Location, locaton, location.

One of the first things that you learn in recovery is the need to separate yourself physically from your past. Ideally, this would be leaving town and any potential triggers far behind. Obviously, this is not always possible, so, moving one's self to another part of town is generally strongly recommended. This is what we ended up having to do to ensure our success in our recovery. Not only did we physically move, but we made sure that we told no one where we were even moving to, giving no one our new address.

This really did prove to be one of the smartest things that we could have done. The part of the city where we choose to live is not an area where users tended to reside nor even tended to visit. We didn't have to worry about inadvertently coming across someone from our prior life, thus removing any sort of temptation as well. Even though we do have to attend the only methadone clinic in our city, we choose to attend the earliest possible clinic of the day so we see our doctor anywhere from 7am until 8:20am on Tuesdays and Fridays, times when the clinic is exceptionally quiet. Our clinic has a maximum number of patients of 24 and does not see anyone who is IMP - a patient that has missed his normal doctor day - so there tends not to be anyone except the clinic's patients hanging around the clinic at these times. Again, we've managed to eleminate as best as possible the chance of us encountering anyone from our past life.

As we're now going on four and a half years away from this lifestyle, this has also helped with the separation. Doesn't take long for this lot to forget you that's for sure - and thank heavens indeed for this aspect!!! The infrequent times when we have encountered someone from our past, we've done our best to keep any interaction as brief and polite as possible. I'm pretty sure that I am more than strong enough at this stage to resist any sort of temptation, but why bother testing this theory if you don't have to? If it ain't broke...

Sony eReader

For as long as I can remember, I have loved to read. I'll literally read almost anything you put in front of me, and for years I was never without a book within arm's reach. Of course, reading for pleasure was one of the first casualties once my drug dependence became of paramount importance. Not only did I no longer seem to have the time to read, but the cost of books and magazines suddenly seemed prohibitive to me when there were other, better things to invest in.

Although its taken me a bit longer into my recovery than I had anticipated, I have finally returned to reading with the same zest and obsession of days gone by! One of the things that has really helped me has been the eReader which is is a line of e-book readers manufactured by Sony. It uses an electronic paper display. The reader uses an iTunes store-like interface to purchase books from Sony Connect eBook store. It also can display Adobe PDFs, ePub format, personal documents, blogs, RSS newsfeeds, JPEGs and can play MP3 files. It is so portable and light and it now goes with me everywhere. 

Currently, I have about 63 different book titles loaded onto it, although it is able to handle loads and loads more than this amount. Now I can easily juggle reading three separate books at a time, and not have to worry about dragging them all around with me weighing down my purse! I've got a variety of subjects loaded on my eReader currently so I'm never bored. There is always one that will pique my interest. The downside, though, has been my recent lack of sleep as I've been staying up to all hours reading!

If anyone else happens to have one and if you're sufficiently interested in the following titles, you are more than welcome to download one or all of the following. The files are all in zip format and once the file has been uncompressed the book is in PDF form. Even if you don't have an ebook, you can still download any of the files as they can be read directly from your computer. Enjoy...

On Speed: The Many Lives of Amphetamine Nicolas Rasmussen

    *a fascinating history of the use and abuse of amphetamines

Bringing the War Home. The Weather Underground, the Red Army Faction, and Revolutionary Violence in the Sixties and Seventies  Jeremy Varon

    *about the history of the rise and fall of Germanys Red Army Faction and the Baader Meinhof Gang

The Addict - One Patient, One Doctor, One Year  Micheal Stein

    *read the New York Times book review

Isn't it pretty?

The Oxycontin Express

I wish I could remember how I originally found this link, but unfortunately, I can not. If I got it through a fellow blogger's own entry, then please notify me so that I can update this post with all the proper and correct info et al.

The Oxycontin Express

Last night Jim and I watched an absolutely riveting documentary from Current TV's original documentary series Vanguard entitled The Oxycontin Express. From the web site:

"In this Peabody Award-winning edition of Vanguard, correspondent Mariana van Zeller travels to South Florida--the "Colombia of prescription drugs"--to expose a bustling pill pipeline that stretches from the beaches of Ft. Lauderdale to the rolling hills of Appalachia. "The OxyContin Express" features intimate access with pill addicts, prisoners and law enforcement as each struggles with a lethal national epidemic."

If you've got an hour to spare, it is well worth investing this time watching this documentary. Frightening stuff indeed!

Vanguard airs every Wednesday at 10pm on Current TV.  

sickgirl

Most recent pic of myself that I could find. Here I am in all my glory at the ripe young age of 46!! Finally starting to feel comfortable in my own skin once again.

Barely 31, this photo was taken over 15 years ago at my brother's wedding. Hadn't quite gone off the rails yet! Barely seems that long ago. Had confidence to spare way back when...

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DECADE AND A HALF AND SOME ADDICTION ISSUES MAKE!!! INDEED...

10 Things You Should Know About Methadone

Found a great series of articles over at Recovery Helpdesk. It is a truly fantastic bit of reading with loads of realistic and relevant information. If you have time...

The first article of the series is entitled 10 Things You Should Know About Methadone (Number 1)

My Ship Has Arrived!

Well, thank you very much indeed! And what a way to start a long weekend. Have just returned from the regional office as I had been called earlier with the request I come by there at 3pm. Our Regional Manager was in town for a few hours today - he lives in Ottawa and I am in London - and wanted to meet with me. GULP!!!

No bad news, only good. He wanted to personally give me a cheque in the amount of $6600 to cover the cost of our prescriptions over a 22 month period that we had originally come out of pocket. Methadone here costs both of us $300/month so multiplied by 22 equals a whole freaking lot! When we went on WSIB originally the company cancelled our benefit coverage which they so were not supposed to do. By law, an employer must cover their employee for one full year from the date of the accident. Ooops. They didn't. My company went even further and covered the entire period that I was off as a gesture of good faith. Good faith indeed!

Right now we couldn't be happier.

peace, love and happiness...

sickgirl