Fool Me Once...

FROM THE JUNKYLIFE ARCHIVES | 2005 07 20

One of the problems of being an addict - one of the very many - is how vulnerable you can become when you are dope sick - that is, in the middle of withdrawal from opiates where your body starts attacking you in a multitude of horrible ways. Under any other circumstance, your thought and decision making process would act so very differently than it does during withdrawal. Being dope sick muddies and clouds your mind no matter how hard you try to overcome this. Things and circumstances that would normally shout out to you to go the other way or scream at you to ignore or whisper to you that if it looks to good to be true then...suddenly disappear from our arsenal of tools we use to get by in the world.

No matter how many times I berate myself over what just happened or scream at the top of my lungs or throw pillows til there are none to throw, nothing can change how much of an idiot I feel like for allowing myself to get taken advantage of by a near complete stranger for no other reason other than how much I've allowed myself to become because of how sick my addiction has made me. As loathsome as this addiction is, there is nothing worse than that feeling of desperation one often feels because of it all.

It was near dawn and I had spent most of the night in a restless sleep. Just before bed, I had made the mistake of recooking some old spoons because we were completely out of everything and wouldn't be able to change this situation until late the next morning at the earliest as we had to wait until approx 4am for Jim's pay to be direct deposited into our bank account. Usually you can manage to get just enough from the old spoons to help with the worst of withdrawal's side effects for a few hours and when you're feeling as bad as this any little bit of relief is more than welcome. I somehow managed to contaminate this shot and as a result within 45 mins I had managed to give myself cotton fever. 

Cotton fever can often feel worse than withdrawal from opiates though it lasts a relatively short time in comparison. Imagine the hottest and most humid day on record except you're not able to take advantage as your body feels like it has been immersed into a deep freeze it is that cold. More often than naught, there will be a bit of a fever but even if there isn't you won't be able to control your body from shivering nor from dripping sweat. Your head feels as if it has grown to be ten times its normal size with a headache to match and if this wasn't enough every single muscle and bone and in fact fiber in your body feels as if it is under attack. These are just a few of the most common side effects of cotton fever but I've found the few times I've gotten it that these are more than enough on their own!

This particular evening my cotton fever thankfully lasted just a bit more than two hours in total so I was greatly relieved. Problem is, it tends to leave your body in a much weakened state once it does disappear and the only way to get rid of it entirely is to sleep the remains of it off. I remember looking at the clock just before 1am and nothing else after this until Jim woke me up around quarter past five in the morning. Now, this time when I woke up I could feel no more side effects of the cotton fever though I definitely felt well and truly dope sick. Now as any junky will tell you, once an addict has managed to fall asleep, the last thing you should do is wake them up unless you've got a bloody amazing reason to do this!

I'd fallen asleep on the sofa and woke fairly quickly after hearing Jim's voice. He was not alone. He quickly explained that he had met this guy at the variety store where he had gone to grab smokes and money from the ATM a few minutes ago. Apparently this guy had lost his keys and was locked out of his apartment until 8 or 9am which was still a few hours away so Jim had invited him to wait at our apartment like the good Samaritan he is. This guy was barely in the door before he was bragging how much he could help me right now with whatever it was that I needed. Nothing at all was a problem and whatever it was that I wanted or needed would be here in no more than twenty minutes.

Right away, I should have been suspicious but any rational thought had quickly been lost to how dreadful my body was currently feeling. Every pore was screaming out for relief of any kind that I eagerly listened to his sales pitch. He certainly knew the various pain pills and their corresponding doses so was able to walk the talk with little effort. Once he had let me know what he could get, I told him what I wanted. I expected that I would give him the appropriate funds before him and Jim left to collect our order.

Now before they left him and Jim continued to carry on a conversation that they'd obviously started earlier though it didn't take me too long to follow along. This guy obviously did blow or crack and it didn't seem to matter how many times Jim attempted to tell him this was not something that we were interested in doing, he didn't seem to care. He kept saying the doing a hit would take the edge of my sickness etc until the pills showed up and wouldn't this be better. Well, yes, obviously this would take the edge off but normally it would never be one of my first, second or even third choices...

Surprise, surprise though. He had to go out to get this crack or blow as he didn't have it on him though he did make sure that he left us with the very distinct impression that he was only grabbing this crack at the same time he'd be grabbing those pills for me cause this guy he was going to see was some sort of one stop shopping kind of drug guy and two birds, one stone etc. Famous last words.

So off Jim and our new friend go jumping into a cab that I had just called for them. Honestly, they're gone no time at all, probably all of a half an hour. When they walk inside the apartment, I can tell by the look on Jim's face that I won't be happy. They're returning with no pills but $135 worth of crack that we have paid for though this guy is holding on to like its his and his alone. Colour me very confused. When I asked him about the pills, he dismissed me with a wave of his hands even after I persisted. I was quickly becoming pretty bitchy and argumentative and was fast losing my patience.

Sarcastically, I asked whether our money paid for this crack and the cab fares. Jim said that it was all of our money and none of his. He started to get self righteous with me saying that I was the one who had said that a hit or two would definitely help by taking the edge off of my dope sickness so why was I so bloody upset.  I also tried to remind him that we had also told him that we were not looking for crack or cocaine and had had no intention of actively going after this and that the only reason we gave him any money at all was that we were supposed to be getting pills at the same time he was getting this. He was very possessive of this bloody crack and no amount of me attempting to explain why I found this whole situation offensive seemed to have any affect. He kept insisting that as soon as I did a few hits I would feel better and that he would be on his way shortly to grab those pills  he had promised. As I could see the direction this was taking, I decided that there was little that we could do except ensure that we got our moneys worth out of this crack we had just paid for.

Shockingly once it was all gone, he was ready to book also and I guess I could not really blame him either. Just as suddenly, he could not find anyone that might have the pills that we needed. Excuse after excuse after excuse followed. I demanded money for the crack that he had smoked but had been bought with our dime as well as money back for the cost of the cabs but nothing. I was not prepared to back down. He said that there was one place he could go to grab pills and of course, he would be using his money to pay for them. Another cabbed called and another crack of dawn trip made with  the guys returning in short order. When they return he hands me a bunch of pills wrapped up in some clear plastic wrap. Once opened I see that they are all garbage and of absolute no use to us. It is as if someone had gone into their medicine cabinet and grabbed whatever over the counter meds were lying around in there.

When I tell him that I don't want them he says that he has to return them to his guy exactly as he got them in order to get the money back. What money, or more appropriately whose money,  did he need to get back? Of course, we had to spend an additional $60 plus the cost of the cab fares for all of this. When I demanded that he pay me the money that he owes us he starts to get all indignant and self righteous like he is the wronged party. I tell him to get out of my apartment and to stop saying that you're going to pay for this or that or whatever else cause I no longer cared. I called him a liar as well as a long list of other colourful not to mention pejorative names. He kept saying more of the same sort of crap that he'd bee spouting for the past hour now, but I did my best to ignore it. He said that I was lucky that he didn't trash my place for the names I was calling but he wouldn't do this as he wasn't going to disrespect me - whatever this means. He challenged me to call the police to charge him with stealing $200 from us as well. finally, he left.

Right now I am angry, upset and frustrated for a number of reasons though mostly I am mad at myself for not putting a stop to this whole fiasco before it even had a chance to start. The writing had been clearly on the wall but I choose to ignore it on the off chance that this one time this guy was actually on the level and could be trusted. When you are dope sick you want to  believe so very badly that this person will actually turn out to be better than advertised and is not simply taking advantage of a situation that has practically been handed to them on a silver platter. 

Junkylife Archives

For the next little while, I am going to post some older entries of mine from a previous blog I had which had been hosted at a domain which, sadly, no longer exists. From July 2005 until approx May 2007, I maintained an online journal titled Why Do Anything When You Can Forget Everything? at www.junkylife.com. Before the domain was kind of unceremoniously shut down, I had managed to post just over 200 entries. While I did manage to get a copy of all of these posts, I haven't been able to figure out how to upload them and add them as part of this blog so from time to time I have entered one of my old posts. I'd like to be able to somehow incorporate these posts with this journal because they cover a part of my past that was particularly dark  and personally frightening which is something that I never want to be cavalier about nor ever forget.  This blog also witnessed my transition out of this near hopeless place as I finally decided to try to get myself help for my opiate addiction. I was able to chronical right from the start my experience with Methadone Maintenance Treatment - MMT - (my first dose was at the end of January 2006).

