you need something you can build a life off of, and this is probably gonna have to be your total sobriety .... I can't help but think you are seeing yourself as a "victim" - based on the way your told you stories, and listing specific events in which you were victimized. but i can't help but also think that you did your fair share of harming others. We all have during our addictions at some point. I think a 12 step program could really benefit you , and through that , you will be able to TRULY PUT THIS ALL BEHIND YOU FOR GOOD

I can't say I disagree with you on all those points. I am going to meetings again but it's difficult since I moved out of the city, where I'm living now there are far fewer of them, I am going though.

And I probably do see myself as a victim, to be honest I'm not sure how not too. Really I'd prefer it not be a part of my life anymore at all, but while I don't think about what happened nearly as much as I once did, it's still something I think about daily. Like I said, I don't know how change that.

It's really sad how the gap between private and public is so obvious. If countries are actually concerned with addiction (as both Australia and the U.S. currently claim to be) why does this persist? A documentary or two come out, every magazine and newspaper has at least a headline a week, everyone from politicians to school administrators claim to care and yet there is no money, no innovation, no studies to show what simply does not work with suggestions for replacement. Your example of the line for instance--how hard should that be to observe and change?

Your last sentence today makes me so happy. You are someone on Bluelight that I always look forward to listening to--whether it is in the political forums or any of the drug focus forums. The psychic pain that leads to addiction and then continues to support it is a formidable foe--but it is a part of you and therefore you have power. The hardest part of being human is learning to navigate the self, especially the parts that terrify us. I am old and I still find that I am prey to the traps my mind has made for me since early childhood. But there is progress and it always comes from exploration; exploration that includes reconciliation, righteous anger, forgiveness, reframing, hard questions and harder answers. But that exploration turns out to be one of the more fascinating and rewarding parts of life. We are always looking for the perfect relationship, the person that will understand and love us unconditionally, will see our faults honestly and continue to encourage us to reach beyond them. What if this person were us?

Honestly I think that'll be the last thing I fix if I ever do at all. Loving myself, encouraging myself. Honestly being able to do that is something I truly think I will find even harder than staying off heroin. It's a totally alien mindset to me, I've never had that and it's in total contradiction to everything about how I think.

With the clinics, I find it amazing that they had to hire security guards to handle aggressive patients, and probably all because the staff didn't know how to treat people decently. My private clinic had no security, cause problems were so rare, they were a weekly occupance at the public one I went too. Rather than just treat people better, which cost nothing, they hire security to intervene.

I remember the first day I had at the private clinic, there was a guy getting frustrated about how long the doctot was taking to see him. One of the staff members came to him, treated him respectfully, and asked him to sit down and wait. And he did. In fact, something I quickly noticed. EVERYONE had a high level of respect for the staff. Which is WHY he listened.

At the public clinic I went too, everyone hated the staff. In the same situation, the way the staff would have interacted with this man would have caused him to lose it. Security would have to intervene, he'd be kicked off the program. All this all cause they couldn't just treat people with respect. They think they should be treated respectfully but they don't give it themselves.

It was a very enlightening experience in how to run a clinic and how not too.

 

[Mafioso]

Acceptance comes with understanding. It may be beneficial to try and understand why you did some of the things you did, but it will do you no good to beat yourself up and immobilize yourself with regret. As defined by wiki, "Addiction is a medical condition that is characterized by compulsive engagement in rewarding stimuli, despite adverse consequences. It can be thought of as a disease or biological process leading to such behaviors." Addictive use of psychoactive substances will "rewire" the brain so that the user will start seeking drugs with the same intensity if not greater that it does food or sex. Drugs become essential for survival in the mind of someone who is suffering from addiction. Not to mention all of the mental health issues that come along with drug abuse.

For me, I was clinically insane for a period of time because of drug use. I did some pretty embarrassing and horrible things while I was in that state. The past 3.5 months I've been working on accepting what I had done as a result of my drug use, taking responsibility for my own actions even when I was unaware but also understanding that I did those things because of my drug use. I know I wouldn't have done them if I was in my right mind and that those actions were the result of being sick and unhealthy. Beating ourselves up because of mistakes we made in the past does nothing to improve our character and likely just immobilized us with guilt.

Having a direction and a bigger goal can really help with moving forward. I decided to go back to school and it has given me a direction and helps me feel good about myself as well as push myself to be better.

Self-acceptance and self-love can be very difficult, especially initially, but not impossible. If you had a sister or a best friend go through the things that you went through, would you embrace them or crucify them? Hopefully you would embrace and encourage them, which is what you need to do for yourself. Maybe you've made some serious mistakes and it's likely those mistakes will have an impact on the rest of your life, but they don't need to control the rest of your life. You get to decide if they will make you a better person because of it, or a worse person because of it. Everyone makes mistakes, it's part of learning and life. Admitting your mistakes and accepting them without letting them stop you is what makes us stronger.

Keep up the good work, sounds like you are making a lot of progress.. Don't let things like stupid policies stop you from progressing and becoming a better person. Become the person you want to be, not the person you hate. It's a lot of work, but it's a lot of reward too...

