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Cocaine
Mar 15, 2016 21:42:07 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 15, 2016 21:42:07 GMT -5
Brett, I didn't shoot heroin because I don't like needles, I've learned later I could have snorted the brown stuff or even smoked it. I did meth for a while, it gave me energy, but when I saw what meth did to long time users, I stuck with my bottle. Meth is the most evil drug of them all, glad I have escaped.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 16:17:16 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 16, 2016 16:17:16 GMT -5
It is not only about alcohol, although it is my poison, it is about addiction. Addiction is addiction is addiction, like they say in real estate, location, location, location.
The problem is the need for an escape, and what is it I am escaping from? Not sure, coping with life may be.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 16:36:14 GMT -5
Post by gwampa69 on Mar 16, 2016 16:36:14 GMT -5
Thank goodness Meth wasn't around my area back then either. That is a nasty blitch for sure. I agree. What it all comes down to is addiction and the need for outside influences (i.e, substances, food, cigs, sex, power, money blah blah blah) to help us feel satisfied, at peace, happy, content etc. Its all the same really. Why is being content with ourselves so damn difficult? The million (billion with inflation) dollar question. The answer is different for everyone affected because I think its all wrapped up in our experiences and what we have gone through in life. But it all boils down to one similarity. When addicts find that thing (or things) that do it for them, they will go to the ends of the earth to get more and can only really hope of recovering after that thing, whatever it is, doesn't work for them any longer.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 17:09:14 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 16, 2016 17:09:14 GMT -5
I sometimes feel I am not well equipped to fit in this life, let alone live it. I become bored very easily and want to just disappear from situations with people involved, I always run away when people want to be close to me....leaving them not understanding why.
It has always been like that, boredom....boredom and more boredom, and I live in a fantastic part of the country......I guess when I am depressed no matter how good my environment is I won't feel happy....and when I am happy I can be happy in the gutters.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 17:30:01 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 16, 2016 17:30:01 GMT -5
I turn to drugs and alcohol to cope...
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 17:48:06 GMT -5
via mobile
Post by gwampa69 on Mar 16, 2016 17:48:06 GMT -5
Hey Sam What you're describing sounds a lot like my own experience with depression. No matter how great things around you might be, still unhappy. Alot of people with depression self medicate with drugs and alcohol. I certainly did. When I stopped drinking I no longer had my "medicine" which of course was only exacerbating my depression. In the absence of the booze, my depression lifted to a point. But not all the way. Therapy didn't do much for me but the anti-depressant prescription seemed to help. I've gone for periods of time without taking them. If I get into a funk that lasts longer than what would be considered normal, I resume the medication (under medical supervision of course). That's what has worked for me.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 18:22:43 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 16, 2016 18:22:43 GMT -5
Depression can be and is a cause of alcoholism, it leads to reaching for something like drug and alcohol to get out of the nastiness that depression is. It is a stigma that people refuse to face, nor at times understand. One can be depressed and successful, funny and outgoing, yet suffering from depression (most comedians are depressed). Depression is not well understood.
Doctors are quick to write prescriptions trying to find the right balance, I don't want any of that.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 19:09:14 GMT -5
Post by gwampa69 on Mar 16, 2016 19:09:14 GMT -5
Sam I think you're right about doctors. I also think it goes well beyond overprescribing for things like depression. If there is a malady, we have a pill for it. Of course there are plenty of drugs out there that save lives and provide relief. But sometimes I wonder whether some of the stuff I've been prescribed medicines for could have been treated some other way. When I was in Thailand, my friend over there explained how their medical system works and that it is getting more and more westernized (like much of their culture). In that country, the people view Americans in general as a society of avid pill poppers. She was right about that if you think about it. We tend to love the idea of remedies coming in a pill form.
I resisted medication for my depression for many years. So I get what you are saying. Its not right for everyone. But it was the right decision for me.
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Cocaine
Mar 16, 2016 19:51:00 GMT -5
Post by hourbyhour on Mar 16, 2016 19:51:00 GMT -5
Booze, weed, meth, crack, coke, heroin. . .people always have these viewpoints of some being more dangerous than others. I guess, but I always kind of thought of a drug as a drug with the same rock bottom destination. The only difference is how fast you get there.
I personally never got into the drug scene. The pot thing was not a good enough experience, so I stuck with my pleasurable alcohol :-) But, both during my drinking and non-drinking days, I still had dreams where I was smoking a joint. So, I don't know if simply thinking about something like cocaine is a sign of "not being fully recovered".
I am incredibly bored myself, and was long before I ever started drinking. The booze certainly was a self medication to get through the times. Perhaps I am depressed, although other parts of my life don't seem to indicate such. But, you never know.
Now without my booze, I am getting by, But, I certainly feel like life is no more than killing time while waiting on a casket. And doing things/work is fun only in the sense it gives you something to do to kill time. If you asked me what I do to have fun, my only response is something to kill time.
