On the "Pity-pot"?

No posts for 5.5 years. I guess you could say I don't share much. I suppose this is my journal and I need to get some things out. Married life can sometimes be pretty tough. Especially when you are married to a fairly immature person. I had considered myself to be pretty immature and greatly lacking patience. But I have repeatedly found myself to be the one exercising the most patience with her as well as the kids. I always felt guilty about my lack of patience, and the way I "handled" life in general. That was one of the reasons I drank and drugged. If you are numb you usually don't overreact. Sertraline kind of did that for me. It was a great antidepressant for me for several years. I have recently gotten off it and have started on Remeron because of the side-effects. Lack of motivation to do anything around the house and sexual dis function. Being off the sertraline has been a little enlightening and a little discomforting. I am seriously considering divorce. Even on the sertraline there were a couple times when I shared with her my desire to commit suicide. These suicidal thoughts were brought on because of her constant belittling of me and speaking down to me no matter if we were alone or not. Even now it continues. I can see that she says what she probably believes are the most hurtful things she can think of. I have tried to actually look at some of these things to see if there was any truth to them. But when she says I am not a man, well, that is a little ridiculous. She never has a nice thing to say to me and I sometimes feel like we are in a bit of a competition. For what? Control of the relationship? I have told her many times this is supposed to be a 50-50 thing. Another thing that bothers me is that she has said many many times that she can do whatever she wants because she is the boss. She says these stupid things in front of the kids quite often. I am sometimes in wonder at her level of emotional maturity. I also think her upbringing is to blame for some of this. It is quite obvious she was a spoiled child. She plays that part with her mother and her brothers. They take it without uttering a word. When angry at me, she will not speak, nor discuss what is bothering her. That can go on for a couple days, then in the middle of the night she will want to fuck. I use the word fuck to describe it because I do not feel like it is making love. I would prefer we talk our differences out first. Today is another non-communicating day. I tried to get her to respond to a question, but got no answer. In frustration I asked her what her problem was. She then repeated everything I said back to me. Me: "What's your problem?" Her: "What's your problem?" Me: "I am getting tired of this" Her: "I am getting tired of this". Another exchange that slips my mind, then I said she was acting like our 8 year old daughter Leanna. How silly. Was she so angry that she couldn't think of what she wanted to say? I am wondering how much more of this I am willing to accept before I decide to get a divorce. I was looking at some sites online which had questionnaires for those thinking of divorce. Obviously I am in the minority being male, because so many of the questions were directed at women. Does he do this or does he do that? LOL. I may be an ass hat, but how can I face that when she won't even tell me what it was that upset her. She apparently holds onto that so that at a later time she can justify her demeaning behavior towards me. Maybe there is no rational reason. I am not a mind-reader. I have enough problems with my own head. Oh well. God is good. I will endure until I have to move on. As an adult with a clear conscience.

I"m back...

Well, after a pretty long time away from the blog, I am back. Recovery is still awesome compared to active addiction. My life has continued to get better and many positive changes have occurred, especially the births of a baby girl and two years later, a baby boy! I will share more soon.

When Now Seems Like Forever

Living with depression can be quite challenging at times. I need to keep reminding myself that things are not as bad as my mind would have me believe. It is no wonder I abused drugs and alcohol for so many years. To naturally desire escape and peace from these feeling without knowing any positive ways to cope with them either leads to madness or self-medication. I know there are many others out there living with this problem and I am sure some of them are self-medicating. We do not hear enough about these types of problems in my opinion. Also, people who have not suffered from depression probably have a hard time understanding it. When I am depressed, I feel quite hopeless and my thoughts become obsessive. I continually am thinking about the things that are wrong in my life which just deepens the gloomy feelings. But I have learned to remember all the blessing I have, especially at times like this. I also must realize that my mind can be my worst enemy. Things are almost never as bad as I think they are. I have heard someone say, "the worst things in my life never happened", or something like that. I am grateful to have found help from my doctor and most of all to the most famous 12 step program. It is ongoing therapy which I will need for the rest of my life. For whatever the reason, my mind sometimes is just not 'right', but I am now able to realize this. Thank God for that. I wish you all peace and serenity!