Monday, Monday

FROM THE JUNKYLIFE ARCHIVES | 2006-01-30

Trying very hard to get through the next two hours of work.  I went to my methadone intake this morning and I get my first dose at 4pm today. Got to love that it is split over the day but I suppose better than waiting until tomorrow. Normally that is the routine but just lucky the way things worked out with me. I am fiending right now because I don''t have anything and I am not usually at work when I am quite this lucid. My dealer got picked up with all of his pills last night although he will be able to pick them up from the police station as soon as he finds his receipt as he is actually prescribed them. Sucks cause he got picked up before he got to my place so I think the rest of you can pretty much fill in the blanks. Grrr. There is someone else that I deal with but she is currently bailing her boyfriend out of jail so I am so stuck here at work with not an option in sight. Three o''clock can not arrive soon enough. My legs are starting to cramp and I am about to get whiney but what''s a girl to do?

I start at 20 - is it mg or ml? - of methadone and increase in units of five twice per week until I have reach a stabilized dose. I think that the last time I was on it I went as high as 90 which seemed to do the trick for me cause I wasn''t using or even thinking of using. So I guess in six or seven weeks I should be drug free except for the methadone if all goes according to plan. The doctor seems quite nice. He gave me this tomb of a book to read on recovery. I think it is like a door prize. I get to keep it just for coming out. Well if this day continues as slow as it is then I may be forced to educate myself!   

And Then...

FROM THE JUNKYLIFE ARCHIVES | 2005-10-06

Well I am at work so I guess that this is something positive. Feel like crap even though I just did a pill. Spent the last of my money until next week on it so am feeling somewhat bittersweet about no longer feeling sick. Always leaves a bit of an aftertaste in my mouth when I use the last of our funds on straightening me out. I was able to reason the expense though in that as we have no real income until my next payday which is still eight days away, that $20 was really not going to benefit us to any great extent. Not as if we could exist for over a week on a $20 budget so figured I might as well be broke a few hours earlier than I was going to be anyway. Pffft...Whatever.

I guess it didn''t help that we had to hand over $1320 for first and last month''s rent on Monday. Obviously had we not have had that expense then things would have been entirely different. I was trying to encourage Jim to go ask for an advance on his pay today but I doubt very much that he will do it. He didn''t seem to be giving me any positive feedback so no hopes up I guess. I could cross my fingers and hope for a miracle but that too would only end up being fruitless. I guess though that I am in a decent enough mood. It is still ridiculously hot and humid in southwestern Ontario, kind of unusual for this time of year. Probably a good thing as I have no idea where my warmer clothes are. Packed most definitely. I did manage to get all of our clothes out so it is just a matter of opening the correct garbage bag!!!

Barrel of a Gun

The summer that my Mom and I ended up having our falling out certainly turned out to be a quite a bit more than a mere convenience for me as it turned out. While there had never been any question that we both had been heading down this path ever since my Dad passed away, I most definitely made the most of the opportunity when it presented itself to me and did nothing much to prevent its derailment. Even though we'd been at odds in the past over issues more serious than the one that I finally used as my excuse to sever our current relationship, by this point it didn't matter. Definitely the proverbial straw for me, as there were a number of very legitimate reasons why we could not, nor should not, continue on with our current relationship as it stood.  

At the same time, I knew that I was also motivated by the fact that there would now be one less potential distraction interfering with my current usage. By this time, I was having a difficult time balancing my active addiction with my work and social responsibilities, my family obligations, as well as dealing with the general day to day mundane stuff one tends to encounter as we drift through our lives . So with that stress gone for the time being, I was able to refocus more of my energies on what was becoming increasingly more and more important, and I don't mean work.

Ironically, about a month or so after my blowup with my Mom, I ended up receiving a temporary layoff  notice from my employer stating that I would be required, immediately, to take a leave from work of between 12 and up to a maximum of 16 weeks. At that time, I had been working for my employer, a software company, for a number of years. By the time I received this notice, our office had been reduced to a staff of just over twenty from a high of near a hundred and fifty employees less than a year prior. Even though I knew I was still a valued employee, I also recognized the financial duress the company was currently experiencing.

Plus, talk about timing. Bloody pathetic on my part, but reality none the less. One less distraction yet again. The writing was so on my wall and yet...

TO BE CONTINUED... 

I WAS WRONG

It would be a full two and a bit years after my Dad's death before my Mom and I would actually have our falling out. Our relationship just seemed to get progressively worse over time. My Mother had always been a bit harsh although often I barely noticed as I had gotten used to her treatment over the years. Usually, it was only after someone else took the time to comment to me about it that I would give any serious thought to what I should do, at least that had been the pattern in the past. Once my Dad passed, I seemed to have become more sensitive to any of her criticisms, and increasingly found it near impossible to stand.

My Mother always seemed to have something to say about my looks, my hair, my clothes, my job, my hobbies, you name it and she could find fault. I never really knew why either, nor could I understand why she always seemed so dissatisfied with me. Growing up I had been a straight A student and had received numerous scholarship offers to university upon graduation from high school. I was never in trouble and even maintained a part time job all through high school so that I could support myself financially. In fact, I was able to buy my first car in cash just after my seventeenth birthday and paid for my entire trip to the British Isles the summer I turned 21.

For the near six months that I drove my Dad to the hospital five days a week, she reminded me each and every day at least three times not to be late, and not in an absent minded sort of way. She was very insistent and quite mean about it too, even though I did not once show up late to pick them up for the hospital. And so on...

Now I can't put all of the blame on my Mom's shoulders for our falling out as I was dealing with some serious issues of my own the summer of 2005. I was easily at the height of my addiction, and I was finding it increasingly difficult trying to conceal it from everyone. No one at home nor work or anywhere knew what I was hiding and this secret was starting to weigh me down. With each passing day, I found it harder and harder to keep all my balls in the air.

By this time, we were spending on average well over $2000/month attempting to support our habit, and by then, this was barely covering its maintenance. Obviously our personal finances were starting to suffer because of the amount we were spending. No amount of additional hours at work seemed to prevent our bills from starting to pile up. My nerves were wearing thin and I was starting to become careless at work. I knew a meltdown was imminent and felt at a loss at being able to prevent it. 

I needed to share my burden with someone and I thought at the time, that my Mother might be the one, but once I had, I quickly realized how desperately wrong I was. Initially, she seemed so very empathetic but this lasted barely 48 hours and then all hell broke loose. It had taken so much to confide everything and she had promised that this would remain between the two of us, but it didn't. Almost instantly she was on the phone to her sister telling her what an awful daughter she had and who knows what else. She actually told me all this the next time we talked. I was shattered. When I asked her why she did exactly what I had asked and she had promised she wouldn't do, she really had no defense.

I remember mumbling something to her during that call that I couldn't do this anymore with her, that I needed to get well and the longer she was around to poison everything, the longer it would end up taking me to get healthy again. I quietly hung up the phone and from that moment on had no communication with her for eighteen months. I didn't look back and in many ways, these eighteen months ended up being some of the happiest and relaxing ones of recent memory. Even though this fracture looked as if it was irreconcilable, in the end, it turned out to be the complete opposite, but another year and a half was to pass before I was able to find out.

TO BE CONTINUED...

Mommy Dearest

Over the years, my Mother and I have had, at best, a somewhat strained relationship, although for the past few years, we somehow were both able to put this to rest and have enjoyed what has very much felt like a normal and healthy one. To say this has been like a breath of fresh air does not even begin to do it any sort of justice. As this was something I had dreamt my entire adult life of having, I was careful to ensure I did nothing to jeopardize it, although I wouldn't have just accepted it without question had I felt that there might be possible negative consequences. In fact, in order to reach the previously unattainable, I had had to completely severe absolutely all ties with my Mom for near two years. Drastic action begets dramatic results it would seem.

