My Addiction
In my darkest days, Only then will I see the light. I am up until the sunrise, Howling at the moonlight. Tomorrow may be my last, But will I ever learn? That one day, It may be my turn. I’m stuck, Between two extremes. Confusing reality, and my dreams. Is it the drugs I feel? That false sense of security. My Pride and vanity, Being Blinded by insanity.
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Hopefully, this will help some to understand the benefits of MAT for people who cannot maintain long-term sobriety from heroin, or other types of opiates. Not mentioned is that for low to medium pain levels, buprenorphine is an option for chronic pain patients with tendency's to abuse opiates, or regular pain patients.
The use of opiates by mankind has been a part of civilization for millennia, and for just as long, humankind has dealt with addiction. Opiates come in all different types, but they are all a morphine derivative, coming from the same plant, the opium poppy. The difference between opiates is based on the chemical makeup, and the number of times that morphine has been synthesized. In principal, there is no difference between pharmaceutical grade opiates, and heroin. Because of this, we are seeing an epidemic unlike anything before. To combat this, doctors and scientists have developed a replacement therapy to help adjust users to a life without. What is MAT? Medication assisted treatment is an option for opiate dependent persons, who cannot seem to maintain sobriety longer than a year. You replace your drug of choice (opiate, sometimes alcohol) with a prescription opiate antagonist, which keeps the person from going through withdrawals, and controls the urges and the temptation to use, helping adjust the patient to a “normal” life. After detoxing from opiates, it is recommended that patients engage in replacement therapy to prevent further relapse. Many do not, though, because of lack of access, not enough funds, not educated enough, and preconceived notions about what “drug-free” means. Other research found that the lower the patients perceived relapse tendency, the less likely they are to express interest in MAT (Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 2016). There is also a stigma around medication assisted treatment (MAT) because it consists of replacing one drug, with another. On the surface, it sounds contradictory. How can a person expect to get better, when they are still using a drug? The part people do not seem to understand is that MAT is proven effective to treat heroin and opiate dependency, and addiction. To be successful, however, more than simply replacing one opiate with an opiate antagonist, is needed. For example, my treatment includes twice weekly drug-counselor appointments, and I meet my doctor twice a month to evaluate my progress. I chose to enroll at a suboxone clinic, over methadone, because when I am on suboxone, it blocks all opiate receptors, no matter what dosage I am on, so I could not get high, even if I wanted too. I found out that users of methadone can still get high, compounding the effects, despite it being the most widely used treatment option. Some other common MAT drugs are:
Buprenorphine is the MAT drug of choice in areas where Methadone is not widely available. It is used as a maintenance therapy drug, helping the user to adjust to a “normal’ life, but is less effective than methadone. As stated earlier, however, one cannot get high while taking suboxone because it blocks the receptors, no matter what dose. When taken regularly, it reduces opiate taking behavior (Behavioral sciences & Law, 2011). (There are other options as well, but these are most common in America). Another benefit of replacement therapy for opiate addiction is that it is beneficial to incarcerated users, who without proper treatment either continue use in jail/prison, or quickly relapse after being released. MAT can help reduce recidivism rates for non-violent drug offender, lower mortality rates, and reduce Hep-C infections, per a study in the Behavioral Sciences and Law Journal. It seems that there is a proven, scientific, method to help treat opiate dependent persons, however, the stigma around being on a replacement drug leads many prospective patients to view MAT as an unacceptable option. The AA/NA notion of 100% abstinence limits the acceptance of MAT within the recovery community. In conclusion, the major hurdle to MAT being widely accepted is the attitudes held about addiction, and drug replacement therapy. Many medical professionals with less formal education and training on the subject show they are less supportive of MAT, but with the right training they become less supportive of confrontational techniques, and more towards MAT (Substance Use & misuse, 2012). To break the stigma, we need more MAT patients to voice their progress, and start a dialogue about the benefits for people who want to get off heroin/opiates, but cannot maintain long-term sobriety. Note to reader: Yes, I am a MAT patient, and I am aware that it could give readers the idea