I don't know if anyone here remembers me but you can look through my submissions history and get an idea. It's not pretty and will take you through a journey of my first time trying heroin to my life quickly falling apart. So take that as a warning it's graphic, I was totally out of my mind, and you may not want to read it depending on where you're at...

This is the first time I have logged into this account in a couple years and I had a bunch of PMs, and people occasionally mention this account in various places on reddit so I'll post a quick update here for anyone who stumbles upon this in the future.

I'm now almost six years clean from all drugs and alcohol and life is good.

It's too difficult for me to go back and even read most of what I originally wrote 7 years ago. Maybe one day I will be able to.

I don't even remember what I said in the first post but I know I can look back objectively and say that things probably weren't as good and 'normal' before I tried heroin that time as I made it seem in that first post. There were certainly warning signs before that with alcohol, weed, and other things that I had issues with substances although I probably couldn't admit it to myself at the time. I would have never tried it if things were truly going well for me. What followed in the later posts with where it took me was very real.

Thanks for everyone who has reached out over the years.

I hope everyone here is able to find recovery and get the help they need.

Last night I relapsed and spent the entire night running from the police. I kept trying to get everything I needed to do my shot, but I was always missing something-- the water, the lighter, the dope. I shared a needle with my ex and realized that I probably just contracted Hep C again after finally making it through the 3-month medication regiment and being declared virus free. I know I got caught on surveillance breaking into a building trying to hide from the police. At some point I realized I didn't know where my 18-month daughter was, and I started to panic. But I couldn't stop trying to get high. Eventually the police caught me, cuffed me, and threw my ass in the back of the patrol car. On the way to the jail, they told me they had taken my daughter and she was being sent to live with a foster family.

Then I woke up. The panic subsided, and I realized my daughter was asleep in the next room. I haven't drank or used in two years. My life is amazing today, and I thank my higher power for the reminders of what is waiting for me out there if I decide to go back.

fuck all the time wasted, fuck waiting in parked cars for the man who said “15 min” 2 hours ago, fuck lying to people you care about, fuck sneaking away to the bathroom all the time to get right, fuck not being able to go to the bathroom, fuck being afraid to check your bank account, fuck a negative bank account, fuck eating unhealthy, fuck all the shitty people you had to deal with, fuck the fixation on a chemical, fuck getting ripped off, fuck getting bunk shit, fuck getting good shit that you won’t get again, fuck spilling or wasting your shit, fuck the panic that sets in when you run out of shit, fuck waking up needing a fix, fuck being absent, fuck canceling plans cause you’re sick, fuck not making plans cause you’re afraid you’ll get sick, fuck losing friends, fuck destroying your sex drive, fuck all the money wasted, fuck not being able to spend money on the things that matter, fuck not being able to buy groceries, fuck not being able to go to the dentist, fuck not being able to fix up your home, fuck not being able to fix your car, fuck not being able to get people nice presents, fuck not caring when someone gets you a nice present, fuck selling things you care about, fuck owing people money, fuck being lazy, fuck neglecting your hobbies, fuck not advancing in or wrecking your career, fuck how others may have looked at you, fuck all the times failing to kick, fuck the sense of failure relapsing, fuck feeling hopeless, fuck suicidal thoughts, fuck the lack of self confidence, fuck worrying about legal troubles, fuck dry skin, fuck feeling bloated, fuck the lack of sleep, fuck being sick, fuck the cold sweats, fuck the chills, fuck runny noses, fuck sneezing fits, fuck restless legs, fuck stomach cramps, fuck puking, fuck diarrhea, fuck headaches, fuck not being able to feel music, fuck not being able to properly grieve, fuck not being able to feel happiness without it, fuck the thousands of other things i’m forgetting to list in this rant.

fuck it all, i’m good without it.

I don’t know about you guys, but when i’ve decided I want some drugs after a long clean stint, I usually go and fucking get it as soon as possible because the craving is so strong. I’ve been clean since January of this year, and today was one of those days that I just couldn’t take it anymore. I hit up my old heroin dealer.

To my dismay, but also secretly to my delight, he responded quickly. We even decided on where to meet. Then it just... didn’t feel right. Of course I still wanted to get high, but I realized, quite suddenly, that i’m really not as powerless as I make myself out to be. I called my dealer and told him to stay home. I’m not coming.

Today was the first time that I’ve called off my own relapse like that. Before, it felt like I did not have a choice once it was decided and put in motion. But today? It was just different. Today I had the power to say no. You wanna know the secret, bud? You always have that power, but sometimes you want to convince yourself you don’t because you want to get high so fucking badly.

Let me tell you what you want more than a temporary fix: a family and friends who truly love you, a decent job, a day spent without thinking about your next high, food to eat, a place to call home. Sometimes you have to lose all of that before you understand what it’s worth.

You will get there. Realize your power.