Growing up, there was just Dad, Mom, my slightly younger brother and myself. When I was five, my parents decided it was time to leave the land of our birth, Ireland, to try our luck in another country halfway around the world, Canada. While I have some very vivid memories of this time, I certainly was far too young to fully comprehend the drastic, not to mention dramatic, changes occurring within our little family. Immigrating to a new country is daunting enough when one is young, single with their whole life ahead of them, I can't even begin to imagine the stress involved for a couple just a few years away from forty with two small children in tow! Not only this, but they had to do it completely on their own as no one else from either one of their families had done this, nor would anyone ever do it. 

What this meant was that neither my brother or myself had the luxury of being part of an extended family while we grew up. Although we had a total of nineteen cousins, we rarely ever saw any of them as an ocean separated us and still does. While we were fortunate enough to spend many a summer vacation visiting and getting to know them all, it was never quite the same as if we had been able to share our daily life on a regular basis with them. On occasion, I sometimes found myself filled with envy if one of my friends had the opportunity of being able to get particularly close to one of their cousins simply because they could - location...location...location.

Yet, in reality, as I grew up, this was really nothing more than a minor handicap because all in all, I was darn fortunate enough to have a pretty idyllic childhood. My folks were amazing enough and neither myself nor my brother were ever victims of any sort of abusive treatment. We were treated more than fairly, and certainly didn't lack for much of anything growing up. I seemed to naturally gravitate towards my Dad, while my brother seemed to be my Mom's favorite. I most definitely was my Daddy's Little Girl, and I surely managed to stay this way until he passed away in 2003. We shared similar interests and I always found it much easier to confide in him than I had ever found in my Mother.

While she doted on my brother who could do no wrong in her eyes, I struggled to simply get along with her at times. She could be overly harsh and critical of me if allowed, but as long as my Father was alive, it rarely happened. From time to time over the years, I'd find myself worrying what would end up happening to our relationship once my Father was no longer around to temper our behavior and treatment of the other. 

Then in 2002, my father was diagnosed with cancer. After his first month of radiation and chemo, he found himself getting weaker and felt that he could no longer drive himself safely back and forth to the hospital. As my Mother had never learned to drive, he asked me if I would drive him back and forth to his hospital appointments. Of course I agreed without hesitation but this also meant that I would be responsible with having to take him five days a week, every week for approx five to six months. 

Although this obviously greatly impacted my life as well as my own immediate family’s, I didn't mind doing it in the least and would gladly have done it again without hesitation. As some days I was required at the hospital for near eight hours, plus had to be there Monday through Friday, I quickly found it was impossible for me to continue to work full time while I did this. Luckily, I had an amazingly empathetic boss and was able to take a six month leave of absence without pay remarkably easily. Tragically, she found herself in a near identical situation with her own father a mere two months after me so...

I began driving my Father on a regular basis about the second week of July and continued to do this every day until just before Christmas of the same year.  My father managed to finish all of his radiation and chemo treatments a scant six days before Christmas Eve. Christmas that year was nice, although we already knew that my father had ended up not responding well to either one of his treatments and wasn't going to be really getting any better. 

This was confirmed before the third week of January had even started. In the interim from Christmas til this time, I had returned to work and was trying my best to settle back into some sort of routine. I was barely back at work, when my father was admitted to the hospital for what ultimately turned out to be the rest of his life. From the moment he went in, I made sure that I visited each and every day though it became increasingly harder to see him suffering so much as it got closer and closer to the end.

For the first time since I had been told that he had cancer back the previous June, I started to really feel stressed and overwhelmed. I often found it quite challenging trying to juggle a successful return to work while meeting my own immediate family’s needs - Sara was only twelve when all of this started and had yet to lose anyone close to her from death so...

At the same time, I found I was at the beck and call of my mother without the benefit of any safety net. As I knew that this was incredibly hard on her, I tried not to take some of her many and frequent outbursts personally . I got it. She felt powerless to help her life partner, a man that had looked after her now since 1956 and visa versa. All faults aside, they really were a truly magnificent couple who loved each other deeply until the very end.

OK, this entry now seems to have taken on a life of its own, so in the interest of looking towards a bit of a conclusion on the way to wrapping this all up, I'm not going to bore you with all of the specifics of what ultimately caused my Mother and I to have this serious falling out. Instead, the following anecdote should illustrate quite nicely what I was more of less up against.

By the time my father finally passed away the second week of March, I was pretty much overwhelmed with so many different emotions, never mind feeling so very, very tired. Through the last week of his life, I had spent every night at the hospital sleeping beside my father in a bed that his nurses had put together for me. The following day the only thing that I wanted to be excused from was having to take my mother to the funeral home to finalize our earlier arrangements. I was so very shattered that I just didn't have it in me to do this. As Jim and I had taken Mom there prior to Dad's passing, I figured now that it could be my brother's turn, especially as he had only visited him twice the whole time he was in hospital.

At the time, I really didn't give this request much thought at all, but it soon became quite apparent that perhaps I should have. My Mom was a little bit demanding of my time the first few months after Dad died. After working hard all week, I rarely had a chance to slow down once the weekend arrived as I was required to chauffeur my Mom around so she could get whatever errands she needed to get done. It seemed as if every place that I happened to take my mother, whenever she was offered condolences, she just had to stop so she could also share a particular story with everyone. 

All puffed up and proud, she told everyone who would listen what an absolute rock my brother had been to her, and how she wouldn't have known what to do had he not been there to look after everything the day after my Father’s passing. Canonization for sainthood must surely be around the next corner. Not one mention of what I had done for five months, nor even the last three months that he spent in the hospital. Nothing at all, nary a word, and, to make matters worse, she did all of this right in front of me, and not just on one occasion, but multiple times. I started cracking up in short order let me tell you.   

This was barely the tip of the iceberg and now that my Father was no longer around to temper my Mother's actions and treatment of me, I found our situation intolerable not to mention untenable. The longer it continued, the more I felt poisoned and shattered, and increasingly more and more depressed. Ultimately, for my own self preservation, I ended up having to sever all ties with my Mother. It turned out to be easier than I had ever imagined, and in the end I managed to avoid my mother and her abuse for nearly eighteen months. 

P.S. TO BE CONTINUED 

Condemnation

It's been almost three years since Jim and I were attacked, and Jim stabbed multiple times, while at work. Even after this amount of time passing, I still find it rather difficult to talk at length about this event. Just thinking about what happened that day still feels so surreal to me, almost as if I am watching it happen to somebody else and not myself. I have pretty much avoided even mentioning that day if at all possible in any of my entries. The few times that I did bother to reference the attack, I pretty much made sure that this is done in passing and as casually as possible. Immediately following the attack, I was still so much in shock that it was relatively easy avoiding this topic. Even today, I find it difficult to wrap my head around what ended up happening to us that Monday afternoon, and how, almost three years later, we are still suffering from the events of May 12, 2008. Now, though, I feel I am ready to share all of the details and specifics of this attack and stabbing that has been so absolutely life altering to me and my family - kind of mind boggling what can end up happening in what was probably no more than two minutes in length!

At the time of the attack, Jim and I were Building Managers for one of the larger high rises in the city. The building we were responsible for looking after had always been a pretty quiet and peaceful one. In the half year that we had been there, there had been no unusual or significant events that stood out as particularly unusual. Pretty much a gravy job all in all. Jim and I shared a single position so to speak, and we divided our duties accordingly. For the most part, I did all of the administrative work related to this position such as rent collection, maintaining building's rental ledger and ensuring all vacant units were in "rentable condition" et al , while Jim looked after all of the physical aspects i.e. cleaning and maintaining all common areas of the building, garbage and snow removal and any unit repairs as required.

Obviously, being a Building Manager of a reasonably large apartment building - 96 units over eight stories - you can absolutely be assured that there will certainly be some very special moments, not to mention a stereotypically odd assortment of characters residing within these eight floors. Some days were definitely easier than others, as were some tenants, but all in all, we knew we had it pretty easy. The majority of the tenants were easy to get along with and undemanding at best. Everyone seemed to respect each other's space so intervening in tenant disputes of any kind were practically non-existent. For the most part, I rarely found any of our tenants irritating or annoying, but like everything else in life, there will always be an exception to the rule!

