Is Quitting Heroin As Hard as It Looks?

[eon_blue]

Don't admire us, we did it to ourselves, you should say how stupid we are.

If I felt that way about myself and my addiction, I would have off'ed myself a long time ago.

Anyone that has overcome a disease like addiction, especially one to a drug like heroin, deserves some admiration if you ask me.

 

[Miss Hollywood]

If I felt that way about myself and my addiction, I would have off'ed myself a long time ago.

Anyone that has overcome a disease like addiction, especially one to a drug like heroin, deserves some admiration if you ask me.

My thoughts exactly man.

I kicked it. And it definately was the hardest thing I've ever had to do in my life.

But a lot of the time, you get those ignorant fucks(like my stepfather)that has that "oh, well it can't be THAT bad! life's a bitch! get used to it!" additude and people like that just make me want to stick 20,000 needles of dope in their arms and then lock them in a room so they can see the complete HELL it is to detox off dope.

Before I ever did dope a friend of mine that was an addict described what it was like to detox and I thought to myself "Wow...but, how can something be THAT BAD?"

Well, I found out real quick when I became a junkie.

It's one of those things you have to experience to fully understand, I guess.

Great thread guys!

 

[Carl Landrover]

How many people actually stay clean after that though?


To permanently quit seems to be incredibly fucking difficult.

Saw the thread title and was going to post something similar.

Apparently I've already expressed my opinion close to a year ago.



So, close to a year since I posted that, and hey! Guess what?! STILL IN THE SAME BOAT.

Lots of up and downs the last year, actually had multiple days where I wasn't on heroin or suboxone. STILL trying to get away from heroin though. Struggled with it from my first sniff (though I was already addicted to oxy) 4.5 years ago.

Honestly, I never saw myself using 4+ years after that first time, much less it being an ongoing struggle and battle. I'm getting to a point where if I don't quit, I'm going to have to make some DRAMATIC changes because I've tried to get away a lot and have failed again and again.

I can quit heroin...temporarily. Permanently? Don't know.

 

[Binge Artist]

^Yep, it's a lot harder to STAY clean than to GET clean.

 

[Captain.Heroin]

By the 9 month mark past trying to get clean, roughly 75% of past heroin addicts will relapse.

I somehow managed to land in the 25% of people who are still clean, and I'm at the 16 month mark now.

Kicking heroin is harder than you can perceive from visually watching a movie about heroin addiction.

^Yep, it's a lot harder to STAY clean than to GET clean.

That's the best way to sum it up, well put BA.

 

[Binge Artist]

Meh, IDK. The question is hard to answer.

"Is Quitting Heroin As Hard as It Looks?"

You see someone quit heroin, and they're rolling on the floor in agony. How does that feel? Well...it feels bad enough that THEY'RE ROLLING ON THE FLOOR IN AGONY.

I mean, I know Hollywood sort of does a "different" take on heroin WD's for cinematic effect. And obviously, on intervention TV shows, you see folks with ADDITIONAL mental problems going through WD's and that adds to how bad it looks.

So, yep, I'd say there's only one way a person could ever know the answer to that question, and I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

 

[eon_blue]

By the 9 month mark past trying to get clean, roughly 75% of past heroin addicts will relapse.

I somehow managed to land in the 25% of people who are still clean, and I'm at the 16 month mark now.

Kicking heroin is harder than you can perceive from visually watching a movie about heroin addiction.



That's the best way to sum it up, well put BA.

First time I got clean from heroin, I lasted exactly 9 months...weird.

Few months after that I got clean again and here I am now...10 months later :D

I actually held a bottle of percs today too and put them back where I found them. I never used to be able to do that. I'm still kind of in shock that I didn't take any.

It was like for the first time ever I actually thought the whole process through...how I would hate myself during the high and even more so afterwards. Probably end up using all over again just to deal with the fact. Not worth it one bit....took having to learn that the hard way in the past to realize it though.

 

[Carl Landrover]

By the 9 month mark past trying to get clean, roughly 75% of past heroin addicts will relapse.

I somehow managed to land in the 25% of people who are still clean, and I'm at the 16 month mark now.

Kicking heroin is harder than you can perceive from visually watching a movie about heroin addiction.



That's the best way to sum it up, well put BA.

Congrats man! Are you still on suboxone out of curiousity?

I had just shy of 18 months away from H once. I spent 14 of the months on suboxone, then had 4 where I was clean (occasional low oxycodone use).

Then I relapsed and it led to many, many other relapses. This was close to 2 years ago now.


I think the longest I've had away from dope since then is around 10-12 weeks.

First time I got clean from heroin, I lasted exactly 9 months...weird.

Few months after that I got clean again and here I am now...10 months later :D

I actually held a bottle of percs today too and put them back where I found them. I never used to be able to do that. I'm still kind of in shock that I didn't take any.

It was like for the first time ever I actually thought the whole process through...how I would hate myself during the high and even more so afterwards. Probably end up using all over again just to deal with the fact. Not worth it one bit....took having to learn that the hard way in the past to realize it though.

Congrats man! I remember when you had that lapse 10 months ago. Good to know you were able to clean up

 

[zurichsb]

I used mostly oxycodone when i was an active addict but I also used heroin occasionaly. Opiate withdrawls are a bitch. But going through the withdrawls isnt the hard part. Its STAYING CLEAN after you get off. Thats the real bitch. The physical addiction is much weaker than the mental IMO.

 

[UnpackedMonolith]

I'd say it depends on the individual and where they are in their life when they begin using Heroin. Some people just come across it try it and leave it. Some people, fall in love with it, lose site of anything else and devote their life to the waiting game lol. I swear when your not on H and you have a habit, your just waiting to do more lol.

I snorted H for 9 months, then shot up for about 4 months. When i was snorting it i eventually developed a tolerance and stopped for about 4 or 5 days and expierenced the withdrawals.. i wasn't too bad into it tho, it was like having a REALLY shitty flu for 3 days... in some ways tho i enjoyed the expierence... it felt like a spiritual cleansing of sorts... starting fresh.... when i was shooting i never shot enough to gain a tolerance so i didn't have to get withdrawals from that.

Later I was charged with possession of a controlled substance narcotic and used periodically through out my probation. Later on I got paranoid that i would get caught again and just quit it all together.

For me quitting wasn't hard. I never really got heavily addicted to it so there wasn't a great deal of fear as to facing life without it. I wasn't using it to run away from anything so much as to enhance my mood and it helped with social anxiety ... well cured it... I can't say it was easy for the people i knew that did it tho... they were addicted and quite amazed at how easy it was for me to quit.

Most likely tho no matter who you are, if you decide to make Heroin your friend, it won't want you to leave anytime soon and neither will you. I'd say quitting smoking cigarettes is much harder though. I don't want to quit those, but even if i did, I imagine it will take some effort.

I think technically It's not so much that heroin is hard to quit using as it is more harder for a person to come up with a decent reason as to why they don't want to keep on using it...

It never made me feel how people in the movies look tho, it always gave me energy and made me feel more alive... rarely did make me just not want to move and sit around like a super stoner...