5 years ago I was homeless shooting up meth and h. Before that I was sellin both, living hotel to hotel but I fell off and started sleeping on the streets. I didn’t care if I was alive or not I even tried to o.d a few times but my tolerance was so high I couldn’t afford it anyway glad I didn’t went to rehab for a month in Seattle 5 years fast forward I got my ged, a welding certificate a good paying welding job which got me my first house, I have a 5 month old girl and can afford to live good I knew I could do it and if I can anyone can. Im not 100% innocent I get my anti anxiety meds but I use them for just that. Once you get clean it’s all uphill from there use your energy you were using to get high to succeed. Hope everyone gets where they wanna be it’s never too late

So I’m 12 days clean today from a 5 year Binge of every opiate/opioid know to man, mostly last 2 years have been H up to 2G a day and Tia up to 10G a day.

So my buddy is a never quitter, and him and I both know it. And it’s cool, he’s made his peace with it. I told him 2 weeks ago that I was quitting and not to message or call me about anything. Well he doesn’t want me to quit because he middle mans for me. I live a couple hours out of the city so I would pick up bulk when I came and he would get 1-2G.

Anyways, long story short. I’m finally feeling better on day 12 so I take a nice morning walk out to the mailbox to get the mail and there is a weird envelope in there with no return address. Inside is a note from him, with a G wrapped up in a dollar. This MF’er.

After staring at the F’n thing on my desk for an hour, knowing how amazing I could feel in 30 seconds. I picked it up and walked slowly to the bathroom, almost to tears I dropped it in the toilet and Flush.......

I am Done!

I preceded to call that M’Fer and told him if he ever did anything like that again I’m putting one between his eyes. And blocked him after.

I feel good, proud. Never in a million years thought I could flush a G. Buts that where that stuff belongs. Keep on keepin on people!

I went into my car to look for a cigarette, and I caught a glimpse under my car seat of a baggie.. Pulled it out, and sure enough if was exactly what I've been trying to avoid.

I flushed it almost instantaneously, because I know if I sat on it I'm sure I would have justified myself to try it.

My heart was racing for a good hour and my palms were so sweaty.

All in all, a little victory for myself.

So, something strange happened today. I got knocked down by a distracted driver. I was laying in the street surrounded by traffic and I felt so calm but so scared at the same time.

I just spent all night in a&e. My ankle is fractured and I have a concussion but other than that, I’m pretty good.

Whilst I was in the ambulance, I was in a lot of pain. They offered me morphine and I declined.

Whilst I was waiting in the hospital, eyes streaming in pain, they offered me pain meds again, I told them no, because I’m 6 months clean from opiates. I got gas and air instead.

When I was discharged from hospital, I was prescribed strong codeine pain medication. I made the decision to stop and tell the doctors again, no. I can’t take these.

2 days ago, I was 6 months clean and today I was hit by a car. I was so fucking strong today, I guess I just want to say, I’m proud of myself.

Her name was Andrea. We met through the chef industry, and she was an incredible chef too. I remember the first time I laid eyes on her; never in my life have I felt that kind of love and passion for another person. Her boyfriend at the time beat the living shit out of here so I beat his skull in and me and Andrea were together from that day forward. She was an incredible archer, and could play the hell out of a viola.

But, she was suicidal from the day we met. She just didn’t want to be a burden to anyone, and no matter what I could say or do, she still wanted out. We started doing 30’s together, then stepped to heroin/fent. I quit Feb 15th, and so did she. Until saturday. She didn’t think her tolerance would have changed so much in 3 months I guess? I’m not sure. All I know is I got to spend four years of my life with a woman I truly loved. And I will stay sober; not just for myself, but for her too.

Ti amo, Andrea. Riposai in pace, e mi mancherai principessa. 🖤

A few weeks ago I celebrated 13 years sober. Some days have been harder than others. Today though my beautiful, smart, addicted, 20 year old daughter died in my arms. She was found unresponsive, and had been down too long, but they tried, so many people doing everything they could to save my little girl. They managed to bring her back for a little while, and for that I'm so grateful, because she got to die surrounded by people who loved her, instead of alone. But I will not use today. Not even just a little to dull the pain. I will face this, and while nothing will ever be the same again, I will not pick up.

This New Years Eve I am alone and kind of sad. 6 months sober, woohoo. Someone I used to get high with hit me up and offered me a free bump, and even in my self pitying depressive mood, I turned it down. I said no to a free hit, and wished him a happy new years and cut off the conversation.

I'm really proud of myself for this, and don't have anyone to share it with.

hope everyone reading this has a great new years

One summer day I walked into a doctor office and got a script for 120x 80mg OxyContin....

At the time I had a wife (my high school sweetheart) and we were getting used to being parents to our son who was 2 years old at the time. I first started doing opiates recreationally when I was 15. Almost 20 years ago. That, along with anything else I could get my hands on. And for a very long time, the bouncing between drugs method to being a highly functional addict worked perfectly. Sure, I had a few instances where I’d get a couple hundred 10mg yellow norcos and binge on them enough to experience some mild withdrawals, but I was always able to be done when I ran out. It was my once or twice a year treat I’d do after the first snow fell onto Detroit. I’d lock myself in a room and play video games.