The exception of our building just happened to be one of our sixth floor tenants who had lived in the building with his wife and two young sons about five years at the time of our attack. Where all of the other tenants were a joy to interact with, he was the complete opposite and then some. You could count on hearing from him on a daily basis, even on weekends and after hours which were normally supposed to be free of any work related issues, not to mention your time off and away from work! John, as he will be referred to from now on, would literally be waiting on the main floor for one of us to unlock our office bright and early every morning without fail. There was always some important nugget of information that he felt compelled to share with us without delay. It took every bit of self control not to over react and lose it on him. I don't think I've counted to ten as often as I had during those six months. Jim and I eventually learned how to effectively deal with him so that we were able to minimize any interaction with him while leaving the impression that we were taking everything he said seriously and then acting appropriately. It took a bit of time and finesse but in the end we became extremely adept at handling this particularly loathsome tenant!

Now, to compound issues somewhat, the Regional Office of the company that we worked for just happened to be located in one of the empty units on the first floor of the building that Jim and I both lived in and were responsible for maintaining. As well as annoying us on a daily basis, he also paid a visit to the girls working in the Regional Office every day. You have no idea what an utter treat this one tenant could be, never mind how much crap we were expected to suffer because of him, but suffer we did. At the end of the day, he was nothing more than a bit player in the bigger, more important picture - or so I thought. Work is work is work, and most of the time, it didn't come home with me - so to speak. Obviously, when you work where you live and live where you work, it tends to be a little bit more difficult to keep the two separate, but this is certainly not impossible. I always ensured that there were very specific boundaries created with the tenants, and then, made sure that they were all very much aware of what these boundaries were. John would prove a bit challenging to these boundaries, and ultimately, because of him, Jim and I would find ourselves in a most untenable work situation!

TO BE CONTINUED!!!

LIQUID LUNCHES

I've managed now to maintain a journal of one sort or another online now coming up on eight years. Initially I was so self conscious about exposing anything about myself, but after a short time, I forgot that I was actually writing on a public forum, and wrote just for the sake of writing - for an audience of one so to speak, moi! With my first journal I did nothing to hide my identity in anyway, but, I also ensured that I made no mention whatsoever of my alternate lifestyle, so to speak. While it was true that everything I wrote about was 100% honest, the mere fact I completely avoided addressing a substantial part of my life was nothing more than me lying through omission which by definition is equally as bad as if I were lying. I wasn't really being truthful or at all. Conundrum!

At the same time, I certainly was by no means ready to expose a very private side of myself or my husband, or at the very least, risk the chance that someone reading my journal would be able to put two and two together and figure out what we had fought and worked so hard to remain secret and separate. Ah-ha! A secret identity was in order. Why not? I thought. It works for super heroes now doesn't it? So with the anniversary of my alter ego in mind, I guess you could say that I've been maintaining a journal online, with my entire life 100% exposed, for near seven and a half years now. While I still chose to keep my real name and my families private and hidden from anyone doing a general search of me, anyone that knows me intimately is familiar with any of my online writings now, my daughters included. More than anything else now, my innate shyness and general self consciousness are the main things that stop me from going any further.

One thing I've not been able to help but notice is how much change has occurred in those writing about addiction. There seems to be far more relatives of addicts writing now than the actual addicts. When I first started out, I can't remember anyone other than addicts or addicts in recovery writing or keeping a personal journal. A point of view that I can't help but consider now, was never a consideration in the past. Nary a glimmer. Keeping current with the ever growing number of this niche keeps me honest, and never forgets to remind me that my recovery no longer affects only me, but any number of people close to me who care about me and my welfare - obviously, there are many other things working away in the background, but each and every time I read one of the relatives journals, I can't help but feel humbled. I also can't begin to say enough about any one of them and the suffering they must endure each and every day. Their writings should be mandatory reading for any drug education course in the school system, the penal system and any other type of system out there!

For anyone new to my writing, I first off, would like to welcome one and all. Secondly, I wish that all of my online writing was accessible to everyone. Currently I have approx 200 plus entries from a former site that I have yet been able to upload to this site. It had been maintained by another and for some reason, about three and a half years ago, it disappeared without warning. Miraculously, he did eventually return everything to me in the form of a .sql file which is a file I've no clue what to do with. I can open it one of the more sophisticated alternatives to notepad but that's pretty much it. Buried deep within all of the stuff that stares out from my computer monitor, I can make out my original entries. On days when I feel particularly ambitious, I've copied and pasted individual entries into this journal with the entry's original date stamp. With over 200 though, I've never quite felt that ambitious! Maybe one day soon - or maybe an idiot proof method of getting this file incorporated with this site will appear miraculously for me! Never, ever say never!

In the meantime, allow me to share one of the few original stories I managed to write while knee deep in addiction. May be a little graphic for some, but it never fails to make me suitably uneasy every time I force myself to read it, reminding me of how important my recovery and sobriety is to me and mine. This story is way too autobiographical for my liking as I seemed to spend many similar days to the one I wrote about than I cared to admit.

LIQUID LUNCHES - a short story

 
I like to call myself a functioning addict or a responsible junky - an oxymoron if I have ever heard one. You ask what makes me so different or special from other junkies or addicts? Well, nothing really except the amount of work involved. It is much harder to be a functioning addict. You are forced to live two very separate and distinct lives. Your public face is the only face that anyone is allowed to see. no one can be allowed entry into your private world. This you keep very well hidden from view.

 
No one can know that your half hour lunch is not sitting down at the nearest coffee shop consuming today’s special washed down with a couple of cups of coffee. No, instead you have quickly headed over to the local public library and have locked yourself in one of their bathroom stalls. Once you are safely behind its closed door, you carefully remove a brown eyeglasses case from your purse only you don’t have a spare pair of glasses in it. You place a strip of toilet paper across the back of the toilet bowel and gently place a spoon on it.  

 
You grab one white pill out of your baggy and place it in the centre of the spoon. With the end of your lighter, you carefully crush it until it is a fine white powder. Next you rip the packaging off of a new syringe and open your small bottle of sterile water, placing the tip of the syringe in it to draw up 50 units. Carefully you fill the spoon with water.

 
Lifting the spoon up into the air, you flick your lighter and aim the flame so that it is centered beneath the spoon. The water starts to bubble and the fine powder dissolves. Breaking some cotton off the end of one of the many q-tips you have, you drop it dead centre into the warm liquid. Quickly you suck the liquid out of the spoon into the syringe. Sit back for a second to breathe a sigh of relief. No clumsy accidents. So far, so good. Taking some more toilet paper, you wipe your spoon clean before returning it to its case. You make sure that your small bottle is properly capped and your baggy zipped up tightly. You crumple the syringe’s wrapper up tightly and place it in the case also. You will have to dispose of it later.

 
Enough time should have passed so that the liquid had cooled. You perch your rear at the edge of the toilet seat making sure your feet are square to the ground. Taking a look at both arms you decide which one to go for this time. The left looks as if it will yield the best results. You tap your forearm a few times and flex your hands. Carefully you remove the cap from your syringe. Taking a deep breath you stick the needle into your skin gently pulling the plunger back a fraction. A rich red floods the barrel. Bulls eye. With as steady a hand possible and a silent plea for them to remain that way, you depress the plunger at a uniform rate until all of the liquid has disappeared.

Bliss. Now not too quickly, you remove the point from your skin, firmly pressing some tissue over the bloody hole. Once the bleeding has stopped, you qrab the point of the needle with your bloodied tissue and twist it until it snaps off. Throwing both into the toilet, you flush them down the drain. You recap your now empty syringe and return it to its place in the eyeglass case. Wrap two elastics around the case and return it to your purse. You certainly can not be too careful. You want no rude surprises should you ever drop purse with contents spilling everywhere. Too big a risk to take for the functioning addict.

You gather your stuff and exit the stall, stopping to wash and dry your hands. Look for your comb to run through your hair. As everything went smoothly, you still have time to freshen your makeup. Touch of lipstick and a brush of powder and you are good to go. With one final glance back at the mirror, you open the bathroom door refreshed and satisfied by your half hour lunch break.

seedless

seedless

This is a link that I really should have put up ages ago, but then I managed to get distracted for quite a bit, and am now only returning to my computer after a fairly long absence. Hopefully this will make up for my negligence! Years ago, when I first started blogging, I was fortunate enough to be able to belong to a website that was, for better or worse, a real showcase for about two dozen fairly talented writers who just happened to also be opiate addicts. During my two years writing under junkylife.com, I met some truly remarkable and brilliant individuals. While we came from all over the world and our ages ranged from teens to retirement, the one thread that we all shared was our love and dependence and continuing battle with a varying range of opiates. As a collective, we managed to bring many, many lifetimes of experiences and stories to the table. At the time, we ranged from being completely abstinent with multiple years of recovery behind us to being knee deep in extremely active addiction with no thoughts of ever stopping.

