addicted to Addictions

[obscurelemming]

I'm new here, and this is my first post. I've come to realize that I'm addicted to addictions. let my explain:

It started with self injury, I'd cut, bruise and burn myself (I hvaen't in a year now). I'm covered in scars that I despise now. I hurt myself from 6th grade to last year, eleventh when i became anorexic and addicted to percocet and other over the counter narcotic analgesics (vicaden, darveset, etc) I was receiving them free from friends and I had at least one a day. somedays I would take three or four and I just lost my ability to function. I smoked for a while but quit (woo!) now, I can't stop taking diet pills. they're killing me and I know it. I don't want to die. More than anything I love life, I do, I've just had a rather difficult one(I'm not complaining- I'm an optimist). I was raised Catholic, I love the religion dearly but there's obviously something missing in my life because there always needs to be something. The diet pills I've been taking have been causing my heart to be extremely strange and I've been passing out a lot. I know what I'm doing to myself is awful but if I don't take them after I eat I become phsically ill, and if I don't eat they'll put me in a weight gain hospital. I feel like I'm trapped in a cycle and there's no way out but death that seems a bit more real than it did a few months ago. I'm only eighteen, I need a way to save myself.

[ang3l2004]

Hello I have read your post and you must be going through alot,What has caused you to want to do these drugs and take these pills in the first place have you had it rough?Well I would like to say mabe you should get some help from someone talk to family and friends or come here to vent but you really need to stop doing this.You have the power to control what you do and you know that this is not healthy for you and it is not doing you any good,You said that you pass out and you feel ill that is not very good your only 18 and you have a whole life ahead of you and you say you love life so you should start getting help now you should talk to someone and you know that you need to stop taking these pills,Start slowly but you really need to get yourself straight and im here if you ever need to talk about anything,But since you discovered that this is a problem which it is you need to start fixing it now and you can do anything you set your mind to and you should start by getting help I know this must be hard for you and really tough but you must stop doing this to yourself and take steps to getting better please reply thanks hope everything works out

[wendella]

We all have our story and some are worse than others. I think that growing up in an abusive family is hell or even worse, I've been there. I can tell you that the road you are on is full of dead ends. Jail, institutions, or death. There is help and anonymity.

 

This may sound really corny to you, but I have been there. You can find a 12 step group, there are thousands in the US. Do a websearch. It has been the ONLY thing in my life that made me feel half-way normal. I have been clean for almost 2 years and I don't know how it works, it just does. You don't even have to like it, just go and listen. You won't feel alone anymore.

 

I started taking pills and ended up living in a hotel and doing herion every day. That is something I never said I would do, but I did. I am telling you seek help now, people can help you, if you let them.

 

You are not a bad person just someone who bad things have happened to. You can get better and have a good life. It takes time and willingness.

 

I hope you find help and get out of your bad situation. I wish you the best and give life a chance.

 

Wendella

[obscurelemming]

thank you so much for your reply. congratulations on staying clean for so long!! I really want to just keep thinking that nothing will ever happen to me, but I'm already seeing how easy it is to just go on a downward spiral. I'm so scared of dying. I'll definitely look into the twelve step groups, especially if you say it works. a lot of my family members have been involved in AA and it never really worked for them, so I've always been soemwhat apprehensive about any groups like them. If it's not too personal, how did you deal with withdrawal when you stopped? I'd really like to hear some of your story if you wouldn't mind. thank you for sharing and congratulations again on staying clean!

[wendella]

I am so glad you responded!

 

Well not to be dramatic but it was -

 

I pretty much got to a point where I wasn't getting high anymore, it wasn't working to dull my emotional pain or make me happy. I was just using to not be sick. It is a downward spiral, a dead end and a vicious circle.

 

I wanted to die so bad I wished that i would OD, I didn't have the guts to do it myself, I was afriad to. I had tried to get help at a hospital a few times but they said I would have to go to inpatient treatment. I thought I didn't need that, I wasn't that bad off. While I was crossing my moral boundries to get drugs and money, I would lie to stangers to get "traveling" money to get home, steal, and sleep with people I didn't want to, didn't talk to my family for almost 2 years but I wasn't that bad!! When in fact I was near the end.

 

I am 5'8" and I think I weighed less than 110 lbs. I couldn't even wear a size 4 it was too big. I never ate, heroin was my food, my god, everything I lived for.

 

After Christmas in 2002 I hadn't eaten in a week and I knew I was either going to die shortly, which I wanted, or have to really get some help.

 

I called the hostpital again and the same man i talked to when i had gone before helped me, he told me his story, how in the 70's he was a junkie and how he had been clean like 20 some years. I set up a date to go to treatment and he gave me a number to call. It was do or die.

 

The morning I was suppose to go, even after all that, I almost didn't go. I hesitated and the lady said that they only had one bed left and if I didn't take it now she couldn't get me in for months. (I later found out that they had plenty of beds and were hardly ever full on the women's side) That lie might have saved my life.

 

I got there and I was sick already, I had to wait for 24 hours to get any methadone. What they did was for about 22 days i was on a dose of methadone then they brought the doses slowly down. It still sucked really, really bad and I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, but it wasn't like the "wanting to peel your skin off" sick you get from pain killers and heroin.