I would DJ downtown at the clubs throughout my twenties, and got it in pretty hard. Ain’t no party like a Detroit party... It was the rave scene. Which was still going strong in the D back when I was first introduced to it in 2002. I was a kid in a candy store - mixing savage amount of drugs for about 15 years straight. We would always carry this vile filled to the top, containing cocaine, MDMA, 2C-i and ketamine. That vile was what me and my boy (who was my partner in both DJaying and crime) would consider our nightly driver, and we perfected its ratio as if we were working on the cure for fucking cancer. This of course was including whatever other drugs we could get our hands on because after all, there are starving kids in China.

For the longest time in that scene it was all just partying and candyflipping. Hundreds of nitrous tanks, psychedelics, ethenogens, phenethylamines, trimethylamines and girls 😍. Sex drugs and techno. The only thing that was missing in excess were the opiates. Even at the after hours clubs, where anything goes, they still wouldn’t allow open opiate use. I should have taken that as a huge sign. When criminals don’t even tolerate junkies that says a lot.

By the time I was 28 I had made a lot of money dealing drugs, weed and selling thousands of nitrous balloons balloons at parties. We’d take our money and put 20% overhead toward the next party and this went on for years. I would say nitrous oxide was the drug that crossed me over to the dark side. They call it hippy crack for a reason. Despite that, I had my house paid off. Three ridiculously loud vehicles paid off. Campers, boats you name it. I had it all and I completely got away with it too. After one too many binges it was time I hung up my decks and headphones. I squirted one into my wife and I was ready to grow up. I was tapped out.

I’ll admit I wasn’t ready to be a dad. I tried my hardest to be clean. I did it for the first 8 months of his life. But I couldn’t run my medical marijuana business and be a stay at home dad without cocaine. Especially with a 20 year hangover. And cocaine makes people insufferable and sleep deprived. Then the alcohol got bad too. I crashed a couple times and eventually got a DUI.

Being the model addict I was determined to beat the system. “They can’t deny a prescription”, I thought. I was determined to stay fucked up. So in August I see my probation officer with my OxyContin script in hand. And before I show him he says, “You’re done. You passed all your drug tests (phew!) and haven’t been a pain in my ass, so enjoy the rest of your summer”

Sometimes I wonder where I’d be if I just tossed that script away. I certainly wouldn’t be writing this living out of a 2004 beat up Impala. But there’s no going back now. My ex who hilariously decided to become a cop had enough of me once our shared last name made it into the system. I came home one day to a note and my family was gone. Just me and my things.... and 120x 80mg OxyContin....

By the time the bottle was gone I was already lining up my dope. I forgot to mention that I always dabbled with a couple packs here and there throughout my party days. I actually shot dope when I was 16 and my ex wife (who was just my high school sweetheart then) found out and warned me then... “Opiates or me”. In hindsight, I always knew she left because of that script. But I played the victim at the time because you all know what time it was...

Nothing numbs pain like heroin. So instead of doing the right thing, I slept. I had enough money to support that habit for three years. Within a month I got up to 3 grams of tan powder per day. Just snorting it tho... you know... because I didn’t want to be a junkie... lol

My partner in crime and his girl were already one year in. They showed me the ropes and eventually when I lost custody of my son they helped me tie off. To this day I close my eyes and say “mmmm” when I see blood rush back into a syringe. Slowly we melted away from everything we loved. And the dope started getting whiter...

I remember the first time I shot fentanyl. I woke up in a bathtub with eyes staring at me in horror. And the only thing I said was “give me more”. Only my buddy laughed. He’ll always be my evil twin and I’ll always be his. We all got fired from our jobs. I was supporting us all with my harvests until my buddy got his monthly insurance payout check and he’d reciprocate. Eventually we realized (after his girl crashed the car a few times) that we needed to level off. Every boy needs a girl after all.

Enter crack. There’s nothing in the world that will exponentially make you use more dope faster than smoking crack all day. Our daily order became one ball of each. We became fiends. Racing thru the drugs. Accusing each other of stealing our hits. Carpet surfing. My buddy’s girl started tricking behind his back. The spots got darker and grimier. The bandos and traps smelled of death. Sometimes we couldn’t wait til we got home and we’d get stuck in the traps for days. Walk in with cash and walk out with the trauma of seeing someone OD and just get rolled under the floorboards. That was the moment I woke up. This is not me. That was someone’s daughter. Just thrown away like trash.

Didn’t stop me from figuring out what the deep web had to offer though. Finally I could just stay home and never have to see that horrible shit again. I found a vendor that was perfect and for a year I sat in bed shooting pure fentanyl and fishscale. God bless bitcoin and darknetmarkets. I got into all the analogues too. FuFent, BuFent, tried doing 4isoButryl to quit. It made me violently ill. And eventually my vendor hit me up and said he had a line on carfentanil. I told him no way.... at first. Then he assured me it was properly cut.

He sent me a tester. I sorted out a tiny little bump. Understand, by this time I was up to 3 grams of his “pure” (ya right) fentanyl HCL per day. At least that’s what his listing said. When I snorted that CF I fell out for 36 hours. All I remember is a massive tingling sensation cover my body and I was unconscious. Fast forward two months later and I was shooting 50mg of this premixed CF twice per day....