that I am biased. I may be biased towards this treatment option, but only because I have experienced the effects. I have tried since 2011 to get off heroin for good. I would stay clean for 9 months, a year, another year, but relapse in between. This led me to MAT as an option. I believe I have been successful because I truly want to be off heroin. I hate what that drug has done to me; the friends I’ve lost, or are imprisoned, the pain and suffering caused to my family, but that was never enough to keep me from using. When I would start to think about it I would become so transfixed that I could not think about anything else. The only way to stop the urge, was to use. Since being on suboxone since August of 2016, I can count on one hand the number of urges I have felt, let alone wanted to use. I started on 8mg, and am now down to 2mg. I will maintain over the summer, and then consider weaning down to a lower dose, and maintain that for another year. What it is allowing me to do is to build healthy habits, and a daily routine that does not involve using. I do not feel high, but I also am not sick, so I am as “normal” as I can be, given my history. When I have some time under my belt off heroin, then I will wean all the way off. It is something I will discuss with my doctors, and I will not make any change to my treatment without first discussing everything with them. Sources: 1. Pecorar0, Anna, Michelle Ma, and George E. Woody. "Science and Practice of Medication Assisted Treatments for Opioid Dependency." Substance Use & Misuse 47 (2012): 1026-040. Informa Health Care, 1 June 2012. Web. 29 June 2017. 2. Gordon, M. S., Kinlock, T. W. and Miller, P. M. (2011), Medication-assisted Treatment Research with Criminal Justice Populations: Challenges of Implementation. Behav. Sci. Law, 29: 829–845. doi:10.1002/bsl.1015 3. Kenney S.R., Bailey G.L., Anderson B.J., Stein M.D. Heroin refusal self-efficacy and preference for medication-assisted treatment after inpatient detoxification. Addictive Behaviors, Volume 73, 2017. 4. Ramsey S.E., Rounsaville D., Hoskinson R., Park T.W., Ames E.G., Neirinckx V.D., Friedmann P. The need for psychosocial interventions to facilitate the transition to extended-release naltrexone (XR-NTX) treatment for opioid dependence: A concise review of the literature. Substance Abuse: Research and Treatment, Volume 10, 2016 Addiction
Stuck, Between two extremes. Confusing reality with my dreams, Is it the drugs I feel? A false sense of security Pride and vanity, Blinded by insanity Some excerpts from my journal from my relapse during 2015 August 30: Waiting on the bath to fill, so I can soak my sore muscles, I have a bunch of research benzos still. I made some yesterday, only to have a microscopic bit fall on my hand. I blacked out and woke up in the ER. Doc said someone found me face down in a ditch, unconscious at 2am. It was a miracle they found me. August 31: Last entry for this journal. Blacked out from benzos the other night, woke up in the hospital with no idea how I got there. Eventually snuck out when the police and doctors stepped out to talk. I ran home 2 miles, 3 weeks after knee surgery. Fuck. My crutches are gone, my body hurts, and I lost some hits of L. Wow. Some excerpts from my journal from my relapse during 2015
July 2015: Bad vibes from the L. I got fucked up, and nearly died last night. I can’t do this anymore. I feel like I am going crazy A poem, written during my comedown: In your darkest days, Only then do you see the light. Up until the sunrise, howling At the moonlight. How long until I learn? One day, it may be my turn. Poem written while under the influence of MDMA: On the grind, All the time, Rolling hard, I’m out of my mind. Sit back, and relax, Rollin zig zags, and Big bags of chronic in my stash. For awhile I was inspired by Hunter S. Thompson, and how his writing reflected his drug fueled mind. Part of me was driven to use again because of these small beliefs I held; Using makes me smarter, less anxious, more care-free, I write better, etc.. Excuses. Just to use again. Lesson from AA
Alcoholics Anonymous, or more commonly known as AA, teaches many important lessons on how to be a decent person, and they are lessons that everyone, regardless of whether you’re an alcoholic/addict, can learn from. These lessons taught in AA will lead to a happy, and purposeful life. Although I do not regularly go to meetings anymore, what I learned in AA is invaluable in my recovery. I’ve said it before, but I firmly believe in each person taking control of their own recovery. What works for me may not work for someone else. With recovery, I have found it helpful to take a little bit of everything from what I learn and create my own. It is a lifestyle I live. After looking through my notes from the meetings I went to in 2016, I compiled the most common, yet important, themes that can help anyone.
I have two more lessons, but some people may perceive them as rather hardcore, but even a “normal” person can learn from them. To that I say, it is life or death for many people in recovery.
