Weekend

So I’ve made it through another weekend without ice. I was worried about Jaz’s party, because I knew there would be drugs around. Also, I couldn’t help thinking about her party last year, when I was still smoking… It’s silly, but I kept remembering what I did on this day last year, how I’d picked up the shards and couldn’t wait to get home, so I puffed in the McDonalds bathroom, and the rush… They were good, real good. I was so high at her party, high and happy, and confident… I was saying the right things. I felt comfortable, and that’s it, isn’t it. Just feeling right and comfortable, and it’s such a relief, and why I’m so drawn to this drug. Afterwards, Jaz told me her friends thought I was a cool chick to party with, and that really is, at the bottom of it all, such a fucking sad thing for me to hear, because that’s not me, it’s the drug, and I truly believe that the real me that I hide with the drug, is not a cool chick to party with.

So that was on my mind when I went this weekend and I felt so…disappointed that I wouldn’t live up to that straight. I’ve been off for 2 weeks now and I still feel awkward and shy and weird – ice seems to do that to me when I use it a lot, somehow it seems to make my personality fade. I feel like I’m less engaged with the world, disconnected maybe, and just hardly here. Geri says it too, that when I’m doing a lot of drugs she’ll talk to me and feel like she’s talking to no one.

Also, I’m still so sleepy, and though her friends are cool, I just couldn’t be fucked , and I felt apathetic, like I’d rather just be home alone. I took half a pill and waited and waited but it didn’t really kick in, and then I convinced Mick that we should go to the city. So we got a taxi, and I did feel bad that I’d left Jaz and her party, because I seem to do that a lot, leave good people to do silly things. And to cut a long story short, the night culminated with me losing $250 playing poker and spending today feeling hungover and anxious and depressed and all those good things.

 

One way to look at stimulant (or other drug) induced sociability is not as a crutch, but rather as being shown that it is possible for you to be sociable. It's generally much harder to pull that off sober, because anxiety will often stand in our way. Or rather, it did for me, and I'm guessing that it is similar with you.

Have you considered seeing a psychologist about this? Even low level anxiety can cause social issues, and can be treated by non-pharmacological means. In my case we used a combination of EMDR along with my being taught a few CBT techniques and a good helping of traditional talk therapy. YMMV, but for me it worked wonders at getting rid of the anxiety which was holding me back socially. I still have some issues with talking to people, but now I'm capable of working on that rather than being paralysed by fear.

 

Yeah, I've also noticed that my personality kinda fades with heavy meth use. I become a lot more introverted and less connected with the world. That "scattered" feeling tends to take over. Congrats for staying off it for two weeks, by the way! You'll probably find that the apathy, anxiety and depression does get better with time.

 

How can you lose at the ca$hino?

I hope a few weeks down the track, it's getting easier.