The group had individuals who were top executives in international companies earning six figure salaries and then some to those who had no idea where they would lay their head each evening to sleep. We were all there to support the others around us. No judgments, no lectures and especially, no shame. For the first time in my life, I had found a safe and secure place to share my experiences without fear of any sort of recriminations. More than anything else though, I discovered that I wasn't alone, that there were others very much like me.

At the time that I received an invitation to join this group, I was as deep as I would get with my addiction. I was using the absolute heaviest that I had ever used in my life, and was doing this while maintaining a full time office job of responsibility, etc, not to mention, maintaining the semblance of a completely normal family. By the time junkylife.com imploded though, I had found the strength to stop using and to get myself back into treatment, but know that I may not have been as successful as I have been, had they not been there for me every step of the way. To any and all that are still out there, a rather belated, but heartfelt thank you.

The above link, seedless, was one of the original members of junkylife.com. He also is an utterly amazing writer with stories that will simply mesmerize you. Words can not begin to serve him justice. I urge one and all to take some time and check out the above link as you will not be disappointed.

P.S. Hope this makes up for my utterly disgracefully slow response to your earlier request! Cheers...

Funeral March

Well, the funeral turned out to be absolutely beautiful and something Daniel would have been pleased with, if this were at all even possible. Standing room only, too. It was still somewhat weird having to return to the town of our youth especially under these circumstances.

The actual service ended up lasting just over an hour. Both of his sisters got up to speak - he was the middle child - as well as his best friend from high school and also one of his nieces - in total he was uncle to five nieces and one nephew. The minister's sermon was very fitting as she took time to address Daniel's two decade battle with mental illness and depression, as well as talking about how he ultimately died. In fact, no one that got up to speak shied away from these normally uncomfortable subjects. To be sure, his parents opened this door originally when they stated in the newspaper's announcement's section how their son actually died. This was certainly a most unusual, not to mention brave move on their part. I can't remember ever seeing something like this mentioned in any other announcement of death in a paper's personnel's section.

I certainly can understand their reasons behind doing this. Anyone attending his funeral would have already been familiar with the fact he was bi-polar and had been for decades. This eliminated having to respond to dozens and dozens of people asking how he died. I can just imagine how both of his parents would have dreaded this part of the whole service, but because of the type of people that they are, they would have answered each and every question without hesitation.

Jim and Daniel started high school twenty nine years ago, and except for a few of their class mates that just simply could not make it to the funeral, almost their entire class managed to show up. This fact alone speaks volumes and then some...Its unfortunate that Daniel never was able to recognize this fact. For most of his life, he felt irrelevant, or that he just simply couldn't measure up to the rest of us. If only he could have taken a step back and actually seen what it was we all saw and recognized in him.

He was a brilliant writer and artist, as well as an excellent student and athlete. Everything came naturally for him though he may not have quite seen it that way. He was one of the best looking guys in high school who could have had any girl that he wanted, but ended up spending his years there single. He was accepted into all of the universities he applied for, and even managed to excel while studying away in a foreign city away from his friends and family.

It was during his final year at university that he was diagnosed with  manic depression - my understanding is that this is now called bi-polar - and even with this, he still managed to graduate. For about half a decade after this, he ended up in and out of institutions, so that by the time he was in his thirties, he felt as if he had really been left behind, and never recovered from this setback.

It really is all very, very tragic. His sisters read some of his most recent writings and while they were all exceptional, they certainly spoke to his current state of  mind. He was filled with far too much  pain it would seem, and nothing on this world seemed to offer him the relief he so obviously sought.

Peace, love and  happiness...

The Informers

I've just finished watching The Informers. Its a new film written by Bret Easton Ellis based on his book of the same name which was published in 1994. The book is actually a collection of thirteen short stories, and this film has done its best to adapt these stories. It was directed by Gregor Jordan and features an ensemble cast, such as Winona Ryder, Billy Bob Thornton, Mickey Rourke, and Kim Basinger. It also was Brad Renfro's last film before his untimely death. The film basically covers stories of seven of the film's characters with these stories  taking place over the course of one week in 1983 Los Angeles. These stories cover the lives of movie executives, rock stars, and other morally challenged characters.

This film was by no means great, in fact, I'm not even sure if it is even good, but for a number of reasons, it ended up kicking me in the stomach.  In an instant, I was transported back to the year that I turned nineteen, 1983! This was to be a seminal year for me and my friends. This was the year that we graduated high school and were about to enter university. Our whole lives were supposedly stretched out in front of us, as in, the world was our oyster. We were invincible, or so we thought.  We dreamed of going off to uni, being away from home and anyone that knew us. We imagined that this would be our time to finally be sexually free, to be able to experiment and to be able to do this without fear of any consequences. How quickly this was all shattered and destroyed.

1983 was also a time when we had first started to hear about some mystery illness that  initially seemed to be randomly killing only gays and IV drug users. A plague of sorts. A plague that was also extremely terrifying especially since the medical community at the time appeared so utterly baffled and helpless. Uncertainty was everywhere. Once the heterosexual population started to show signs of this illness, fears escalated rapidly, as did denial. The medical community had yet to announce how this illness was spreading nor how it could be prevented from spreading.

One thing, though, that we seemed to recognize instinctively, were any thoughts of us finally being able to have indiscriminate sexual encounters would have to end if we were to remain immune. So much for us going off to university with thoughts of anonymous one night stands dancing in  our heads. Didn't matter any more if we were on the pill as a much larger issue now existed. Not getting pregnant would be the least of our worries. The party really was over, as was our innocence.

This movies touches so many aspects of what me and my friends were going through in our own personal lives twenty six years ago. It seems eerie watching it now, almost voyeuristic. It also almost appears to be a sequel to Ellis's book/movie Less Than Zero. The book originally was published back in 1985, with the movie of the same name coming out a couple of years later, although there were a lot of changes and departures. What may really end up being interesting will be if Ellis does indeed publish a sequel to Less Than Zero, something he has been promising for a little while now.

P.S. Speaking of the above movie, I just had to go and dig it out to watch yet again. Even though its a bit on the dated side, it still remains one of my favourites from that time period.

just can't get enough

In less than 24 hours, I will be swaying to the beats of one of my all time favourite bands - Depeche Mode. At times it seems as if it has taken a lifetime to get here - the moment I heard Just Can't Get Enough when I was seventeen, way back in 1981 I was hooked. I've remained hooked until this very day. They have been one of the constants in my life. It seems rather fitting that I'll be enjoying them with two of my other constants - my husband and daughter. Come September, it will be twenty-nine years since I met and was introduced to Jim. Imagine that, almost three decades ago. We've definitely shared some adventures over the years.

Now we are sharing in our recovery. Both of us have been on MMT for just over three years, and neither one of us has stumbled - yet, cause you can just never say never...Had we been still using, this concert would have been missed. In fact, I doubt very much that it would have even been much more than a blip on my radar. No time for stuff like that back then. Would have dismissed it with the excuse that we could simply not afford it, which was not at all truthful. In reality, we couldn't be bothered to afford it, as our money was already earmarked for something far more important. What a difference a few years has made. I paid $150 for our three concert tickets, and yesterday paid out almost another $150 for our three bus tickets to Toronto. I've budgeted another $150 to use for our spending money. To a former addict, this is a massive step forward. Being able to hold onto money, to put it away to use later, to actually save is a skill that we rapidly lose once we become a junkie. I am happy, and proud and plan on really enjoying our family day out together at the show - Toronto garbage strike be damned!

P.S. Jim also just celebrated his 43rd birthday on Thursday! Happy birthday baby...Love you always...

I Got The Music In Me!!!