And then the DEA shut down the big three and suddenly he was gone.... Fuck My Life.... So just to let you all know, back then the word carfentanil wasn’t on the news describing imagery like tranquilized elephants. Nobody knew what the fuck it was. Let alone where to get it.... I had to resort to banging 5 grams of street fentanyl per day just to stay well... Finally I realized that this was no longer manageable. It didn’t matter if I grew a forest of weed to sell.

So I started my research and diligently sourced a rapid drug detox center in Royal Oak, MI. They touted a cure that involved putting me under anesthesia and flushing me out with Narcan and vitamins. “You will come out of this feeling like you’re in week 6!!” they said... motherfuckers....

So if you ever want to know what the precipitated withdrawal feels like coming off carfentanil look this place up. I cannot begin to even describe the agony of this experience. I literally have PTSD from it. Not only had these doctors never heard of carfentanil, they just rather assumed I was a stupid junkie who didn’t know what he was on.

I don’t remember this part personally, but they said that when they administered the Narcan I immediately went into a seizure. They administered some kind of sedative to bring me out of that, and when they did they told me I flopped around like a fish unconscious, until I woke up out of the anesthesia and they had to knock me out again. The only thing I remember is having these insane, physically impossible dreams. Like roads swirling around my head and falling thru the middle of them. Molecules of fire being shaved off by swinging pendulums. Just the weirdest craziest imagery I never thought was possible. Withdrawal dreams...

When I awoke I had ataxia. I had shit myself. Pissed myself. And god was electrocuting my soul. The pain was at apex this existence would allow. I managed to roll off the gurney and for some reason just started crawling. The nurses tried stopping me but my fight or flight kicked in. After 18 hours of hell they wheel chaired me to my nurse monitored hotel room where I had my suboxone stash.

That was the height of my addiction leaving that rapid detox. 5 grams of dope, a ball of crack and 5 Xanax bars was my daily purchase. I sold all my cars. Sold my house. Pawned every last one of my things I thought were so important. Went from 215lb to 125lb. I tried intentionally overdosing 3 separate times. But it’s really hard to overdose when you have that kind of tolerance. Water can only hold so much fentanyl, and a needle can only hold so much. Nothing is more disappointing in life than waking up from a suicide attempt. The shame and embarrassment of even trying just eats you up.

I’m not going to bore you with every home detox attempt, treatment center and methadone clinic. Back and fourth from dope to subs. Got up to 225mg methadone. Back to dope. Back to rehab. Back to subs. Back to dope. Rehab. Subs. Dope. Rehabs. Subs. Etc... Six USA treatment centers overall. Years of this. Three years of lowering my tolerance with each treatment. Relapsing when I couldn’t take it anymore. Giving it my all the next time.

Somehow I landed the love of my life during all this. My friends old gal. We went way back. Joked we really should be together. She decides to jump into my situation when I was 125lbs. She literally left the guy she lived with to save my life. I had never felt that before. Being wanted like that. If it weren’t for her I wouldn’t be here. She stood by the last two years. Run my baths and try her little heart out to get me through it. Well over 30 at home detox attempts she’d stand by me for 3-4 days and her heart would sink as she watched me just give up and head to the dope spot. It makes me sick just typing it. I tried kicking her out and ending things many times to rid the guilt of doing this to her. But this little thing wouldn’t give in. So I didn’t either. The only reason I include this is because as cheesy as it sounds, love really is the strongest drug in the world. Don’t worry that’s not the cure tho lol

So at my second to last treatment center out in California I meet this dude. Huge body builder but gentle giant. Sweetest guy I’ve ever met. He starts telling me about this crazy treatment he did down in Mexico that cured him. Naturally I ask, well why the fuck are you here if it cured you? “Well it cured my opIate addiction, but now I’m here for benzos and alcohol”.... lol

I let it stew for a while. I had heard of Ibogaine a long time ago and always thought it was some bullshit junkie myth. Ya like I’m gonna go sit in some tribal ceremony and let a witch doctor heal me with voodoo plants.

Then I hit rock bottom....

Fuck it! I’ve literally tried everything else.

Side note: I just want to add that up until this point I had always been a vehement atheist. I prayed to Sagan and put all my faith into science. But after living in a bathtub for a quarter of the last three years, I was starting to see myself begging god to make this stop more and more.

So I made a deal. If this shit cures my physical addiction, and physiologically repairs all the broken neurons, and rewires all the synapses in my brain like the research says it does, then I will not only believe in god, but I will know that he heard my cries.

So I find this beautiful clinic. At this point mom is paying for me to go because I’m homeless and broke and have absolutely nothing. She shells out the $4500usd bucks, praying for a miracle.

So I feel like a total asshole walking into this resort. I’m used to USA rehabs that are punishment based and have rules and treat you like children. This place was staffed with highly professional on site nurses and doctors catering to you like a baby. Fucking beach view. Personal chef. Netflix/Xbox/PS4. They provide free cigarettes!? Like where the fuck had this rehab been? They can’t find a vein on my body I haven’t destroyed so I have to get a central line put in for my IV saline bags. I was there for 5 days and they kept me well with 725mg of morphine per day. Then they tested my heart with an EKG monitor and I’m cleared for take off.