 

[JessFR]

Actually I do have a friend, my best female friend in fact, who has gone through and done almost all the same shit I have. Abuse history, heroin addiction, etc. And yes, I do embrace and encourage them. But, the part of my mind that endlessly puts me down always has the same thing to say. "Well of course you're understanding of them, you did the same bad shit, you just want to be forgiven yourself which is why you're so willing to forgive others, it doesn't mean you actually deserve forgiveness"

The other thing it says is that I've probably done a lot of worse shit than she has in my addiction. In reality I don't actually know that's true, it probably isn't. I don't know about every bad thing she's done, just as she doesn't know about ever bad thing I've done. I'm too ashamed to tell anyone I know who doesn't already know (usually because they were the victim of what I did) what I've done. And so if she's in a similar position she likely wouldn't tell me either.

I don't know how to forgive myself, a big part of my truly doesn't feel like I deserve to be forgiven for the shit I've done to people. I agree that it's not constructive, and I agree I'd be better off if I put it in the past and forgave myself. I just honestly feel like I can't. At best I might be able to accept what i did, try and make amends to whatever small extent I can, but I don't know if I can forgive myself for it. I did some pretty awful things in the peak of my heroin addiction. I hurt a lot of people very badly.

Yes, I was under enormous duress because of the way heroin fucks with your head and the fear of withdrawal, but I still haven't been able to find a way to forgive myself. The victim of my worst actions (my exbf) hasn't forgiven me, nor do I expect him too. so who am I to forgive myself?

The most solice I've been able to get is in knowing that I hurt myself more than anyone. The greatest victim of my actions is me.
But between the emotional issues I had before from before I started using, and the pain of the damage I did to myself, and the pain of the damage I did to others. Well, it can be pretty overwhelming.

I'm trying though, I don't see that I can do much else. Just keep trying, try and not go back to the way I was living, and try and make amends in whatever small ways I can. I try to remind myself when I'm at my most depressed that until I have done everything I can to try and repay the people I stole from, my life isn't mine to end even if I wanted too. I gotta keep going no matter what I want. Especially after coming this far.

 

[BehindtheShadow]

Ahh Jess I tell you its almost like reading my own life story every single time you post - I just wanted to tell you that things do get better!

I know I breached trust with my mom and its years later and I still don't think she trusts me 100% BUT and its a big but we are getting there slowly but surely.

The loving yourself part I find difficult too but I accept myself which is something!

One of the days Ill PM you and give you a bit of my story - you can share yours if you want to and if you don't no sweat

Just know you are NOT alone

 

[herbavore]

Self forgiveness is the hardest thing in the world.

 

[motiv311]

when i get totally sober, I cringe thinking of some of the things I actually did while fucked up on hard drugs.... It makes me sad and literally depressed and often leads to me using again to numb those feelings out

 

[JessFR]

when i get totally sober, I cringe thinking of some of the things I actually did while fucked up on hard drugs.... It makes me sad and literally depressed and often leads to me using again to numb those feelings out

Yeah, that was one of the big reasons along with PAWS and fear of withdrawal and my belief that it was doomed to failure that I went with long term methadone rather than attempting to actually get off everything.

I don't get high off methadone, but it does help keep me from getting too down, which I undoubtably would have otherwise. And yeah, that sadness and pain really makes me wanna use to numb out those feelings.

I haven't come close to listing all the bad shit I've done and all the ways it hurts me. I find nighttime is especially hard. I've always tended to be more depressed at night. And it's been tough since I started doing this. I naturally have serious sleep problems, and between working all day and having a shit before bed my sleep pattern tended to stay very stable. Now that I'm not doing that my sleep pattern is reverting to the way it's been my whole life. Which means I tend to be awake most of the night. And it can be real hard. Trying not to think about what I've lost and how it's my fault.

Methadone isn't perfect, but I truly don't think I had any realistic chance at all at this stage in my life of maintaining sobriety for any real length of time totally off everything. My hope is some point way way way down the track I might be in a place where I can taper off methadone, but that time isn't now nor any time soon.

Before anyone says anything, I wouldn't bother giving suggestions to help with the sleeping thing. My brain doesn't work like most people's in this regard. Sleep problems run in my family and my whole life from even a really little kid I have not been able to maintain a stable sleep pattern for any length of time without drugs. None of the usual suggestions, nor the more exotic ones work. My circadian rhythm simple doesn't work for me the way it does for other people.

I've never been diagnosed but there's a condition called non-24 sleep wake syndrome that perfectly describes the problem I have. It's common in blind people but there's a rare few people who's circadian rythms doesn't work right causing them to experience the same problem sighted. It's thought to be because our brains don't correctly process the light cues that normally synchronize our biological clocks.

Drugs are the only thing that has worked at all for any length of time for me. Keeping a strong routine won't work for me like it would for other people.

 

[Mafioso]

Hey if it keeps you from going back to heroin and helps you get control of your life then methadone is great for the time being. It sounds like you have made some serious progress in your life, that is great.

Addiction is very cyclical.. we have negative feelings so we use drugs which leads to unhealthy/sick behavior which makes us feel bad and so on. It may be hard to fully accept the things you did or forgive yourself, but maybe you can understand on a deeper level what drove you to do those things. The brain of someone with substance use disorder functions drastically different than someone who has never used drugs. I think this is largely why it seems like only other addicts understand the irrational behaviors of addicts.

I think most every addict can relate to some very out of character behavior related to drug use. I have a friend who was locked up twice from robbing one of our mutual friends. He got out the first time and did the same exact thing. Heroin is powerful.

Anyways, I don't think drugs are the only solution for you, although it may seem like it. Keep moving forward, focus on doing things that will make a better tomorrow for yourself. It's a struggle I'm sure.