For as long back as I can remember, music has played an important part of my life. Discovering the wonders of Elvis Presley as a nine year old would forever alter the way that I looked at the world. To me at that time, I felt as if I had discovered something that no one else had any idea even existed. It was truly a magical and innocent time for me, and from that point on, I had to have music on in the background for every one of my waking moments - the hours of my day devoted solely to school would at times seem unbearable. From Elvis I moved on to pretty much whatever happened to be playing on the local AM Top Forty radio stations in my area. You can well imagine just how limited I actually was in regards to my musical choices, seeing how I just so happened to be growing up in the deepest, darkest musical abyss that was southwestern Ontario of the late 70's. To my young and naive being though, I didn't really know quite how awful it really was, and how much I was really missing out on. Of course, this all changed the summer that I turned fifteen, 1979. This would be the summer that, for better or worse, changed me in ways I can't even begin to describe. Those brief months became a revelation to me, and from this point on, there was no way that SW Ont would ever be able to hold me down!

It was getting towards the end of June 1979. Grade Nine was rapidly coming to an end, and summer vacation was beckoning us all. Couldn't wait for those lazy days of summer, especially as this summer just happened to offer something very, very special. My father was a teacher at the local community college, so he too, got to enjoy a couple of months vacation each and every summer, just like myself and my brother. As a family, we also had immigrated from Ireland to Canada a decade prior to this summer, and while my Dad had returned home a few times over the preceding ten years, the rest of us hadn't. This was all about to change, as my family would be spending this summer's vacation in Ireland, as well as England - my Mom's parents had moved there from Ireland a number of years earlier so we were going to spend an equal amount of time between both countries and both sets of grandparents. I was so excited, although at the time, I had no idea exactly what kind of adventures awaited me, nor how profound a change these brief couple of months would end up having on me.

Although, my brother and I had more cousins living in Ireland, we did have a handful our age living in London, England, and they were more than happy to show their cousins from the colonies exactly what a huge city has to offer. Nothing in Canada prepared me for the grandness of London. At the time, we lived in a small town with a population of slightly more than 1 100. The largest city was a twenty minute drive from where we lived, and even then, its population didn't quite reach 250 000. I was captivated instantly. I surrendered completely the second my cousins took us to Kings Road in Chelsea. I had never, ever seen or heard anything quite like I found here. Punk rock was alive and kicking, so to speak, although by the time I had arrived in the UK, the original punk movement that had exploded in 1976, had long since disappeared and been replaced by what many classify as a second wave of the punk rock movement. By the time that I arrived, punk had splintered into a number of sub groups, many of which I found exciting beyond belief, and for the brief couple of months spent in England and Ireland that summer, I couldn't consume enough of this new music fast enough. I discovered what would soon be called New Wave and Pop Punk were my favourites and to this very day, I remain faithful and true to my first loves.

In just over a week's time, I will be going to see one of my very first loves, Depeche Mode! They have a show at Toronto's Molsen Amphitheatre on Friday, July 24 - just so happens, this show falls on the day after Jim's birthday! We're going to make it a bit of a family day as Sara is coming with us - she was also allowed to bring a friend with her so she wouldn't be stuck all day with our boring selves! This is also a bit of a big step for us as we've been keeping pretty much to ourselves this past year. Certainly, this event will have the largest crowd of people that we've had to interact and function within since the attack. Could prove fairly interesting. If nothing else, it certainly is a testament to how much I adore this particular band as I can't think of too much else that would motivate me this much that's for bloody sure.

Now, as an aside and for anyone that might be interested, besides Depeche Mode, my other all time favourite bands would have to be the Clash, Social Distortion, and Manic Street Preachers. I have a boatload of almost rans but that list would be too long...If I were stuck on a desert island, though...

The Pen Is Mightier...

I have been keeping a journal of some sort on and off since I was about 10 or 11, so about 34 or 35 years now. I kept one religiously all thru high school and university because it seemed like so much was happening with things changing so quickly, I was afraid that I would forget stuff and at that time in my life, I wanted to remember everything, good or bad. As I settled down into married life in my twenties and then motherhood in my thirties, keeping a journal was but a faint and distant memory. It was the farthest thing from my mind. At that time, there seemed to be no time left to undertake this sometimes time consuming task, plus, for better or worse, my life had seemed to have settled into something of a routine. Excitement and change seemed to be memories of the past. Not that this was necessarily a bad thing, just different.




Seven years ago this past June, my father was diagnosed with cancer and he passed away the following March. For the first time in over a decade, I picked up pen and put it back to paper. Towards the end of his life, I found myself in a long since forgotten place, but suddenly it became extremely important that I remembered everything that was happening around me these last seven or eight months of his life. Now more than any other time, I did not want to lose so much as a single memory from what was happening. I was so very afraid that I might forget something about his last days. For all of us, it was definitely a time of change.


I carried my journal with me everywhere. I filled up dozens of blank ones over this period of time, and every time I started to feel restless, I would write, and write, and write. Many days, I had a lot of time to do this. For twenty plus weeks, I spent each and every week day waiting in various rooms at the hospital for my father to complete whatever appointment he had that day. Every day he had his radiation treatment, plus there were a multitude of other types of appointments related to his cancer. To top everything else off, he was also getting chemo at the exact same time as his radiation, although the chemo finished about a month after the radiation. For just over five months, I drove him to the hospital five days a week for his treatments. Most days we would be at the hospital the entire day, but there were others where we were lucky enough to get out of there within the hour.


Regardless of the length of each visit, there was plenty of time for me to reflect and write. It was also a time for me to really get to know my dad all over again, as well as he had a chance to reacquaint himself with me. Bittersweet is an apt description I should imagine. After he passed, I continued to write as an outlet for my emotions. To this day, I carry a journal with me everywhere I go, and any time I feel the need, I write something in it. An entry can be one word to endless pages. I have found that whenever I am restless, upset, bored, impatient, irritated, you name it, the moment that I start writing I am immediately calmed. My recent journals follow no set form. They range from neat and tidy to tremendously disorganized and messy. I paste pictures in them sometimes. I doodle in them. I make sure that each one is different from the next. I haunt stores looking for unique and different books to use as journals. I have become quite creative in my quest to make each somewhat unique in its own way.


Now, I also keep an on line journal, although it is nowhere near as current or updated as my written - I am hindered somewhat by my complete inability to type as well and as fast as I would like. It was about five years ago that I was told about livejournal.com . This became my first foray into on line journaling. It seemed to take me an exceptionally long time to feel comfortable expressing myself publicly, although once I more or less got the hang of it, it became easier and easier. For the most part, I have liked using livejournal, and in fact, initially, I ended up having a number of separate accounts there. In the beginning, I mostly used them to display and store my art work. But these earlier attempts were dishonest at best, half truths at the most. They in no way reflected my actual life, although they did allow brief glimpses of it from time to time.




As I became more familiar and comfortable with this method of journaling, it became increasingly important that they start to actually reflect what was really going on in my life at that time. Initially though this caused me momentary paralysis as I certainly had no desire to lay bare those portions of my life I had spent years pretty much hiding from the general populous. My "alternate" life needed to continue being exactly that - one face for the majority and another for the precious few that were familiar with my drug use/abuse. That face was not yet ready for public consumption.


With the identity that I had been using, I found that this was going to be impossible to be completely frank and open about my lifestyle. Finally one day, I created an alternate online identity to reflect my alternate life. This is the one that I continue to use today. Over the past four and a half years there has been a blurring of my real and of my alternate world. This has become possible because my comfort level continually increases allowing me the luxury of honesty. For the most part, my mask is still there. I try to keep my name and my families and those that are important to me as anonymous as possible in an effort to ensure that their privacy is respected, as there is no certainty that they may feel as relaxed as I.


The majority of my drug use/abuse years are currently not available to read anymore online as the site that I had been using for this particular period of my life, literally disappeared overnight about two years ago. I used to be part of a group of addicts and recovering addicts that all had their personal journals at JUNKLIFE. At any given time, there were about twenty to twenty five of us sharing our stories with each other and anyone else who was interested. Sadly, it is now gone. After a number of frantic months attempting to contact the web master, I finally was able to get all of my writings from my time spent there. Until I received them, I was utterly gutted, as I had well over two hundred separate entries just from the two years I had been writing there. More importantly, I needed these writings available to me as an aid in my current recovery. I had only just started MMT when my site disappeared, so the lion's share of what was happening to me during this period reflected my very active addiction, as well as documenting how I allowed it to get so out of control. With each passing month, you could see where I was inevitably heading - the proverbial, or cliched, rock bottom.