 

I finally was clean and it was so hard to face reality. The job of the treatment center is to get the drugs and alcohol out of our bodies and give us the first stone to step on, but I can tell you if a person doesn't do something to ensure their sobriety after treatment it will not work.

 

I thought I was so bad off when I got there, but in my group I heard stories that would make my skin crawl. There was this girl from New York who was like 19 and her older boyfriend would sell her to drug dealers and other guys to get money and heroin. He beat her up all the time he was trash. He ended up ODing in front of her and she came back to Minnesota to get clean. But after all that she wanted to kill herself to go be with a man that abused her like that. There also was this guy that was like 65 he was so sweet and had a daughter that loved him so much. He was a cronic alcoholic, he was so physically sick that he couldn't get out of bed to get cigs and liqour anymore, so his daughter did it for him, he went to the hospital cause his liver and pancreas were deteriorating, but he still wanted to drink, he would die from drinking.

 

It is a disease. Alcoholism and drug addiction has nothing to do with being a bad person or not having morals. I was so ashamed of myself for so long and hated myself for what i did to my life. My body doesn't act the same to drugs and alcohol. Some people can just do them and it doens't effect them. But for me I am wired differently, I want more and more and more. It may take years to get to that point and it may sound crazy to someone who thinks that they can control it still but it always ends up where it is controlling you.

 

I sound like some preacher but I am not religious at all, I do believe that somewhere, something, someone is looking out for me. I couldn't tell you what it was if i tried. I just write this stuff so if I even help one person by telling my story, i reached my goal.

 

So anyway the withdrawl i got help with and then I joined a program. I hated it at first and thought all the people were like a cult, and they thought they were so much better than me. I still hate the program some days but i still go and i feel better after i go, if i let it help me. Someone always says something that i need to hear. If you totally hate it at first go two more times to that one and then try another one, but give it a chance. You may find someone you can help too.

 

My life is not all peaches and cream but at least now I am making it better instead of making it worse and by hearing stories of people who used longer than me I know it can get much worse. If I go back out there i can look forward to living under bridges, getting gang raped, getting beat up, going to jail, going insane, and maybe if i was lucky, dying. Death is the easy way out when a person is an addict, living in the addiction is much much worse.

 

I hope this helps. You can fill that aching empty hole you have inside you, I know what it feels like i've had it there all my life. Find a good sober friend that has been clean for a while and trust her and tell her all your secrets, and then find another sober friend and do the same. Then you can help another woman who may be hurting herself with chemicals. It's the circle of life, they say that no matter how far down the scale we have gone we can always help another by telling our story. You are really not alone and someone, somewhere, knows your pain and can feel ya. For the first time I know I belong.

 

That tiny piece of hope can grow and you can save your life and others lives.

 

I wish you the very best.

 

Wendella

[obscurelemming]

wow. thank you so much for trusting me with your story. it really hit me when you wrote

"It is a disease. Alcoholism and drug addiction has nothing to do with being a bad person or not having morals. I was so ashamed of myself for so long and hated myself for what i did to my life. My body doesn't act the same to drugs and alcohol. Some people can just do them and it doens't effect them. But for me I am wired differently, I want more and more and more. It may take years to get to that point and it may sound crazy to someone who thinks that they can control it still but it always ends up where it is controlling you. "

chemicals play mind games with people. like when I started smoking it was only cloves and only occasionally then I started trading with people and become more of a social smoker and smoking more often then one day I tried to go the whole day without a cigarette and I couldn't. but in the beginning I swore I'd retain my control. It's like you tell yourself, I only need this to get through this or that thenn I'll stop but there's always something different you need it for then you just can't stop. I wonder if it's genetic or something because I know I'm the same way as you. it's just a different chemical response and suddenly it becomes your life.

I have been suicidal before, one time I mixed caffeine pills, painkillers, and chased them with a few shots of tequila and stilll woke up rather sick and surrounded by the evidence. I'm so glad you never overdosed. I still have the urge occasionally, especially when I realize how much control I've lost over my life. you wrote that death is easier for the addict, but life is so much more interesting.

 

hearing your story gave me chills I must admit. I am so terrified of reaching the point where theres nothing but me and whatever chemical I'm abusing at the time. Do you know what caused you to start int he beginning? was it offered to you or did you try it for curiosity's sake? I keep trying to remember my original reason for popping that first (insert pill name here). I told one of my close friends some of what's going on recently and she was kind of shocked but she said she'd do whatever she coudl to help. thank you for your reply and feel free to AIM me; keep in touch.

*hugs*

Jenny

[wendella]

I guess it started when I was like 14. I started drinking a lot and smoking. Then over the years it just got worse. I did the drugs I said I never would. I am glad you got something from my story.

 

I think it might be genetic and circumstantial. Like if you had abuse as a child or stuff like that. They do say if your mom and dad were alcoholics and addicts that you could be too. No one knows for sure. I think the whole reason we drink or use is cause we want to feel good, better or fix what is majorly wrong. Ya know?

 

I started using the bad stuff when I was in a bad relationship and he brought it over once, I tried it and liked it and didn't think of where it would bring me..... I don't blame him, I chose to do it.

 

Thanks for your reply and keep in touch, hugs back.

 

Wendy