Hey everyone. I'm new here, and not sure what to write. But, I am dying to talk to people with the same problems as me, well, my boyfriend has the same problems, but I need to talk to somebody who can help me get through this disease I have. It all started like this.. I grew up with a normal family, was never abused, mistreated, or anything like that...got everything i wanted or needed. I had friends in school, was a cheerleader, did well...blah blah blah. Well..in high school i smoked pot with friends but really no biggie... Then just like..about 10 months ago I met my now boyfriend. Im 22 and hes 38. When i met him i didnt know he was into drugs. I soon found out, and didnt understand when he got dope sick, didnt understand his pains, and I became an enabler and co dependent because I was starting to fall in love with him. I gave him money and took him to buy his crack. I dropped him off at his house so he could use, then I would pick him up after. I didn't understand the whole thing. And frankly, I didnt want to. I always told myself, even after finding out he was a user, that i would NEVER touch cocaine. Well...one night like after 3 months of dating...we all went to a party and there was a guy chopping out lines on the kitchen counter. i was in the middle of rolling a joint and my boyfriend did a line. everyone was so up and happy and energetic. i thought hey..ill just do one line..i probably wont like it.. well i did the line, and i liked the feeling it gave me. i smoked the joint with my friends, and we did more lines... well a week passed and i didnt touch the stuff again, until my boyfriend and i came into some money...and we decided to get some powder. well thats pretty much what started it for me. i started selling my stuff and stealing to get money for cocaine. i was in denial. my friends saw i had a problem, and they thought it was bad, even though they themselves had drug issues. well my boyfriend is a crack smoker, and whenever we would get powder he would cook some up to smoke. but i kept saying ill NEVER smoke this shit...just snort it... well it started getting harder for us to score powder in our city, every dealer out there had rock..but no soft.... so one night i got frustrated, and my boyfriend had bought 50 dollars worth of crack..so i smoked it with him... i didnt feel anything! i thought what a waste... well i tried it again a week later...and thats when i felt the intense high..i LOVED it. i was hooked. thats all it took. long story short..i am addicted to crack cocaine (and xanax, but thats another story). i use whenever i have the money to. i cant have 30 dollars in my pocket without wanting some of that stupid shit. its taking over my life. i have done so many things in the past 8 months that i never thought i would do. ive stolen from my mother, emptied her bank account, ive sold all my nice stuff, ive stolen things from the store and sold them to people...my boyfriend does all the same things. i know my first step to getting better is getting away from drug related things and people..including my boyfriend...but i love him and i cant leave him. all my druggie friends i can leave because they arent real friends anyway...they are just my crack smoking partners. but my boyfriend...we've been together almost a year..and we want to get married..i cant leave him. but i just need someone to talk to that is clean and straight..and is willing to give me advice, or maybe talk to me when i feel like going and using. i want my old life back.... i want things the way they were before... i feel that im at rock bottom..
hi Kristine, and welcome to Miracles In Progress. Thanks for sharing your story. Many of us became addicted in a very similar fashion. Our Basic Text says, "In the beginning using was fun. For us, using became a habit, and finally was necessary for survival." (not an exact quote, but close) It's important for you to know that there is a way out. It's called Narcotics Anonymous. The twelve steps. The Fellowship. It's also important for you to know that you can NEVER go back. As a cucumber becomes a pickle and can never be a cucumber again, once addicted, we can never be "normies" again. Addiction is a disease, progressive, incurable, and fatal if not arrested. However, it is a treatable disease. We begin to treat it by not using, just for today and by working the twelve steps of NA.
Find an NA meeting in your area. There is a link to the NA meeting locator in the "sticky's" on this board. Find a sponsor. Read from our literature. Continue to visit here for support and encouragement. Seek guidance and strength from a God of your understanding. You can do this, Kristine. We will help. We do it together, help each other. You will find love and support here. We understand like no one else can. We have valuable experience to offer, WHEN ASKED. So don't be afraid to ask.
Thanks for your honest sharing. Good luck on your journey. Be well.
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"With a sweet tongue of kindness, you can drag an elephant by a hair." ~Persian Proverb
Hi Kristine , Welcome to miracles in progress. Dan put it out there very well. Many addicts started the same way you did. I think you may have a big advantage over many of us. From your post you seem to be very aware of where you are on an emotional and maybe spiritual level. Use those fine qualities to guide you into your first NA meeting. Our thoughts are with you in your recovery. Follow the suggestions Dan outlined. You need never feel this way again.
Welcome home Anthony G
-- Edited by AnthonyG at 09:06, 2008-11-13
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The fundamental delusion of humanity , is to suppose that I am here and you are out there .
Welcome. I want to caution you about your wanting your life back, wanting it like it was before. For two reasons.