Suddenly it hits me. What the fuck has happened to my life.... I am in MEXICO 🇲🇽 with a PICC line inserted damn near into my heart, and I’m about to eat 25mg/ kilogram of body weight of pure Ibogaine HCL. Somehow I just knew inside that this was the end. That drugs got me into this mess and drugs will get me out. I mean it’s the perfect ending right?

Well upstairs to my room I go. Test dose. Feel nothing. Hour later. Flood dose 1. Starting to feel shaky. I sneak downstairs and get a few cigarettes in me. And I had to rat on myself because the time I was done I was FUCKED UP. Nurses helped me back to my bed. Scolded me in Spanish and gave me my 2nd flood dose. I’m vibrating now. Vision is barely possible. My body becomes a noodle. My bones are just vibrating. But there was no pain. Nurse comes in again. “Time for next dose”.... “ Are you sure dude? This shits reallly kicking in. “Here swallow. Close your eyes. Listen to your headphones. Flood dose 3 down the hatch.

My body ceased to exist. The vibrations of the universe shook loose every last opiate in my body. I felt like warm cream. I go unconscious. The visions appear. First my fiancé. Just appears out of a black void and looks at me. She starts balling. And then her skin gets older and she starts dying and decaying in my arms.

This goes on and on and on for about an hour and a half. My son. My ex wife. My mom. My dad. My grandma. My friends. Everyone I have ever loved in my life. I watched die in my arms. Which let me tell you is one thing to read in someone else’s story on a screen. But I cannot emphasize the gravity of what this did to me. It was payback for making everyone I have ever loved watch me die in front of them. Finally I understood.

Finally back to reality but suuuuper fucked up. My body is humming so loud I can hear it. Every time I close my eyes I see my son and I start crying. I hadn’t cried like that in almost 20 years. And I couldn’t stop. My eyes just wept for another half hour.

So that’s the subjective trip. But what does Ibogaine really do to the brain? Neuroscientists still don’t know. But they know it works. They know it resets the brain to a pre-addicted state. Research 18-MC and 18-HC and you will see that the scientific community is working on this Ibogaine analog to develop the same effect but without the trip. I have mixed feelings on this. If you ask the people who go through it they will claim god was in that experience. But that’s not good enough for some people. But I was willing to do anything. And I don’t think the god experience should be removed.

Ibogaine worked for me. It has been working for addicts for over 40 years. Maybe longer in tribal communities. Unfortunately, it works so well that rich addicts are using it as a get out of jail free card to just lower their tolerance and go right back out. But it is the miracle cure - just buried in myths, and advocates of suboxone and a bunch of other stuff that never worked for me.

That doesn’t mean Ibogaine should be a last resort. If I did Ibogaine when I first heard about it I would have erased half a decade of hell. So all I want to say to you is that it is the real deal. There are many reputable clinics in Mexico offering this treatment. The one I went to has successfully detoxed over 2,000 patients without a single incident. When I was there I personally witnessed 12 people kick opiates.

The main thing about it though isn’t the fact that it completely erases the acute withdrawals. It’s the fact that after you come out of it, you are you again. Your mental state is clear. You don’t have that cloud of “I’m a piece of shit” following you around. You actually feel excited and happy. No dealing with months of depression. And this place prescribed me Lyrica and sent me home with 3 booster doses of the Ibogaine total alkaloid extract. Which is different from the pure HCL extract you get for the big trip.

So far three weeks later I haven’t even touched my boosters. I walked back across the border on day 2 off opiates. And the day I left I also got to smoke the infamous Bufo Alvarius toad venom, which contains 5-MEO-DMT. I won’t go far into that because that was a very personal experience I got to have. But you can read about those experiences elsewhere. And let me tell you. That was the last puzzle piece in my head that allowed me to let go of all the evil shit I had encountered. I was finally forgiven.

Unfortunately my ex isn’t as forgiving as god... I got some work to do!

Be careful ya’ll. For those that got here, thanks for letting me share. And thank you for helping me stay clean. Love ya reddit.

I just want to say that Ibogaine is the cure for physical addiction / the broken mental state that lingers for months into recovery. Which in many cases is what causes people to relapse within the first 12-18 months of recovery. Ibogaine is a shortcut to the path of recovery that is lifelong. If you go home after this treatment to the same life, with the same environment, same people and seek no after care / support, you will relapse.

Also, thank god we live in a time where suboxone and methadone allow people to have their lives back. Recovery isn’t a competition. I had 8 months clean times thanks to suboxone. But I was still addicted to a legal opioid. I didn’t have a big boy job like others that required me to be well. Being a dope fiend was my job. I recognize that despite losing EVERYTHING, I was very fortunate and lucky all things considered. Unfortunately, to all the methadone/ bupe users inquiring about Ibogaine, you must be ~40-60 days off long acting opioids in order to do this treatment. If you are stable and have your life back then keep tapering down. Do not throw away your recovery to do Ibogaine.

