Monday, November 11th Daily Check-in

That’s never an easy thing to witness, as we all see ourselves in those situations. Good on you for still carrying narcan. Let experiences like this remind us why we are still not out there. Our lives may not be perfect, but at least we have them.

30 days for me today, hopefully many more to come.

Happy Veterans Day all! I am a YEAR and almost 2 weeks clean!!!!! I never thought this would happen to me I’m so proud. I read this journal entry from a news article (I never did heroin but I did pills and this hit home) so read if you want and if you’re clean keep at it...if you’re still in the game, just know you can get out before it’s too late.

“Funny, I don’t remember no good dope days. I remember walking for miles in a dope fiend haze. I remember sleeping in houses that had no electric. I remember being called a junkie, but I couldn’t accept it. I remember hanging out in abandos that were empty and dark. I remember shooting up in the bathroom and falling out at the park. I remember nodding out in front of my sisters kid. I remember not remembering half of the things that I did. I remember the dope man’s time frame, just ten more minutes. I remember those days being so sick that I just wanted to end it. I remember the birthdays and holiday celebrations. All the things I missed during my incarceration. I remember overdosing on my bedroom floor. I remember my sisters cry and my dad having to break down the door. I remember the look on his face when I opened my eyes, thinking today was the day that his baby had died. I remember blaming myself when my mom decided to leave. I remember the guilt I felt in my chest making it hard to breathe. I remember caring so much but not knowing how to show it. and I know to this day that she probably don’t even know it. I remember feeling like I lost all hope. I remember giving up my body for the next bag of dope. I remember only causing pain, destruction and harm. I remember the track marks the needles left on my arm. I remember watching the slow break up of my home. I remember thinking my family would be better off if I just left them alone. I remember looking in the mirror at my sickly completion. I remember not recognizing myself in my own Damn reflection. I remember constantly obsessing over my next score but what I remember most is getting down on my knees and asking God to save me cuz I don’t want to do this no more !!! “

Damn, man. That's a rough thing to watch. Especially when you just quit juuling. Keep up the strong work, my friend.

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Just hit 3 years last Thursday, so that's pretty rad. Here's to another 24 hours.

Happy Veteran's day!!!! Good day so far and I'm going to make sure the rest of it continues that way. Healthy, happy and free for the time being. I've accepted that I could possibly sentenced to 9 or 10 years in prison, but by doing the right thing and showing the court that I am, I have faith I won't even get much time. If I do, then I accept that I have to make up for my past mistakes. Life is so fucking good now.

Thank you for sharing, and being ready to help someone in need- that's huge. You're an awesome person, keep fighting the good fight brother 100

Oof man both those things sound rough. I'm sorry and hope you're doing alright. It's super common to see ppl nodding so hard that you can barely tell they're alive or just straight conked out on the street in my city and while most ppl walk by them like its nothing (a point of view which, although I know it seems shitty, I do understand having grown up in a big city and felt that way myself for a long time) but I'll always at least check on them to see if they're moving. I remember when one of my best friends oded in the passenger seat of my car while I was in the store and coming out having to attempt CPR and call an ambo and and stash my dope.. ugh shit makes me shiver.

How is the quitting juul going for you? I use a different vape (njoy) but I'm pretty sure the nicotine levels are the same or similar. I've been planning on using chantix when the time comes but honestly despite the strides I've made over conquering a lot of my addictive mindset these last 7.5 months deep down I don't feel ready to quit nicotine. That's super impressive that you are and let us know how your progress goes; we're rooting for ya!

Anyway. I know I've been super sporadic posting here lately. I've just been so fucking busy literally almost every minute of my time is planned. I do usually have like 40 minutes in bed in the morning while I'm drinking coffee and eating my sub then maybe an hour before bed at night but I usually need that time to just like not think so I end up mindlessly scrolling on reddit instead of posting here.

But! I've been doing pretty good. School is going well, have a lot more work leading up to finals but at least most of it is stuff I can enjoy. My group project for my fashion marketing/ merchandising class is so interesting and fun. When I start working on something for that class, I'll sit down at say 7pm and then all of a sudden it'll be midnight and it feels like 30 minutes passed. That's def a good thing. Work has been going well too, I work more and more shifts with my manager and at this point she's up there with my two favorite managers ever who I still speak to 5 years after leaving those jobs. She works full time, has her kids on scholarship at a really good school, and pretty much runs her household since her husband works construction and a lot of overtime. Shit is insane, I dunno how she does it but its super inspiring to me.

Things with R and I have been going better as well, he's been tapering down on his subs which at first I was worried about but he seems to be doing fine. We still have had our little "bickerments" but overall the relationship dynamic is much better. Not looking at it in a sunk cost fallacy way but we really have been through so much together... yesterday we went into downtown got poke bowls (expensive but I'm obsessed with those things lol) then we got coffee and I went to this store to do field research while he sat in the coffee shop and worked on his final speech for a class, and when I was done with my field notes I came and sat with him to type them up, and as we were sitting there, dressed all nice drinking coffee, I had a flashback to us sitting in the pile of blankets in the back of my car drawing up our shots arguing over whos gonna hold the flashlight for who and who gets the duller rig, and I thought about how back then, even if I maybe wanted this, I never in a million years thought it would happen. But somehow it did and that shit is kinda rare so we must be doing something right y'know?