Now, while I have all of these entries stored on my computer's hard drive, I have utterly no clue how to get them uploaded once again to the INTERNET. They were sent to me as one .sql file - whatever the heck this means cus I've so got no clue! Ideally, I'd like to add them to this site, or even if I had to, start a new site for my archived writings from my addiction period. I can go through this very large file and enter one entry at a time by copying and pasting it, and then back dating said entry with its original publishing date and time. I've manually entered a few, but it is just too time consuming, and honestly tres boring to have to do it this way. This site was actually started approx May 2007 when I first started having trouble accessing my previous site. Any writings from that point on are all original to this site, any before this time, were culled from my previous two sites, and are sadly not remotely enough to really paint the complete picture of my severe addiction years. If nothing else though, they are a start. Perhaps I'll suddenly feel energized enough to enter a few more of my old entries! LATER...

She Works Hard for the Money

FROM THE ARCHIVES 2005-07-27

---

While I was a student at university I waitressed and then finally graduated to bartending. I absolutely loved working in the service industry. Never in my life have I made as much money as I did then. The mid to late 80''s were still the golden age of the service industry. Expense accounts still existed for businessmen and women and the GST had yet to rear its ugly head. I was fortunate that I got into one of the more upscale establishments that my city had to offer because there was a small fortune to be made. I remember going to school full time for my third and fourth year at uni plus working at least 30 hours a week serving. I was taking home a minimum of $600 to $700 each week which was a small fortune to a 21 year old. After graduating university I found it very difficult to give up.

By then I had become so accustomed to the tips always having money available to me rather than waiting a fortnight for a pay cheque - which we actually also got but that was just gravy - that it took me a year to finally leave the industry. I had made a lot of great friends my four years serving. Some of them were like me, students, but many were "career" people, this is all that they would end up doing. Unfortunately serving is looked down upon in the frightfully white collar city that I reside in that had I stayed in service, I would have been perceived as a failure. Back then that apparently mattered to me although I have long since gotten over that mentality. I was dragging my feet though in making my exit. Not only would it be difficult to get used to the substantial reduction in earnings but suddenly I would be expected to be part of the land of the living. Part of the allure of bartending was that you didn't start work until dark and the people that you encountered were by far much more interesting than their daytime counterparts.

As luck would have it, the decision was taken out of my hands when I had a bad fall the week before Christmas and broke my kneecap. After crutches, a cane, physio and not driving for five months I knew that it would be tough to go back to bartending or waitressing anytime soon but I now desperately needed an income of any sort. Plus my confidence had taken quite a beating. Getting my strength back in my leg and as a result my back, et al was slow going plus when I did make an early attempt at returning to bartending I had forgotten how messy we could be and those we floors behind the bar were just another accident waiting to happen.

My immediate loss of income right after the accident also made things tough going. But you gotta take the good with the bad and as the majority of tips are never declared by servers, they end up never paying tax on this income. As a result they are then denied the benefit of collecting any type of Employment Insurance as you can only end up collecting what you contribute and if you contribute a big fat zero then you are not entitled to any thing more. So hah on me. After about three months sitting at home with my dog I started to get a little restless and started to look for a "real" job. I found one and I went to work for what turned out to be a pretty darn nice company. For nine years they treated me well and in return I think that I was a definite asset for them but I always remembered my serving days with fondness. I was starting to get itchy feet. I wanted something a little less ordinary than going to work Monday to Friday from 9am until 5pm with three weeks vacation each year and some time off at Christmas and blah, blah, blah.

I was bored and I was getting bored with myself. Surprisingly enough I even managed to spend seven of those years pretty darn squeaky clean. For shame, for shame...to be continued... 

HIGH PRIESTESS OF PUNK returns in high style next!!!

I WANT A NEW DRUG

I ask that you bear with me a moment or two until I am able to get my bearings, as I am literally still spinning from yet another attack against Methadone Maintenance Treatment from someone who doesn't have a bloody clue what it even is or entails! Grant me patience, now. First of all, I live in southwestern Ontario, Canada, and because of this location, I, as well as any other opiate addict also residing here, have very limited options available as far as recovery from this insidious addiction goes. Suboxone and its ilk is currently not available for prescription in this country. I will confess that it is more than possible that I may not be completely accurate with this declaration, but the last time I asked my doctor at the clinic about availability, I was told, not yet. Perhaps there are test studies being performed even as I speak, and sooner, rather than later, opiate addicts will actually be able to choose their poison!

Short of going cold turkey, to be properly detoxed and rehabbed from opiates, MMT seems to be an addicts only viable option if one hopes for a successful recovery. I absolutely am convinced that this treatment can and is, highly effective in keeping the addict away from abusing opiates. I know that there is the school of thought that maintains the addict is merely exchanging one addiction for another, but I find this argument simply too simplistic and terribly narrow. MMT does far more than exchange one of the same for more of the same, and I know that anyone reading my journal is well enough informed with what I am alluding to here that it isn't necessary for me to regurgitate all of this once again.

Even to my own ears and eyes, some of what I am about to say sounds like a huge series of rationalizations and this may very well be true - after all, one must never forget that rationalization may be the addicts only real true friend and if not friend, most certainly companion! When I first started MMT in the fall of 1999, I was in pretty rough shape.

We had been doing heroin and some pills for a solid two years, and pretty much had been dedicating all of of extra money and time towards our addiction. Pretty much from the first time that I tried it, I was hooked. I certainly had found what I thought was my nirvana. It was wondrous and it didn't take long to develop a tolerance for it. Thank heavens we knew someone that could get us heroin. He was out of town three out of the seven days and he happened to be working in a place that was literally drowning in it so every Thursday night right after getting off his bus, he would drop by our place with our weekly package. Sunday night we would wave him goodbye as his bus left town, our money in his pocket. This went on for over a year.

It started to get quite expensive as all habits tend to but this one also felt different. Where before, I may have been a bit of a bitch if I couldn't get blow or speed, I could get by at least but not this time. When I was without I hurt, I felt sick, I was in severe pain. I couldn't or wouldn't want to go to work and I had always prided myself on never letting any of my vices interfere with work and to be honest, life in general. Suddenly I had become single minded, nothing else mattered but not feeling sick anymore. I had to have a hit no matter what. Came close to bankrupting us. Sad but at least we had a house to sell to get us out of debt. And selling this one, our favorite, meant that we still had two others left although they were nowhere near as nice and they were in a much rougher part of town but that didn't seem to concern us so much anymore. We moved. We had to. We had someone else very important in our life now that very much needed to be accommodated. I had never lied before but suddenly I found myself doing just that. When my family doctor confronted me I couldn't admit it at first. I was every which way of denial until I couldn't take it anymore. This drug eventually wears you down, strips you of every vestige of dignity and self respect. I fessed up and when he started talking about getting us into a methadone program, I pretty much said yes just to humor him plus he said that as soon as we were on the list, he would be able to help us out and get us from having to buy our dope on the street at ridiculous prices.

I had never actually intended to follow thru with the methadone. The moment we were accepted our doctor wrote us each a prescription for 30 dilaudid a week. It was as if we had hit the jackpot. Between us we had 60 pills that would normally have cost us almost $20 each - quite a savings. He said that he could keep us supplied until we reached a high enough methadone dose that could sustain us on its own. I figured that we would ride this out as long as we could. Looked like it would be at least eight weeks that we could get our prescription and I figured that was long enough for us to get our finances back in order. We would in theory save a lot by not having to buy opioids for a two month period. As it was we were spending about $700/week and that was barely keeping us from getting sick so I knew that we were living on borrowed time if we continued spending at that rate. We were long overdue for a financial break.

But a funny thing happened while we going to methadone. It started working. I stopped grieving for any of the others. I went a day without a hit, then two and then a week. A week turned into a month and then two and three and we were still going. Suddenly two years had passed and I no longer did anything except for my methadone. I didn't even drink anymore. I forgot about heroin and dilaudid and morphine - oxys had yet to make their appearance but that was only a matter of time. The methadone made me so very tired though even if it did seem to work a small miracle. I would start to nod off at the worst possible time something I rarely did while addicted to the others. I needed to stay awake. So slowly, we both started to taper down our dose and as we did this, the constant state of tiredness also started to seem to decrease.