Early Days

My life, as far back as I can remember, has been troubled. I was always getting in trouble, but I never really knew why I did some of the things I did. One of my earliest memories was when I was very young, maybe 5 or 6 years old. The street in front of my house was being oiled. It was a paved street. First they would spray oil or some kind of runny black tar, then they would spread sand on top of it. It was a paved road, so when the hot oil was fresh and not yet covered with sand, it looked like a sheet of black ice. I only remember a couple of things about this. The first thing about it was I was riding my tricycle on the sidewalk and I was very interested in what the men were doing to the street. I remember my Mother saying something like, "don't go in the street". My next memory is of me trying to ride my tricycle in the oil and falling over and getting that oil all over me. The men started yelling and I started crying. The only other thing I can remember was my Mother scrubbing the oil off my body. She had to use kerosene to get it off me. Another early memory was an attempt to make wine or grape juice. I was intrigued with the neighbor's air conditioner, It was a modern unit for central air conditioning. It looked like a big green box with a fan on top covered by a grille. I would sometimes stand by it and wait for it to start. This was noticed by one of my sisters who warned me not to play with it. One day, I happened to be eating grapes while I was watching the air conditioner. This neighbor also had a large grapevine. Somehow I got the idea to stick a grape in the fan. I was delighted by what the fan did to the grape, so I proceeded to gather bunches of grapes and started to push them through the grille into the fan. It made quite a mess. The side of the neighbors house and the front of my shirt and face were covered with grape juice. The only other thing I remember about this episode was the fact that the neighbor had to have a repairman come to her house and fix the air conditioner. Maybe he only had to clean it out, I don't know. I do know that I was punished severely for this, but it didn't change my behaviour. Well, after 40 years, I have finally changed for the better. I will share more of my early adventures next time. Take care!

A Clearer Perception

One thing my recovery depends upon is my daily realization that many of my usual ways of thinking are flawed. Recovery, to me, must be an onward march towards perfection of thought and action. I know that I will never be perfect, it is a goal only. While I was using, I was deluded with the idea that I could become perfect. The failed attempts to do everything perfectly was just another reason to beat myself up and to prove to myself that I was a failure. I had become comfortable with failure. Whatever accomplishments I did achieve, I usually did something to sabotage. It got to the point that whenever I was making some kind of progress in my life, I started feeling uncomfortable and subconsciously or conscientiously began doing things which would get me back in trouble. My addiction used these failures as proof that I was not good enough or good at all. Those were the feelings that I was used to. Success made me feel uncomfortable because it caused me to have feelings which I was not used to. Today I have a clearer perception of myself. I am just another human being whose life is fragile and uncertain. But today, by trying to do the right thing, I reap the rewards of serenity and peace. Feelings of guilt are painful and hard to bear. They block out the serenity I depend upon to live my life as a happy person. My old ways of thinking and of perceiving reality lead to flawed choices and actions. I am happier now than at any time during my using past. I must watch daily for my old thinking patterns and recognize them for what they are. They are just delusions of an addict. I can do the right thing most of the time if I remember my place in the world as just another human being trying to do the next right thing. I am no better and no worse than anyone else. I have become comfortable with this realization. It is another source of serenity. I am not God and I have no control over people, places and things. The only control I have is self-control and it must start with my negative thoughts and perceptions. It is no longer me against the world. It is me against my old self. I can and will win many battles against my old ways of thinking, but I will never win the war. I am not perfect and never will be. Life is a journey. It has become a happy one thanks to my sobriety and my new, more positive ways of perceiving the world around me. I wish you all the love and happiness that an addict can experience. It begins with sobriety one day at a time. It takes a changing of perception and anyone can do it.

