[TRIGGERING CONTENT] The Relapse Part III - I Thought it Was Over

[bennyZA]

Well as many of you know, after going most of the year sober I have recently relapsed. It started pretty harmlessly, I could sleep so someone offered me some sleep pills. Too bad they gave me a bunch, and this cocktail was full of benzos.

When I died for a few minutes and finally regained conscieness, my father said it was the most important moment of his life. Since then I've been mostly clean. A couple times I slipped up and used a stamp of H here, a couple tabs of acid there. In general though, I think my dad is proud of me... Too bad starting with those benzos, I think I've undone everything.

So a couple days after the stupid and ridiculous benzo binge, I did the oxy and the methadone. And now I know for sure, the boy completely gone.

<snip -- this paragraph did not contain a question. Dicksizing drug amounts is against our forum guidelines.>

So... why is this part III. Well, I did my benzo binge bullshit a little over a week ago, I did my oxy binge for 3 days which ended 2 days ago, and.. say what?! I'm drinking now and have no desire to stop. Now why, do you ask, would I drink when alcohol was my 2nd biggest problem and I finished relapsing a few days ago...? It's simple, I'm so pathetic that I thought I'd be able to go to sleep earlier if I drank. Well, that backfire. I'm now writing this at 3:11am.

So what's next for bennyZA, the greatest ZA there is?? I don't know. Can you tell me. I thought things were over, I really did. I thought I'd quickly get shit out of my system and move on... hahahahah The mind of an addict.

I don't know why this is going so far so fast. I think I just don't give a fuck anymore. Honestly, I have no money, I'm as unemployed as you can get. I can barely work, so what does everyone say: disability, go on disability, you get free money! Anyone ever think I don't want to go on disability. I know, for fact, that I'd spend every dime that I could on drugs, but seriously, I'm 26 years old. Yes, I broke my body, there's no job I can get that that meets my needs physically and my meets my need neurologically. If I'm on disability, what am I going to do, huh? Be a productive member of society? I'm just a burden to society .... and boohoo if I die, honestly. I will admit that people will miss me, but they'll get over it.

I really need some help on how to sober up and I need help on how to find a will to live. Does anyone have any advice or suggestions?

 

[T. Calderone]

That was a sad story. I don't know what to say Benny because once you're an addict, it's really hard to use casually. I had a feeling this would happen from your other thread. You got sucked right back in and you have to find a way to put a stop to it. Don't get into this mindset that you can never be a productive member of society. If you really want sobriety, it can happen but you have to keep trying. When you relapse, count your blessings that people in your life still care about what happens to you.

 

[YaBa]

Enough with the self hatred mate. Don't give yourself hard time for this. One year sober is hell of an achievement. Now just stop being _______ and quit everything, take few days off watching tv and feeling bad, blaming yourself, whatever you need to do to get your head straight. And then start again, this time for good.


Not sure what's your mindset now, but even you might see more of those good sides of your substances (since it's usually good those few times before you're in deep shit - again), those same reasons are still there why you originally quit. No matter how distant it might feel now, those reasons are certainly still valid for you and your life. Remember that and don't try to talk yourself into some stupid shit, I can see from your posts you are smarter than that. Take care

 

[bennyZA]

One of the things that really bothers me is that since I did so much shit, I look like shit. I scratched all these holes in my face, I have soars all over my body. Long scratch marks. My nose it totally destroyed and the scabs on the inside not only make it painful to breath, but you can see them. I started growing a beard to cover up a lot of the soars, and that looks terrible. People have been asking me what all this stuff is, what happened.

I'm also not sure what to do tonight. Every night since the first fuck up I've drugged myself to sleep. I was going to try sobriety last night, but I was scared I wouldn't fall asleep so i did something stupid and I drank myself into oblivion, which is a terrible idea and never works. I'm not sure what to do tonight...

I'm also shocked, totally shocked, that I was able to do <a dangerously high amount> of oxycodone in 3 days when my tolerance was very, very, low. Like, 25mg of oxy felt pretty good the first day... That's not okay. I can't believe I couldn't stop. WTF?! I thought I was at least sorta able to control things... HAHAHA

 

[pro re nata]

i think it is good that you are putting these thoughts up and they are all time stamped with all of your current events. do you re-visit your threads? writing thoughts, feelings and actions down is a very helpful practice in recovery. you have some really good material here to help you and if you are not already keep a small mule skin style notebook that you can carry to sketch shit into... powerful material now and then.

looking over these threads and thoughts i think is what you need to do to start and form an outline directed toward a personal recovery plan.

have you looked into state service through DHS that offer vocational rehabilitation? it is free and if your on ssi you most likely will not need to go through the application process. with your ssi there is a specific program called "ticket to work" that you might want to check out. they look at your disabilities and they help you form a realistic plan for a long term job that you can relate to and handle. they also have vocational education programs that can be up to 2 years that the state will pay for and for sure helping if you want to go to college. independence is there long term hope for the people they work with and help.

this could work right along with your recovery plan.

are you hitting up any type of support groups?

it really all does come down to personal discipline of what you want for yourself... if it is not there or truly being worked on it is just bull-shiting yourself along with anyone else that is directly involved with you.

keep communicating with the people that are close to you, it will show them you do want change and need help... . it might be nice to work with them on a plan. relapse is all part of this ride as we all know. it is a constant learning process in controlling addiction. most of us have gone through pretty dark, fucked up times that are full of loss and coated in pain. it is good that you are sharing it and processing it! at some point you need to work on letting it go as it builds that state of hopeless that can just keep pulling you back in to your addiction. for sure it is easy to keep in this set as it seems like there are endless obstacles to figure out, let go of, deal with, to move forward. fuck it you have to do it, you can do it!!