One is if you measure your recovery based on that goal, "How much is my life now like it used to be..." you will more than likely be dissappointed. As the saying goes, "You can't go home again..." As addicts we do not handle dissappointment well. Resentement kills us. One of the things you learn in recovery is to take a look at the setup of your life, your expectations for your life and yourself, and see how you are setting yourself up to fail, relapse, NOT get sober. Sobriety is more than just not using. The expectations we carry for ourselves, God and others will always exist. We can't live expectation free. What we can do however is closely examine ourselves, part of our daily moment by moment inventory, and toss out, get rid of, expectations that are unreal and unhealthy. So if you are using "what it used to be like" in any way as a guage to determine the value of your recovery, you are setting yourself up to fail. In recovery you give up trying to change what you can't change, to assume a power you don't have. You don't have the power to make it like it was.
Second and most importantly and why the first point is not a truth that you should then give up or blow your brains out. You need to allow for the reality that it will be BETTER than it ever was. Recovery and sobriety has the potential to create for you a life that far surpasses ANYTHING you ever were before. The idea that I want it like it was is limiting what is in front of you. It can be so much better. Its that "better" that becomes the fuel or drive if you will to stay in the cycle of recovery instead of the cycle of addiction. No it does not happen right away. Early on you do simply have to not use and work your program. And while you never get to a place where you can become complacent about your addiction, you do get to a place where the drive or energy to stay sober becomes the quality life you are living, not the pain you are numbing. Sobriety is that place. Its not being a dry drunk or a user who doesn't use. Its having a life that is worth living and the value of that life drives the lifelong cycle of recovery.
Open yourself up to the very real future that you life will be so much better than your life ever was that you will wonder why you even had the momentary idea that you wanted your old life back.
I hope that makes sense. Recovery is not negative in the sense of doing without something as in our addiction and addictive behavior and that's all it is. It is positive, it is all gain. The gain drawfs the addiction. Again not at first. I understand and I am not dismissing the issues of early recovery, the work that it is, the moment by moment, day by day, reality of recovery. But its more than that. Don't let the "wanting things to be like they were" limit you from experiencing the "more".
Let it ALL go. Surrender. Do the work. Watch in amazement the miracle that is what you and what your life will become.
Thank you all so much for everything. Your words have really opened my eyes. i have located a meeting in my area and im going to attend. what sucks is....my dealer just called me...ugh.. i didnt answer it though. i let it ring and just hoped he didnt call back..he hasnt yet.
the funny thing is, there will be days where i wake up and say "Ok. Today im NOT going to use. There are other things OI'd rather do. I have money, I'll go shopping with friends, or my boyfriend and I will go see a movie", but then..my dealer calls..and gets the idea in my head...and that ends it all for me.
i used to be a strong minded person, now im weak...
but i know that God will guide me through this and I will help myself become a better person!
Ok I know how you feel right now I was at the same point as you. I was more lost than you though. My suggestion is this get to a meeting make 90 meetings in 90 days. find yourself some women and get their phone numbers 1 phone number for each meeting you go to. That is a great suggestion then I will have 90 different people to call upon. Then get a na basic text and read who is an addict for 30 days. Then get a sponsor and call her each and every day like you do the dope man. Get rid of all old playmates,playthings, and playgrounds. Tell boyfriend I am working on a program of recovery you can be around to help the change or get the hell outta my way, cause I love me more than I love you and the dope together. This is how I had to do it with my ex. We see where I am at and where he is not at. He chose the dope over me. I told him to go and marry the dopeman we used and when you get an itch in your pants go ask the dopeman to give you the cure for it, use him not me. I had to get real and honest with a sponsor and that is how I have six months and 1 day right now. I just finished a 1st step the day before my six month anniversary and I feel a sense of relief to see how sick I was and how I am getting some recovery and coming to believe that the program does work. You guys have been yahooed by an naer
"i used to be a strong minded person, now im weak..."
Sorry but no, addiction is not a moral issue anymore than high blood pressure is a moral issue. You are not weak. Being strong minded is not going to stop your addiction any more than being weak minded caused it.
The strongest people you will ever know are addicts. We are controlling, manipulating, know how to get others to do what we want, we can find the resources to buy our drug of choice when it seems like there are absolutely no resources to use. We will walk uphill a mile in the snow in our undies to get and use our substance of choice. We are far from weak.
I encourage you to get to NA or AA and get started on the steps and into the "Big Book" for AA or the NA book. There is a change coming for you and that change starts with accurate information about addiction. You get that information from places like AA, NA, etc.
There is help and you have taken the first and most important step. You have come into the light with the matter.
welcome kristine i to use to be normal when i can't remember but you are here now get to some live meetings get a sponsor and get your life back i will warn you you probably won't be able to save the boyfreind but with freinds like him you don't need any enemies change play grounds and play mates you have to make these changes in order to get what some of us have clean and serene and some sembalance of a normal lifeget a big blue book and get to some meetings please it will change your life
take care and keep coming back it works if you work it rocky
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some of us win some of us lose with god and this program i will be a winner
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