Drug Rehab-A Personal Account

My personal experience with drug rehab was not a success. I had gone to the local hospital seeking help for my problem. I was having quite a problem with a GHB. I had gotten to the point where I needed to take this stuff about every two hours or I would begin to experience withdrawal symptoms. I had maintained my GHB level for about a year and a half. During this time I would bounce from overdose to overdose. I was amazingly still holding down a job, but I was thoroughly exhausted. The hospital had no experience with this drug, but I was admitted anyway. I don't remember much about my early detox. I was hallucinating and psychotic for about three days. When I finally became coherent, I started attending the rehab program. I was serious about getting off drugs and staying clean, but I was not totally beat by drugs and alcohol because in my mind, I still had the idea that somehow I was different from the other people in rehab. I learned a lot in the program and became friends with most of my fellow addicts. Despite having gained much knowledge about addiction and about myself, when I was finally discharged I only stayed clean for about a week. What caused my relapse? Many things. I learned about triggers in rehab, but once I was back in my old environment, I was overwhelmed by them. My house was filled with memories of using. There was one particular room where I had done most of my using. It almost seemed haunted. I felt very uncomfortable every time I had to be in there and I avoided that room as much as possible. There were many people and places that I could not avoid. It was too much for me and I fell right back into my old patterns of thinking and then the obsession returned. For me, I know now that I could never have stayed clean in that environment. How much of it needed to be different? I honestly don't know. There was too much for me to cope with in those old surroundings and old ways of thinking cannot be changed in 30 days. I had drank and drugged for 20 years. During that time I had put a lot of effort into getting high. I will need to put a lot of effort into my recovery. Getting high had it's rewards. Recovery has it's rewards as well. I needed to get to the point where I could experience the rewards of sobriety on a daily basis because I got high on a daily basis for so long. There are many rewards that sober living gives to me which active addiction never could. Too many to list. One very big difference for me is that the load of guilt I used to carry around is now gone. I have found true happiness and peace. It is more than I had ever hoped for or thought that I deserved. We all deserve to feel this way. You can too. There is hope for all of us. Seek and you will find it. It can be found among others in recovery.

Instant Update

Wow. I just found out that my cousin was stabbed to death last night. He was only 30 years old, but had a troubled life. Perhaps this ending to His life will be a wake-up call to His older brother. I, myself, was once on this same road to hell. But by a miracle, not of my own making, was I saved from that lonely end. Drugs and alcohol had been my only source of relief for most of my life, but became my prison as well. For those who do not understand addiction, I would describe it to you. Imagine yourself lost in a vast forest or jungle. You are feeling overcome with the fear of never finding your way home. You have walked a long way and are exhausted mentally and physically. You stop to rest. As you ponder your situation, you remember the last time you felt any happiness or hope. It was the last time you got high. You were sure you had found the way out, but when the high was gone, your hope and happiness was gone too. So onward you trekked, driven by your innate will to survive. Until you needed to rest, so here you are resting. Your thoughts keep returning to that last good feeling. After a while, you can resist the urge no more. Your own mind has somehow convinced you, once again, that you will find your way if only you are high again. You have rationalized all past misdeeds and anything else your conscience can through your way till only the guilt and remorse remain when remembering the past. Your addiction uses this as a bludgeon, to beat you into submission. You are exhausted and reach for the only relief you know. Escape into the "high". But every subsequent high brings only shorter periods of happiness and hope. When your high is gone, you realize that you have been only walking in circles, going nowhere. You pick yourself up, more exhausted than before and travel on again until the time comes when you must rest again. The inevitable happens. You are an addict and you do what addicts do. You reach for the only escape that you know, even if it is only temporary. You are so tired and there is no end in sight except one. You are truly lost. It is, you believe, your fate. So you end up doing anything and everything to get your relief and make sure it is available when you need it. These actions only add to your remorse and guilt. It is a downward spiral. There is no hope and rest will only come at the very end. I hope this will give non-addicts some understanding of what it feels like on the inside of active addiction. To those still actively addicted, you now know that there is a way out. You can find the way just as I have. If you do, it will be more than you had ever hoped for. I wish you all good luck and happiness. With Love....