If I come off extreme it is because my time using, and subsequent recovery, have made it that way. I must be deadly serious with my recovery, or I may not survive the next OD. So, these are some of the more powerful themes I picked up from my notes from attending meetings in my area. I try to change my meetings up when I do go, and not get too comfortable with one group of people. Falling into complacency is dangerous for someone like me, so it is good to avoid falling into habitual patterns. If anyone has any other important themes they learned, feel free to share them with us! I would like to end with a quote I overheard, “things that come easy don’t last, and what lasts does not come easy.” God bless. Thank you for reading. The Complete Serenity Prayer
God, Grant me the serenity, To accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Live 1 day at a time, And accept hardship as a pathway to peace. Taking this sinful world as it is, Not as I would have it. Trusting that You (God) will make all things right If I surrender to your will, So that I may be reasonably happy in this life, And supremely happy with You, forever in the next. Amen. Wow. What a powerful prayer. The first four lines are a mantra I have been telling myself since I first stepped into AA when I was 19. 7 years later and I would say I am doing pretty well for myself. It has been me taking one step forward and two steps back, but I have made progress with MAT and I am hopeful in a successful, relapse free, rest of my life! Before I went to bed last night I checked my Twitter feed and saw that I had some notifications. It made me feel good about myself that I have been recognized for my recovery, it totally fed my ego, and my desires to have people like me. That is when I remembered how seeing those likes and notifications on social media gives me the same reward as, say, a hit of heroin. They are completely different, yes, but the heroin, and seeing the likes, both give me a reward, dopamine. Essentially, the addiction principal is the same whether I am a drug addict, food addict, sex, too much internet, whatever it may be, I am chasing the reward which is a rush of dopamine. I am a deep, philosophical thinker, so topics like addiction which are so broad and difficult to understand, intrigue me. Any thoughts on this?
Somebody recently asked me, as an MAT (Medication assisted treatment) patient, what am I doing that is working? To help break the stigma surrounding suboxone and methadone treatments I have been sharing my story on this blog in hopes that it will help at least 1 person who may be struggling with drug addiction. Suboxone works for me because I have no other options. I went into recovery in 2011 and since then I have relapsed every summer. And as the summer is winding down my drug use usually picks up, and since 2011 I have been hospitalized twice from an overdose, and then I had a gran-mal seizure because I was going through benzodiazepine withdrawal. I have reached the conclusion that I cannot carry on any longer in this cycle of addiction. It is becoming too difficult to pick myself up after I fall. The traditional rehabilitation routes did not work for me. Long-term I was still having trouble maintaining my sobriety. Last summer, after I had been on a three-month bender, it dawned on me that I did not have the energy to detox myself and then go right into my senior year of college. I had put myself in a fucked-up position, but it was becoming a common occurrence, and I needed to break the cycle. That is when I reached out to a methadone and suboxone clinic. I am grateful I chose suboxone after I learned how it affects me differently than methadone. They do the same thing chemically, however with methadone you can also use and compound the high. Suboxone blocks the opiate receptors in your brain so that if I were to use there would be no effect. No opiates can bind to any receptors. Also, the suboxone I take is buprenorphine and naloxone so there is no high associated with it. It keeps me from going through withdrawals, it helps me adjust to a normal lifestyle, and the most important factor is that it severely decreases the amount and strength of urges. Given, now that it is the summer I have been having more urges than normal. To counter this, I initially took an extra 1mg one morning and it helped relieve the anxiety; I am back down again to 2mg. I also have been running nearly every morning. The exercise has helped incredibly. It is an outlet for me to release my energy. Energy that otherwise would be fueling the ruminating thought cycle that precedes a relapse. This is where I have noticed a difference. Running has helped me to channel the energy it takes to think about using, and focus it into my run. I will begin to think about a time using, and I will feel a shot of dopamine rush through my blood. All my hairs stand on end and I get goosebumps, but I also get an energy boost in my run. I focus that energy and I feel my pace get quicker, my legs move faster, and I get into a zone. It is such a hyper-focus that I get tunnel vision, my peripherals go blurry like I am going through a worm hole. The thought quickly dissipates but the energy boost lasts much longer. It is like I hit the NO2 button, and the last miles of my run feel effortless. Music helps also. When a song comes on that I would listen to when I had been rolling, I get a boost of energy as well. By learning to focus my energy I am breaking my cycle of addiction. My ultimate goal is to create the habit that when I feel an urge to use, instead of ruminating on the thought, or fighting the thoughts, I release that energy through an intense run or workout, or through the work I am doing. Either way I am learning to channel my energy for good.