Oh and one last thing! (Sorry for this dissertation 😣) I got my car up and running again! I had saved up some money myself and my dad helped me with the rest as a 25th birthday present. I still gotta take it back to get this leak fixed and get a sticker on it but that's not much and for the most part bridget ii (my cars name) and I are back on the road! I think I might've mentioned this before but one of the main reasons I waited to get it fixed (other than money ofc) is Cuz initially it was honestly too triggering to have an instant mode of transport like that and for a while even just sitting in the driver's seat gave me shitty flashbacks to being all dope sick dangerously speeding to the dealer's house. But its been long enough (and I'm busy enough!) That bridget ii and I have a new life together now, the one we've always wanted and have worked towards. I'm so happy that my little family (YES, my car is a part of my family, R, me and our two dogs lived out of her for nearly a year so yeah don't hate lol I know I'm silly) is finally all healthy taken care of and reunited.

Alright lemme wrap this up. I'm on my rag which sucks Cuz pain but I picked up these awesome CBD gummies that I tried a free sample of a while ago yesterday and they're definitely helping. So I just gotta mentally banish (or at least attempt to) the pain and get in the shower and work on my project before I go to work. I hope everyone is doing well, I feel really bad about being MIA for weeks then dropping in on a check in with a self centered ten paragraph long post lol I really do but it does help me so much posting on here even when its sporadic. I love and appreciate all of you guys and I hope everyone has a great week! 💜

Bittersweet day. Today is my one year wedding anniversary. And I just found out that a girlfriend of mine that I work on the warm line with passed away from an overdose last night. I feel so sick to my stomach. She just got a year clean last month.

This is exactly why even though it’s been over 6 years since I actually abused an opioid and over 2 years since I got off methadone I still keep Narcan nasal spray in my trunk. You never know. I also keep an extra box to give to any old “friends” if I happen to run into them. You never know, especially with the shit that’s going around today. Scary shit. Good on you for being prepared and congrats on keeping on man.

Good for you for quitting your Juul and best of luck, you got this! Quitting nicotine cold turkey is rough. :( I’ve been a smoker on and off for about 2 years and I’m on my 4th quitting attempt - the farthest I’ve made it is 3 months. I had surgery 3 months ago (2-level and quit smoking about a month before to avoid complications but I still fell back on vaping to make it a bit easier. Post-op I was doing great quitting nicotine altogether and had reached that 3 month mark again but I found myself wanting to smoke so I caved and started using the patch to help with the cravings. Of course eventually that wasn’t enough and I’ve slipped and started smoking 2-3 cigs a day for the past couple weeks. I hate that I let myself start again after being so proud of myself for hitting the 3 month mark. Before quitting I was smoking a pack every couple days and I know if I don’t quit now I’m going to end up right back there again. So I decided enough is enough and last night was my last cigarette. It’s been so nice not having a smokers cough these past few months, not smelling like smoke, and just feeling like I can breathe better and I don’t want to go back because every time it gets harder to quit.

Speaking of surgery, that brings me to why I’m here. I’d been taking hydrocodone 5mg for about 6 months before my surgery for pain from 3 herniated disks. Post-op was rough and I was in a lot of pain because I’d already built a tolerance from taking 5mg for so long and 7.5 every 4-6 hours post-op wasn’t enough for the pain. I got up to 50mg (6 pills) a day which is the highest I’ve ever taken. I started taking them out of habit even when my pain was at a tolerable level and I didn’t realize just how dependent I’d become on them until these past few weeks when my doctor moved me back down to 5mg and told me that this refill would be my last and I panicked. I gotten myself down to 10mg a day this past week or so but I’ve almost gone through my last bottle so on Friday I started taking 5mg in the mornings and that’s it. I feel like crap and the stomach problems and getting out of the habit of taking them are the worst. I have about 6 pills left so I have this week to wean myself off them and I’m dreading it. I’ve known for awhile I have an addictive personality but I told myself it was okay that I was taking 6 pills a day because I was in so much pain, but I got into the habit and started taking them even I didn’t need them anymore. I had a scare after becoming dependent on oxy a few years ago post-op after another surgery and had ended up flushing my pills at the time because my doctor kept prescribing them and I started taking them just because and was starting to abuse them. I caught myself early enough that time that the withdrawals weren’t that bad. This time around fucking sucks and I feel like crap. I knew when my doctor wrote me that first prescription and again from the way I got pissed when my doc gave my hydrocodone after my surgery because I missed oxy that I’d end up here but I didn’t really care because I loved the way it felt when I took them so much and I’ve been chasing that feeling ever since and dealing with the withdrawals and wanting more now that my supply is almost out has been a wake up call that I was in denial about being hooked this entire time. This year has been a nightmare overall for me and I’ve let it become an excuse to fall back on shitty coping mechanisms and anything that will numb the pain and it’s come back to bite me in the ass like it always does.

Sorry for the novel, I haven’t really talked to any of my family or friends about this and feel safer posting here.

When i quit smoking I also quit drinking energy drinks the same day. Lemme tell you. I was just straight up STUPID for about a week. And cranky. It gets better though, as all things do. Don’t worry.

Sorry you had to see that.

At least you're sober!

170 days! Woo