 

[ad lib]

I also feel that it's a good idea for you to utilize the BL blogs Benny to track your progress.

Of course you can seek support here too, but you may want to take a peek at blogs! I personally find writing to be extremely therapeutic and helpful.

 

[stardust.hero]

I'm also not sure what to do tonight. Every night since the first fuck up I've drugged myself to sleep. I was going to try sobriety last night, but I was scared I wouldn't fall asleep so i did something stupid and I drank myself into oblivion, which is a terrible idea and never works. I'm not sure what to do tonight...

Benny, I am a long term suffer of insomnia. It has been going on (on and off) from as early as I can remember. As a child it was hard, very hard but I can't remember how I delt with it. All I remember is it was accompanied by the same panic as I get today.

At times in my life it would disappear, and then others it would show up again. My most recent insomia I believe is due to drug use, possibly post traumatic shock caused by stimulants (Mephedrone) and not being able to fall asleep on those nights.

I turned to many drugs to fall asleep, first alcohol which became a terrible habit--I got to drinking 1 bottle of 13% wine (the highest content I could find), the entire bottle to fall asleep. I chose wine as I could drink as much as I wanted and never spun like I did from hard liquor, the only result of drinking too much wine was passing out (which was what I wanted). The side effects were terrible and I didn't even notice them as they came on. I actually began to believe that my house was infested with black mold and that we had to leave. I believed that the symptoms I was having were due to black mold (I felt as if I was falling backwards at times, shortness of breath, blurred vision to the point of having didiculty seeing especially in brightly lit areas like my job.) Alcohol put me out but also became a very serious problem.

At one point I also used heroin to fall asleep but have tried relentlessly to keep my habit from forming to something more than a 3 day stint. Finally the most recent and most ugly battle I've been involved in is with benzos. I began using etizolam 1mg at night to fall asleep. This lasted for a decent amount of time and things were good, I had no anxiety before bedtime and I was able to fall asleep without a worry every night. All was peachy until one day I decided to take an etizolam before a work interview to calm my nerves. It didn't happen immediatly but I began to use etizolam to mask any anxieties I had. I would take one every morning to avoid the anxiety of going to work, one at 5 to avoid the anxiety of driving home (I have 2 major anxieties--sleep and driving). This turned into me taking them on a schedule of morning,noon,evening, and 2 and night.

When I first started taking etizolam the thought of admitting I took drugs/benzos to a doctor was unimaginable--I would never do that. I would simply get off if I had to. It did not end that way and I had to admit my severe addiction to etizolam to a doctor and be put on a medically supervised benzo taper which I am still battling with.

I can identify so much with and your sleep problem. Do you have a reason you can think of that is currently a cause of this now? I don't particularly have a reason other than that I've always had it even if it was in the back of my head so to speak, and my recent (and by recent I mean in the past 4 years) use of stimulants and bad comedowns that contributed to it for me.

You, just as I have to, must learn to cope with this sleep fear that we have. Because every drug eventually runs out of efficacy and we're stuck with both a sleep disorder and the drugs side-effects.

I would say just stay on here if you can't sleep--that's what I do. Talk to us, try to write a poem (sounds corny but when was the last time you've written a poem?), draw something (how you're feeling, something from you day, your favorite shape (even if it's an imaginary shape), write a blog entry--say how you are feeling, what your plans for the near and also distant future, maybe both, in regards to your sleep issue but also your life in general.

Just chat with us, there is always someone online and we can occupy you all night, I bet by daybreak you will be tired and sleep like a baby until 12 (you'll still have plenty of day left to do things so don't worry about wasting you day) Unless you have work, that could pose an issue.

Thanks for reaching out to us Benny, you need to learn the rules a bit more and follow them but you are a good person, I am happy you are here and reaching out for help. And I agree, enough with the self hatred. You're BennyZA. So quit it .

Sorry for the TL;DR, don't mean to jack your thread either with my past history, I just wanted to let you know we both have many things in common and you aren't alone.

 

[bennyZA]

I've been dealing with insomnia since I was a kid. Really bad insomnia. It doesn't matter how early I wake up, I will fall asleep at 2-3am. Unfortunately, if I don't get enough sleep, go a couple days in a row with less than 4 hours, I will have a seizure, no matter how much medicine I take. So I get really scared. Right now doctors wont prescribe any z-drug cause of my substance abuse issues. During college and during my 20's I would get so messed up I would pass out because of the drugs... which is a pathetic way to fall asleep, and if you think that it's nice you can finally sleep when you start partying... well... self medication is probably the #1 cause of addiction.

After that, I had a script for benzos and I would take them, and I would always drink at least a 1/5th, and I would usually do some dope or oxy.

Now all they will give me is trazadone, and that works well, but only the first time, it doesn't work at all anymore. These days I just go to sleep really, really late and then I force myself to keep sleeping for 8 hours, so if that mean sleeping till 12, so be it.

 

[ad lib]

^ What do they use to manage your seizures? Them denying you benzos when you suffer from seizures doesn't sound ethical.

 

[bennyZA]

I abused the shit out of my benzo's. I voluntarily stopped. I was a zombie. I would always run out and go through benzo withdrawal. I take huge doses of lamictal, keppra, and zonegran. When I mean a couple days with barely any sleep, I mean 5 days at least with 10hr spread over the 5, maybe 15.

I could tell them, and they would be like "yea, sure, take the trazadone. Do you think we're stupid?"

 

[gr33n3y3z]

You seem to want to get better, you have been posting this kind of thread for the past few weeks, I feel for you.
If you don't believe you cant get clean by yourself then it's time to get treatment for your own well being. I'm not saying this to be rude, hell I'm not even talking about a rehab center unless you have absolutely no control. It could be as simple as a Suboxone program. It's time for you to make a change before it's too late.