So, to answer the question of what I am doing that seems to work, meditation and running are the top two. With meditation, it helps me to engage in self-reflection. It also helps with easing my mind. I now have less anxiety and I don’t constantly feel like there is a hamster on a treadmill in my mind. It has also increased my self-awareness and to recognize what is important to me. It may sound crazy but meditating is my medicine these days. If you have a regular practice yourself, you may understand what I mean. If not, I recommend taking time each morning to focus your mind with guided breathing, and try it for a few months before you quit. You may be surprised at the benefits you start to see. Like meditation, running has also helped ease my anxiety, and become an outlet to release energy. I would get so transfixed by the thought of getting high, I was powerless to my desires. Running and meditation help me to direct that energy into healthy outlets. I am amazed at how after 2 or 3 miles, any thoughts about drugs, and the subsequent dopamine shot I feel, gives me an energy boost to run as fast as I can for the last part of the run; which can be close to a mile. It is complete liberation from the body; I do not feel my legs and my movements and breath feel in perfect harmony. Thus, I feel rejuvenated. I feel like I am getting myself back to who I truly am. Before I began using I was a huge athlete playing all sort of sports. My love to be active has returned now, and I enjoy exercise, and playing the sports I used too. I want to thank my current drug counselor for helping make me aware of my energy and how I can use it to my advantage. He studies jiu-jitsu and uses similar techniques himself. Also, I had a woman in my life who introduce me to reiki, which led to my interest in energy and chakras. Before I end the post, I thought of this as I was lying in bed last night: Drug addiction is a two-faced monster. On one face is the beautiful person beneath the disorder, And the other side is the monster itself. Be careful when you stoke the beast, For you might not like her response. God bless. Thank you for reading. It is summer time. And with that comes nice weather, long, hot days, and for a recovering addict it brings with it a host of urges and memories. No matter how long you have been in recovery, you will have to learn to cope with urges and temptations. This time of year though brings back memories of years past. The festivals I'd go to for entire weekends, tubing down the river, hiking in the mountains, and so many other fun things I would do. The most prolific memories though are of using drugs. It is those memories I have to battle to make sure I don't make a mistake, relapse. So I memorialize my feelings in journals and blog posts, and I fight the urges by getting up and going for a run. It works for me and that's all that matters.
I was sitting in church last Sunday, and I had decided to go alone. I didn't know why but I felt a desire to be there at that particular moment. And I am glad I did because I saw they were remembering the life of a girl I had dated after HS, my best friend dated her throughout HS, and she was my senior prom date. It was terribly sad to hear that she died from complications from heroin use. She is leaving behind a daughter who is now an orphan because the father passed years ago from, you guessed it, Heroin OD. And this was a girl who did not even smoke weed until senior year. So I am sitting in the pew with my hand over my eyes thinking of all the people who I have known have lost their life to Heroin. Then I see that the little brother of a buddy of mine also passed away. I do not know details but I do know he was in recovery. I suffer from survivors guilt because of everything that has happened. I feel guilty for introducing H to my friends group. It was not until I brought it around that people started switching from OC to H. I did not care at the time because it was exciting, a new drug that would knock anyone on their ass. I have talked with old friends about this and there response is if I wouldn't have brought it, somebody else would of, so don't beat myself up over something I cannot control. But when you see the destruction the drug has caused in your hometown, no matter what people tell me, I will still have a small amount of guilt. I was really having troubles with a topic for this post as I was brainstorming last night. I decided to take an honest approach. I have been dealing with strong urges to use; something about the summer time brings out the beast in me and if I am not careful my thinking shifts back to a criminal mind state and I tend to relapse shortly after. In AA it is called a case of the "fuck its." I have now had two more old friends die from drug use or complications from IV use, and my first thought is, damn that must've been some good H! How fucked up is that??!! HA. I have some great friends though who can talk me back down from the edge, who will tell me what I need to hear, not what I want to hear. Not sure what the point of this post is other than I needed to get some shit off my chest. I do have people to talk too when I feel anxious or tempted, but I feel a sense of ownership with this blog, and I want to communicate to readers that recovery is for life. You are never "healed," you may be in "remission," but you never fully recover. You learn proactive preventative techniques to help manage emotions and feelings, to regain a sense of control in your life. For me, I meditate, practice yoga, I've began running 2 miles every morning, lift weights, and anything that will break a sweat. I was an athlete before I was an addict, and I am that same person. Playing sports takes me to my childhood, before I saw how fucked up life can get. I also have gotten back into fishing, and golfing. If there was a hero's journey in my story, I am back home and on the path moving forward, and part of my responsibility is to give back what I was given so freely. I hope that something in this post resonates, that there is a better day coming, pain and suffering are not permanent but you have the power to pull yourself up from the depths of darkness and shine light where there was none. God bless. Thank you for reading. What a week. Now that school is over, and I'm in between jobs, I don't have much to do. And for an addict, that is dangerous. I thought of a few tips that I thought I'd share about how to prevent your next relapse.
Thanks for reading. |
AuthorI am a grateful recovering alcoholic and substance abuser. I graduated from CSU with a BA in business, and am now a law student pursuing a career in the legal field. I hope you enjoy my site! Feel free to introduce yourself and share a story with me that I will publish! Archives
July 2020
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