And I look around at people who never drank at all-and all I am seeing them do are things to kill time like me.
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Cocaine
Mar 17, 2016 0:57:42 GMT -5
Post by Sam on Mar 17, 2016 0:57:42 GMT -5
I don't want to undermine the role that therapists/psychologists play in uncovering the issues that drive some of us alcoholics to drink or users to use. I have seen a psychologist in the past, and was prescribed Prozac and other meds that I did not take and threw away. I have this problem for a lack of better word of not wanting any legal drugs that will mess with my brain..... imagine that!
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Cocaine
Mar 17, 2016 18:22:56 GMT -5
Post by hourbyhour on Mar 17, 2016 18:22:56 GMT -5
I am not pro/against the legal drugs, but I always question their needs with a suspicious eye. One must watch the money trail!
I know many people who are so overmedicated for (IMHO) non-issues.
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Cocaine
Mar 20, 2016 0:31:54 GMT -5
Post by quitat54 on Mar 20, 2016 0:31:54 GMT -5
Hi All
I have always felt depression underlying my need to drink. Feeling of sadness and heaviness as my constant companion. When it got heavy I had to have a drink. I have been surrounded by mental illness in my family - close family. I agree with Sam in principle and don't want to take any medication. In some sick way I think that I am entitled to my sadness. It is a messed up world that we live in so being sad seems perfectly normal. People who go around smiling all the time are deluded or brainwashed or both. However staying depressed takes a toll on a person hence a need for a drink or ten. I have been sober for 7 months now. My son picked up some beer today. I was sitting inside the car while he went to the store. I did not crave it overwhelmingly but there was confusion inside of me and I had to make mental effort to focus on something else. I feared that if I started contemplating alcohol that thought process might take me anywhere. It is, or it has been in the past like driving a car downhill without any breaks. Once I start thinking about, my mind tends to focus on soothing effects of alcohol, on the first few drinks when it really feels good. The consequences are pushed to the side... and "to hell with it" mentality creeps in. It did not happened to me today. I am still sober. I have a constant sense of melancholy as my partner. Sometimes it gets really heavy. But not overwhelmingly so that I cannot function. Anyway, I thought certain affinity with Sam and Brett description...
J
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Cocaine
Mar 20, 2016 7:46:52 GMT -5
Post by yvan on Mar 20, 2016 7:46:52 GMT -5
Hi Sam and everyone. I never wanted to take any medication. I know very well about depression, one of the reasons I drank. I remember PAWS, it was tough sometimes but I knew why I was depressed and that it would pass. Btw Sam, maybe you are experiencing PAWS. I never wanted to feel happy thanks to a tablet. Drinking wasn't a better option, but at least, when I felt crap afterwards, I knew why. I am not drinking anymore, I am just myself. That's what I wanted, being me and know who I am without an escape or a crutch. No stuff in my body to make me another person. I know people who are on anti-depressants, and sleeping tablets for some, but who are they really? Who would they be without? That's what I don't like about the idea of depending on tablets without ever knowing who I am in reality. But if it works for them to feel good, after all, that's what those tablets are for and that's the most important. Many lives have been saved thanks to medication. There are some days, not very often, thanks to a longer time of sobriety, I don't feel myself, a mixture of sadness and emptiness, but there is nothing I can do about it. I have no escape anymore, I just have to accept it. I even don't try to understand why; human feelings, just being a human being and life that is not always heaven on earth. If it is normal to feel good, happy, strong, it's normal to feel sad, low, empty sometimes. I get upset when I see what is going on in the world and all the horrors, I can be very sad and on the top of that, I know people who just don't care about anything, they're always happy, if fact, they are ignorant, selfish and that's affect me as well. Can't help it. Anyway, I am sober with all the emotions I experience every second of the day. If some days I don't feel the way I would like to feel, most of them I do. As long as I don't feel the need to escape my feelings when they are not ok, I am ok. If I started thinking escaping with a drink, remembering the suffering because of it would shake me up enough to know that a bottle would open the gate to a dark future and depression would be part of it. It's good to see you strong J. We learn everyday to become free from alcoholism. It makes us stronger and stronger with time passing. I feel totally free, one day, you'll see, the whole alcohol thing leaves you for good, it's something that you know in your heart. Hi Kim. How are you? I hope you are feeling better and what you are doing is helping you. My thoughts go to you. Have a good day, night, everyone.
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Deleted
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Cocaine
Mar 26, 2016 16:45:01 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Mar 26, 2016 16:45:01 GMT -5
Hey Yvan, Thanks for that post. Always great to hear from you. Its good to know that everyone experiences ups and downs and its just a part of life. You are right that the bottle just opens the gate to a dark future. I was back in that darkness and feel like I have another chance to put it behind me once and for all.
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