Suddenly twenty seven months had passed. We were starting to get tired of the daily grind of having to grab our methadone. Yes, for the most part normalcy had returned to our lives. We fell into our own little routine. Gone were the hours upon hours dedicated to finding that one hit that would take away the pain. I could go back to work full time, we both could. Methadone gave our life structure once again. My credit card debts were now paid off. We had sold the other two houses and purchased a three story apartment building. Our self confidence and esteem had returned. We didn't want or need methadone any more. It was time to say goodbye. I had two weeks vacation at Christmas 2001 but a week before my vacation started I got a terrible flu. I was down to about 20mg of methadone a day. I felt so sick that I just didn't feel like grabbing my methadone one day and the next and the day after that. I just stopped going and when my flu ended, any withdrawal that I may have been going thru had also ended. It was hard to tell one from the other so I kept telling myself that there was no withdrawal just crappy flu symptoms.

Both of our tapers turned out to be successes. By the time that we had stopped taking methadone on a regular basis, our bodies had repaired themselves as best that they could. After  two and a half years, we were also able to beat the mental cravings as our bodies had essentially trained themselves. So, now both the physical and mental cravings seemed to have been put to rest. I knew that when I woke up each morning that the first thing in my mind would not have anything to do with opiates and so it continued for a number of years after we had finished with methadone.

I wish that I could say that we returned to abusing opiates because of some body and mind crushing craving and longing, but that is so not  true whatsoever. It was actually nothing at all, something so utterly innocuous in the end. Boredom and availability.

TO BE CONTINUED... 

The Policy of Truth PART FOUR

Now of course, moving in with my bro wasn't going to be enough for SIL.  The moment that she could somehow manage it, they were married and she was pregnant with their first. They now have three little darlings by the way. So, suddenly their space above mine was not anywhere near adequate enough for their rapidly growing family. For now, SIL accepted moving out of this space and renting something that was more suitable. In the meantime, their old unit was rented out. There was utterly no problem what so ever trying to get a tenant to fill their empty apt as our house was located in very desirable Old South. In fact, we had a waiting list. Without having to do anything at all for the most part, the tenant more than paid for my bro's share of our mortgage and then some.

You would think that this would be more than enough for SIL, but no, of course not. She viewed this house as tainted. He had lived their with that other woman after all so nothing short of him getting rid of this constant reminder would satisfy her. Now, never mind that by this time, my family had lived in our part of the house for close to seven years. We had put enough of our own money into its upkeep, etc but more than this, this was pretty much the only home that my daughter knew. She grew up here. She was barely four when I took possession of the house. She had only ever gone to the one public school. All of her friends were in this neighborhood, in fact, anything and everything she knew was to be found here.

It so didn't matter. SIL wore away at my bro until he himself was convinced that he absolutely had to sell this house. No amount of logic could change his mind. Why would anyone in this day and age get rid of an income property if you didn't need to? It just didn't or doesn't make sound business sense. Well, like everything else, she ended up prevailing and so the house was sold. It was sold at a loss as we didn't end up regaining all of our initial down payment but she didn't care. They still got money out of the deal and as she wasn't around seven years earlier when my bro and I threw $30 000 towards our down payment, what did she care what the actual amount of money was in the end? She's just one dumb stupid b***ch is all that I can say.

Actually, digging this particular memory up has now angered me so much, I must conclude this entry here rather than where I had initially planned on ending. I now need to do a bit of sulking.

Mainliner

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED 2005 07 29

OK it has been a crazy day at work which kind of sucks for a Friday as I tend to like to ease into my weekend. I apologize in advance to anyone actually reading this entry as my thoughts are all over the place plus combined with the fact that I am also working I suspect that this entry will have absolutely no flow. That being the case,  for some reason there are a few things kind of bothering me today that I need to vent about and this, I guess, is the place that I can do it.

Went to my girlfriend's before work today cause I owed her a little bit of money and I wanted to get that out of the way. Not only is she a good friend but she is also one of my dealers, one that I am ever slowly fazing out because it is getting harder and harder for her to separate work and business and as a result I am now having difficulty also so...Slightly veering off topic now. Told you there would be flow issues. I was a late bloomer so to speak as far as drugs are concerned. I never actually tried any until a few months before my twenty first birthday when I smoked my first joint. Now I am fairly confident that I have made up for lost time. And except for a six year period about a decade and a half ago when I didn't use or abuse anything except for cigarettes and alcohol I have pretty much used some sort of drug every day since my first joint.

This being the case, I also want to state that I think that the reason(s) I still use and abuse and don't seem to have this overwhelming guilt about my usage is that I really haven't had any dignity stealing experiences relating to my use. By this I mean that I have never had to use my body in any shape or form to acquire whatever happened to be my poison du jour. I know alot of female addicts who suffer terrible self-esteem issues because of some of the things that they may have done to get that much needed fix. I am not judging. I know how lucky I am to be in the position that I am in. I was lucky. I have never stolen to feed my addiction - well, I didn't return all of my father's painkillers to the pharmacy after he had passed away but I rationalized that one away. And I did bring back the majority of the stuff that my Mom had given me to return so...

Now I know that this seems to be going nowhere but trust me I have a point. OK so I have never had to sell my body or my firstborn or my husband but over the past year I have been loaning my vehicle to my friend to use while I am at work and for the use of it I usually get some sort of tip. Call this a rental charge. Now as we are first and foremost friends she tends to take a lot more liberties with me than I suspect she would with someone else. I know she does. She has become sloppy in what I think her responsibilities should be when she has my truck. Like I will ask it back at a certain time and she will show up three or four hours later or she won't be here to pick me up when I am done work or even better she will end up giving some lowlife creep a ride in it and then suddenly $750 worth of my husband's tools are missing. And she tells me that she only left it unlocked for about five minutes while she ran into her house to get this guy looked after. Yeah well that is all his friend, who was literally waiting in the bushes, needed to grap everything that was in our backseat. Then she says that this could have happened to anyone. Well, no that is not true because scum like him would never have been in my truck so he would have no idea what goodies I had stored there. Plus she doesn't think that she should be held financially responsible for these items yet the outstanding bill of $385 that I have with her has to be paid immediately or else.

Or else what? I won't get any more of your crap dope? I won't be left standing outside for an hour and a half at night in a rainstorm waiting to be picked up by my vehicle? I won't have stuff that my husband, not even me, uses to make a living stolen from my truck while you are looking after it and then don't do crap about it? I won't have to put another $1200 in repairs into the truck a day after you have had it for a three day period in which you towed a trailer that I specifically told you not to tow? I have put $5200 in repairs into the truck since Christmas plus have also paid the $440 a month we have to pay to get the stupid thing insured.

Anyway it is times like this that I end up getting kind of depressed about my habit. I feel dirty or compromised or something that I can not quite articulate. I resent my usage I guess. Like I said I think for the most part I have been really lucky. I have never had to pawn all of my worldly possessions. In fact I have only been to a pawn shop maybe twice in my life and the visits were totally not related to dope. I have never been homeless or even jobless. I have never been really hungry. Like there have been lots of times that I haven't wanted to eat but I pretty much have always been able to eat.  I sometimes shudder when I stop to think about the shear amount of money that I have probably spent over the last twenty years but it is not as if I can take that money with me either so I can usually shake that thought pretty fast.

Again I am not entirely sure what I wanted to really express today. I was just mad and what actually set me off is that when I went to pay part of my debt she of course was out of pills - so, yes I am actually at work having not gotten anything prior which is a minor miracle in its own right - so I said that I would grab a bit of speed instead. I just wanted a quarter so I gave her another $30. She said that she didn't have any broken out that I would have to take a half but that I could use this as a down payment towards the next time she needs the truck. So I look at it just as she is hustling me out the door and I say to her that there is no way that this is a half and she said that I would have to weigh it at home. Now she knew that I was on my way to work and that I did not have any scales at home so I don't know what game she was trying to play. I said no that it was a quarter and that she in no way was going to get the truck and say that she had already given me something. Yuck, feel gross just writing/typing this out.