God bless you all and thank you for the kind words and wonderful responses. I know it was a long one, so I am truly touched by the responses 🥰

Today is so special to me. I quit last Sunday cold turkey, finally sucked it up and faced withdrawal head on. But today is extra special because today someone offered me Oxys and I, not even fully through the withdrawal phase and still truly miserable, turned them down.

I actually did it. I chose myself and my future over temporary relief. It doesn't even feel real to me. It seems so silly but for years I've watched people's sobriety journeys with such envy & frustration because I convinced myself I couldn't do it and I would inevitably die this way, but I did it. There's no guarantee that I can keep this up forever or even for another week, but today gave me hope that I might have it in me.

Edit: I was truly not expecting so many responses dude, thank you all so so much for the nice things you guys have been saying, it means alot :) and for everyone who said they've been clean for around the same time as me, I wish you guys luck from the bottom of my heart, we can do this ❤️‍🩹

So, the plug hit me up yesterday saying the percs were in. But whatever, I brushed it off. Then today (my first day back at work) my ex boyfriend (we were in active addiction & living together) hit me up asking if I wanted to go get some.. I have NEVER in my life been so tempted to go and buy pain pills. My mouth started literally watering, and tears filled up my eyes. I was so mad at myself. Because of how badly I wanted some. Not to mention, me and this ex work at the same place. And work was so boring and physically I was so exhausted because I work in a warehouse with no heat/ac and it’s physically so demanding. Today was my first sober day at work in I couldn’t tell you how long… Now I know why I was getting high at work (lol, joking)

BUT I managed to say NO! I didn’t give in! I didn’t cave! I’m still 12 days sober as of 3 pm today!! I just wanted to get it out there because it helps with my cravings.

As cliche as it is, I just need to say that if I can do it, anyone can and I hope you do. Life is amazing right now. I’m married, have kitties, full time job and a couple k in the bank. Still mind blown that I did this.

summer chief enter door cable ad hoc spark attempt violet aware

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

I’m in my final semester of nursing school. Part of our psychiatric clinical rotation was to go to a state addiction treatment center, where we would assess patients in their stages of withdrawal, and give a few presentations while we were there. It was, of course, the same facility I went to while in the grips of IV heroin addiction.

I got to stand up in front of a group of addicts, in the same room I sat in for 21 days in a row, and explain how their addiction works and how to fight it.

I got to tell these people that they needed to give themselves more, because they’re worth more than the life they’ve been living.

I never told them I was a former addict, let alone that I had been a patient there just like them. Although, as I spoke one-on-one with a patient about his plan to taper with subutex, he said, “Wow, you’re really knowledgeable about all this.” And I replied, “Yeah, well, I have...a lot of experience with this subject.” And he just kind of laughed and said, “Got it, you don’t have to say anything else.”

One of the patients I helped admit for alcohol detox wasn’t sure he’d stay the full 21 days. He thought he might just do the detox and leave.

I came up to him at the end of the day and told him, “Hey man, I know you didn’t ask for my opinion. But I really think you should stay the whole time. Give yourself some time to just focus on you and your recovery. Getting some space away from the outside world can make a difference.” And he said he’d think about it.

He was still there when I came back the next week. I told him I’d been thinking about him over the weekend and that I was so proud he’d decided to stay. It felt good. It felt like a small victory, even though I’m sure I wasn’t the deciding factor in all of it. It felt like I made a difference, and paid it forward, just a tiny bit.

I don’t really have any point in writing this other than just to kind of get it out of my head. It was both a surreal and jarring couple weeks. I never thought I’d go back to that rehab, but the circumstances in which I did made it all just feel...I don’t know. I’d like to say it makes me feel as though I’ve come a long way, but I struggle with so much guilt still, that it’s hard to acknowledge it. This experience was humbling though, and reminded me of where I came from.

I graduate from nursing school on May 19th. On May 21st, I’ll have 3 consecutive years clean from opiates. Pretty cool.

That’s all I got. Thanks to anyone who read this.

“I have absolutely no pleasure in the stimulants in which I sometimes so madly indulge. It has not been in the pursuit of pleasure that I have periled life and reputation and reason. It has been the desperate attempt to escape from torturing memories, from a sense of insupportable loneliness and a dread of some strange impending doom.” -Edgar Allan Poe

How true is that, for some of us?

I’m a mess. There was someone there, with Narcan, that left him. Face down on the floor to die. His girlfriend freaked out so they left. Left and didn’t narcan him. Didn’t call 911. Fuck. I’m so crushed. If you’re shooting dope, remember to please start small, you can always do more, never less. OR GET HELP PLEASE. I wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone. They say you can’t get clean for someone else, but that’s shit. I look at my 12 year old and know he is hurting because his dads dead, and it keeps me strong. I’m in the worst pain I’ve ever been in and I’m not running to crush it because I look at that face. I never wanted an afterlife, like I always hoped when you die you die. It’s over. But now I would love to know I will see him again. Please be safe everyone. Heroin never has a happy ending. Like ever. You’re not exempt. He was a lifer. He was the toughest person I’ve ever known and it took him. I fucking hate it. I feel like my heart is being ripped out of my chest. We were together over 12 years. Had lots of spells of sustained sobriety. A lot of real time together, living a great life together. It’s all fucking gone. All of it. My kid doesn’t have someone to cheer him at his football games. I’m just venting and if anyone has any advice on dealing with this and how to not let it destroy me I would love some advice. I’m lost and sad. I have great friends and an enormous community behind me in AA so I’m just leaning on everyone I can. He was a punk rock legend and losing him has hurt the whole city. I hate sharing his death and seeing other people sad about it. Is that normal? Fuck this hurts. Please never do this to your loved ones. Get help if you need it.

