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| I am building a new life | |||||
Heroin, Brown, Gear, Smack, Junk, call it want you want. Myself? I think there is only one way to describe it and that is, EVIL, pure evil. If there is one thing in this world that can drag you down into the gutter it’s Smack. If there is one thing in this world that can ruin your life it’s Smack, only if you let it though. I wasn’t strong enough to say no, I couldn’t resist the temptation. Curiosity killed the cat; it killed a lot of things in my life. In fact if I’m completely honest with myself it ruined everything. |
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took me less than a year to loose everything, my job, my home, my friends and
my family, they’re all gone. I have no one to blame but myself. All that I
lost has been through my own selfishness and stupidity. When you are an heroin
addict the only thing that matters to you is where you are going to get your
next hit from and you will do anything to get it. I have done things that would
never have crossed my mind before I started to use heroin. Looking back I wish
I had never taken the evil stuff. If I could have one wish it would be that I
had never taken the drug. You think that you can control the drug but that is
far from the truth. Once addicted, it controls you. You don’t just crave for it psychologically, you crave for it physically; your body needs it; you need it. At the beginning someone said to me ‘Once you’ve had it you’ll always want it’. I disagreed, I just wanted to try it. I just wanted to see what it was like, just once. It wasn’t just once though was it? How stupid was I? ‘Same shit, different day,’ that’s what they say isn’t it? All of the time that I’ve been on heroin has just flown by. I don’t know where all of the time has gone. Day after day, week after week, month after month, chasing the thing that I loved most – heroin. It’s done me no good at all; it has destroyed my life. It has taken away anything and everything that has ever meant anything to me. I can’t help but love the stuff though, and that is how it gets you. It’s a love/hate relationship; one minute you love the stuff because it’s taking away all the hurt and pain in your life; the next you hate it because of the things that you have lost through it. And the things that it makes you do – it’s like, suddenly you have no conscience at all. When I was a little girl there were a million things that I wanted to do, a million things that I wanted to be. I had hopes, dreams, ambitions. Now I know that I am a slave to this evil drug. Although I tell myself each and every day that I will get myself clean and sort myself out I know that I am only fooling myself. I know that any of the hopes, dreams and ambitions that I once had are nothing more than fantasy. Since I started using heroin, my life has been turned upside down, I have done things that I am not proud of, things I deeply regret. I have hurt so many people on my journey through addiction. At that time I didn’t care. At the time all I could think about was, where my next fix was coming from. It was selfish I know. Sooner or later you realise that living life as a Smackhead is no life for anyone; sooner or later you hit rock bottom and you don’t even know how you got there. I started off thinking that I could be the boss of it. Everyone thinks that, but soon it takes over and there is nothing that you can do. First you just dabble at week-ends, then Monday, then Wednesday and before you know it , you have fallen into the trap and it’s got you. You wake up every morning and your first thought is heroin. You wake up one morning and your nose is running, you have backache, stomach ache and your legs feel like lead. You are no longer in control, it is. You can quit to-morrow though, can’t you? You see a spoon or a piece of foil and it reminds you; you can’t shake loose. It’s on you; it’s got you. It’s got me. I tried so many times to do my rattle and each time I failed. Every time the pain started to kick in I gave in; I couldn’t do it; I couldn’t do it no matter how hard I tried. The pain would always take me back. Someone once told me that doing the rattle was the easy part. The easy part! I couldn’t even do that! Throughout my using there have been lots of reasons why I should stop and only one reason why I shouldn’t – I didn’t want to. I left nothing but a trail of destruction behind me whilst I was in active addiction, yet nothing could stop me. I hurt most of the people whom I care about and who care about me. I ended up in hospital on a number of occasions through injecting and got into trouble with the police. It didn’t matter though because at the end of the d ay I loved using heroin. When I came to Blackburn, I got involved with T.H.O.M.A.S. and through them I met lots of people who had been through the rehab.centre. With the help of my key workers and those who were coming out of treatment I learned a lot about myself. I realised that I was sick. I learned that I suffered from a disease for which there is no known cure – Addiction. As I learned more about it I started to understand it and I knew that I wanted to get clean. My boyfriend had already gone into T.H.O.M.A.S. and I knew that I desperately wanted a new life. When he first went into treatment I thought that all my problems would be solved; I believed that, that would be the end of my using. Unfortunately I was wrong. I knew that he was going to be away for at least 12 weeks and so I thought that I had enough time to sort myself out. A week past and I kept thinking to myself that everything was ok because I still had 11 weeks to it. The weeks kept passing and I was still using. As the 12 weeks were nearing the end I decided once and for all that it was now or never. I had all the support that I needed around me, I just had to ask for help. For me, asking for help was hard because it meant admitting that I had a problem. I had made lots of new friends who were clean, through T.H.O.M.A.S., and I could see what they had achieved and I wanted it too. I knew that it was going to be hard but I knew also that I had to do it. I poured my methadone down the sink and I ripped up my prescription. I knew that the drug clinic was closed for Christmas so there was no way of changing my mind. I knew what I had to do and I was determined to do it. I had burned a lot of bridges and I believed that this was my last chance. I wanted my life to mean something. I wont pretend that it was easy, because it wasn’t. There were many times whilst doing my rattle that I wanted to go out and score, but I knew that I had to do it, so I carried on. Soon the hours turned into days and the days into weeks and the weeks turned into months and today I am happy to be clean. When I was first clean I thought that I was being tested all of the time. I would go to the phone box to make a call and there would be people scoring and they would ask me if I were doing the same. I didn’t give in. People would knock on my door to ask if they could use my house saying they would sort me out, but I didn’t give in. All the time there were constant reminders all around me. To be honest, I don’t know why I didn’t give in. It would have been so easy just to say yes. Sometimes I don’t know where I found the strength to walk away, but I did and I’m glad I did. I have discovered a new desire for life. With the help of the Floating Support team, N.A., my fantastic friends and my wonderful boyfriend I have all of the support I need around me to help me stay clean; people who I care about and more importantly, people who care about me and who are happy to help without wanting anything in return. At one time my only worry would have been where I’d get my next fix from; today I worry that I wont have enough time to do all of the things that I want to do. I can’t say that I don’t ever think about heroin, because I do. It’s only a thought though and as long as I don’t put that thought into action, I’ll be ok. If it gets really bad, then I know there are people who will be happy to help. Instead of making a call to a dealer I make a call to them. At the end of the day I am an addict, I’ll be an addict until the day I die. It’s important for me to remember this. Because the moment that I think that I’m cured, then that’s when it will get on me. I understand my illness a lot more today and I know that it will affect me in different ways; I know that sometimes I will think about using again and I’m ok.with that. I also know what I have to do to stop myself from putting the thought into action and I’m ok. with that too. I now know that the rattle is the easy part, it’s the staying clean that is the hard part. The most important thing in my life today is my recovery and I take it one day at a time. Today I want to succeed. Today I am determined to succeed. |
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