UPDATE: His autopsy shows zero opiates and only Carfentanil. It’s 100 times stronger than Fetanyl. If you’re using, please be safe. Get help. It’s out there and it does get better.

Advice?

Never pick up.

We all did.

Shame.

You asked for advice and I don't see many comments answering that.

To live is to suffer. we've forgotten.

Opiates remove that suffering at a cost.

We all know subconsciously that there is a price to pay when we take them.

There will be hell to pay for heaven on earth.

We've all been exploited by the overproduction of opiates false advertisement corrupt capitalistic values and the sales pitch of a pain free life which is the very pinnacle of this decadent utopian paradise we've all been promised.

We were handed the most addictive substance in the world with a perc that looked no different than a multivitamin for pain and ended up at the trap house coping dope after selling your sisters spice girls cd at the pawn shop. Maybe a fake watch or two from your aunt Susie next week. They laughed at you and you still went back the next week.

What lies ahead well..

...what lies ahead is thee most painful weeks and months imaginable few have the displeasure to endure in the human experience on this earth.

Opiate withdrawal.

What helps...hmmm.

Honestly guys or gals it always seemed like nothing helped.

Looking back I think that hopeless desperation alone is enough to drive a sane person absolutely raving stark mad bat shit insane asylum crazy.

However.

Drinking water, mixed with baking soda which only cost a dollar at the store perfect PH balancing antacid effect. A dollar at the store for the same exact thing alka-seltzer is for $60 at that many servings. Especially if your broke.

Eating bread or something to bind the stomach it's not an ulcer it's narcotic bowel syndrome when your that deep addiction. Stomach bubbling like the aquarium at sea world. That takes a good 30 days to start to settle down. Real fun.

Eating healthy fruits,vegtables, vitamin c a B complex also magnesium glycinate for aches and nerve damage as well as sleep and anxiety ginger garlic kale spinach bananas pepto bismuth probiotics tums aloe vera juice

Tylenol alive or Advil with food.

Hot showers. My favorite.

Heating pad.

Cut the comfort meds off asap but Taper slowly.

Boiled eggs oatmeal beans cheap healthy food.

Probably won't feel like eating for a while though.

You will also demolish every toilet bowl unfortunate enough to cross your path. Every 2 hours.

You need to replace those electrolytes and drink a gallon water a day and start small little sips in the beginning.

Oh yeah and TIME.

Time helps.

Time is the only thing that will help.

" They say time supposed to heal ya but I aint done much healing. "

I know Adele but you gotta wait longer. Trust me.

You will only sleep a half hour for a few days then 2 hours the second week then 4 hours a night then 6 hours if your lucky in the second month.

Some random nights you won't sleep at all out of no where you think it's getting better than.. WHAM!

That's why people relapse . This isn't exactly a slow linear progression. This is a confusing up and down painful "at the mercy of the process" type of journey.

You will suffer. It WILL PASS.

You will think 8 days off or 6 weeks off or 4 months off would be a perfect time to use again.

It's not.

But.

It is a sign that your brain is still completely decimated.

No normal person every thought taking H at anytime is or will ever be a good idea.

That's a sick mind that thinks that. Trust me.

I've been plenty sick before my friend. Plenty.

You're healed when the very thought of dope physically makes you ill because of how truly poisonous and vile a sober mind knows it actually is. That's a sign your real brain is working again.

You suffer sweat and fight the devil for your life back. Writhe in agony until one day you wake up so powerful that you don't fight your body to move a finger and take an hour to think about getting out of bed. No. Your body finally listens to your mind because you are healed.

Food taste beyond amazing. You can smell again. Sex is finally enjoyable and WAY MORE ENJOYABLE AGAIN.

In early recovery people would piss me off saying they got better because even 4 months of paws will make you feel like it never ends.

I literally hated people that smiled. I was hatred incarnate.

No soul in my body for a good month after I quit.

But.

You will laugh again and cry.

You will make witty jokes. You will one day wake up not sweating not aching not exhausted from not sleeping not fiending but simply just wake up from your precious beauty sleep and realize how disgusting and embarrassing the old junkie version of you was.

You maintain an attitude of gratitude.

You begin to exercise not for looks..but because your body wants to be challenged naturally again.

You confidently ace an interview with a reputable company.

You take your life and your respect back.

You remember what it was like to suffer and you help those that are still suffering because we all suffer in some degree and to help one another is to make life an experience worth living.

When I first started getting clean, I'd always ask others on here how it's done and just be amazed by then, thinking I'd never see that day. But here I am, feeling great! I've no got connections now, I've cut out lot ofpeople out. Ones that asks me every now and then if I wanted. Even my own sister.... What helped me?... reddit did. People in this sub. I owe a lot to everyone here, more than they k now it. Thank you all!!!

Song lyrics that helps me keep going.... "We dragged ourselves through hell, we'll be damned if we go back" -BMTH

"Hey I'm at day 1 million never thought I'd get here. Life's great now! I won't elaborate on how I got here because that would actually be helpful to you guys so I'll just overstate my accomplishments to collect likes and feel good about myself anyways have a good day oh well just thought I'd say hi and good luck !"

If you come here often you've seen the posts.

My favorite is the same Goddamn Troll post that seemingly appears every other week...and it's goes something like this..

" Hey recovering addict friends! It's little Timothy here just letting you all know I found the biggest bag of powdered dope ever! You know the kind of dope good for sniffing and shooting? Yeah that dope! Anyways 40 days clean here and I flushed it! Took a lot of willpower to do it! Anyways hope I didn't trigger anyone and I'm sure this post benefited no one in any way at all but just figured I'd share"

It's literally the Same.Pointless. Unhelpful. Vapid. Posts.

You guys know what I'm talking about.

You've seen the posts if you visit often.

Visit often huh? Me too.

Why do we all need to visit here often?

It's sickening? Isn't it?

Yeah we may be clean.

A day. A month. An hour. A year.

But we still come back.

Something deep within the very fiber of our being woven deep within the matrix of our DNA is yearning for something.

Our souls ache. Longing deeply inside.

Searching for something we've never had.

That something is closure.

Like a war torn broken solider who has fought to long, killed to many, denied his very morals for the promised glory when all there ever was to be found was blood and endless shame in our conquest for eternal pleasure and refuge from this cold world in a speck of dust called Heroin.

Heroin is an ugly word.

Tell a sober person you have done Her-O-in next time you get the chance.

It's a stark reminder that heroin is a dirty word. It's not dope/smack/diesel.

Percs at 19 years old at a few parties turned into an 11 year battle with opiates with 8 of those years mainly sniffing heroin. Sniffing heroin because I'm a godamn existential yet narsaccistic masochist who kills themselves safely by sniffing not injecting.

Ya know? Because it's safer...

Not.

There is no bottom in heroin. Likewise there is no top.

Interestingly enough with heroin...

It can take you as high as you want and as low as any human can possibly go.

But you don't take heroin. Heroin takes you. Every long term junkie know that this is a real drug. Some claim the king of all drugs. The pacifier for all life's woes.

This drug will skew and offset the default settings of your mind so bad you will think wrong is right and right is wrong by the time it is all over.

Your frontal lobe which controls executive decision making. Your brain stem which controls all involuntary bodily function and your hypothalamus and hippocampus the limbic system so on and so on every other part of the brain is warped fron using this substance.

In lay man's terms.

This drug will fuck your mind up so bad that by the time this Silver Back Guerilla is done anal fucking your skull through your ear... it will turn your little virgin puckered asshole into a loading dock bay for tractor trailers and Boeing 747s.

I'd like to admit that I have been broken too.

I had almost 2 years clean. Again. And relapsed.

That's the cold dirty truth every one.

Recovery isn't all thumbs up and smiley faces.

I relapsed and my wife caught me by putting a GPS tracker on my phone as I'm driving into the hood in a business suit on my way to work.

That's real people.

Not funny. Not cool.

30 years old with a mortgage and the damage from heroin was still fucking with me 2 years clean.

I felt okay in sobreity.

I just never actually felt completely unequivocally ....well.....

Great?

Don't get me wrong.

I had deep moments that felt good. I sure slept good ate good. Got new things.

But then.

Total nunbness.

A void.

.... there was a deep ache like something was missing.

I used for over a decade in my life.

So..

Exercise and walking and a good diet and mediation only goes so far.

Your mind. Our mind is physically damaged. And that's sad.

We need our mind to think.

So...

THINK...

...about that.

So my point of this post with another 96 days in sobriety again is to not turn a short relapse into a full blown nightmare.

I was complacent and still dealing with chronic back pain fron when I began this long journey 11 years ago.

Thought this was behind me like A LOT of One time posters come and claim here but this is truly a life long battle in some form or another.

I mean fucking A guys.

Life could be going good. But as addicts we all have that fuck the world mentality like I can sneak off and change this all right now with a little bit and no One will ever know.

Bullshit man. YOU KNOW. That's the only person that ever mattered.

Look I can blame my abusive criminal and absent father or my just as jaded victimized mother.

But i take responsibility for never loving myself.

And that has lead to more issues that just drugs in general in my life.

Such as trying to please others.

Your boss didn't give you a raise?

Your wife hasn't made love to you passionately in a year?

Fuck it!

Heroin is and has always been there to comfort you and make it all better like God almighty Himself.

.....and when it wears off and you catch cold and your mind is only producing bad thoughts endlessly because you highjacked and overrided the natural reward system the way the real God intended it to be. only then will you really know what a true " Hell on Earth" is like people.

Thanks for letting me share tonight and listening ladies and gentlemen.

I'm here along side all of you...fighting.