Drug Rehab Options Blog

I had a week of vacation, Thur. last week through Wed. this week. Alot has happened, I still have a long way to go though.

Thursday nite I drove w/fellow Nar-Anon members to attempt to recover one of my two cars from AS. Car was not in the parking lot of apt. he was staying at. After discussing options w/my group members, I decided to go knock on the door of the apt. My AS was there and said a friend had the car. I made arrangements to meet him Friday at a grocery store stating I needed the car back at that time.

AS did not show on Friday. One of my group members was there and I had a police officer standing by to "keep the peace." (I really thought he would show w/money to pay the title loan owing and beg me to keep the car another 30 days til next payment was due.)

I went home and called the police to report my 2nd car stolen from my apt. parking lot by my son. A man had called woman AS was staying with to ask about getting the title to 2nd car as he claims to have bought it. I was able to give police that man's name & phone number. Police talked to him, explained situation and he delivered car to police. (Car is in my name and I have a loan on it, so couldn't sell it without paying off loan.)

Saturday I learned my AS sold 1st car as well (the one w/the temporary title loan.) A different guy was calling woman AS was staying with looking for that title. I turned that over to police, they talked w/him and he delivered car to police. I have surrendered both cars - one to title loan company on Monday and other one to regular bank today.

Saturday my AS was arrested on unrelated outstanding warrant (Financial Card Fraud) he had inital hearing Monday morning and was released. Has a court date at the end of January. AS did not attempt to contact me at all to bail him out. I did pick up phone call from him today (I know, I know . . . I shouldn't have . . .) I gave him a new toothbrush that I had in my desk drawer and a $10 bus pass (I know I shouldn't even have done that.) You're all thinking how stupid is this woman?!?! After telling of car issues and then I even think of taking his call and then giving him a bus pass. I pray he'll use it to get to the Gospel Mission or MN Teen Challenge or wherever to get help & a place to stay. If not, I'm no longer responsible. I've given all the help I can and don't want to give any more. He has to help himself to have any sort of relationship with me. I am repeating "Thy Will Be Done" because I can't control it, I can only control me from here on out.

My goals are:

• Give AS NO money
• Get a hard nosed Sponsor
  • Pay off Pay Day loans
  • Buy pants that fit
  • Get a hard nosed therapist

Not necessarily in that order!

Take it easy and thanks for listening!
Joan

Greetings everyone, fellow people in recovery and so on. You all know me as Paulos, I was once a crier on this site I will admit... and I'm still not perfect. I just wanted to announce that I'll be hosting a nightly ANTI ALCOHOL/DRUGS/ADDICTION meeting *if this is alright with the mods* in the chat, 9pm eastern in the MEETING ROOM.

Why? I want to make people feel comfortable, give some hope, and just try to assist those who need it because I know we need it... we all need each other. I will be there as much as I can for the people of SR. I will not lie, I didn't gain recovery from SR, I didn't gain sobriety from it but I gained some friends and people who wanted to listen to me and care... some did not, while many did. Therefore if you wish to come to my nightly meeting by all means, come to the chat room at 9pm eastern, I will be there nightly to help out.

I hope to see you there, I hope I can give you hope and we can all exist together in harmony, sure it sounds perhaps impossible but let's give it a try. :ghug2:ghug3

Greetings everyone, fellow people in recovery and so on. You all know me as Paulos, I was once a crier on this site I will admit... and I'm still not perfect. I just wanted to announce that I'll be hosting a nightly ANTI ALCOHOL/DRUGS/ADDICTION meeting *if this is alright with the mods* in the chat, 9pm eastern in the MEETING ROOM.

Why? I want to make people feel comfortable, give some hope, and just try to assist those who need it because I know we need it... we all need each other. I will be there as much as I can for the people of SR. I will not lie, I didn't gain recovery from SR, I didn't gain sobriety from it but I gained some friends and people who wanted to listen to me and care... some did not, while many did. Therefore if you wish to come to my nightly meeting by all means, come to the chat room at 9pm eastern, I will be there nightly to help out.

I hope to see you there, I hope I can give you hope and we can all exist together in harmony, sure it sounds perhaps impossible but let's give it a try. :ghug2:ghug3

Greetings everyone, fellow people in recovery and so on. You all know me as Paulos, I was once a crier on this site I will admit... and I'm still not perfect. I just wanted to announce that I'll be hosting a nightly ANTI ALCOHOL/DRUGS/ADDICTION meeting *if this is alright with the mods* in the chat, 9pm eastern in the MEETING ROOM.

Why? I want to make people feel comfortable, give some hope, and just try to assist those who need it because I know we need it... we all need each other. I will be there as much as I can for the people of SR. I will not lie, I didn't gain recovery from SR, I didn't gain sobriety from it but I gained some friends and people who wanted to listen to me and care... some did not, while many did. Therefore if you wish to come to my nightly meeting by all means, come to the chat room at 9pm eastern, I will be there nightly to help out.

I hope to see you there, I hope I can give you hope and we can all exist together in harmony, sure it sounds perhaps impossible but let's give it a try. :ghug2:ghug3

Here I go again.

Hi everyone, fellow quitters.

In the last 3 years I have have quit, started and quit again and again and again. The longest I stayed stopped was 4 months and I vividly remember feeling great by 3 months.

Last Tuesday I had my annual physical which always includes an ECG. For the last 12 years they have always been normal. My Dr. office called me on Thursday to come back to talk about my ECG.

The news is that I have to see a cardiologist and have a stress test. My Dr. is theee WORST at answering questions so I left the office knowing next to nothing. No more than I went in with. Al she said was "Smoking has GOT TO STOP~today!!!

You'd think this would be a huge motivator to quit immediately, but I'm feeling more stressed by it. I have a few cigarettes left and plan for that to be the last. I have nicorette gum on the ready.

I've quit so many times before, but I have anxiety this time around.

Help anyone.

Hello -

I am on day one of no more weed. I have been using marijuana mostly regularly since I was 15. I am now 42 and I no longer want to be a 42 year-old pot head, though my use has slowed down somewhat in that I always just used a little through a vaporizer. But enough's enough. I would be able to go two days and then I'd be fiending for some.

I finally ran out, cannot afford to get any, and don't want any. I could say, "well, i can just smoke it if someone offers it to me," but I know that will lead to me wanting to buy some again. It always has.

I also suffer from depression and have always made this drug part of my cocktail and sometimes I feel miserable and things and then I smoke a little and it's like my mind opens up and I can get a perspective on things or a "grip," but eventually I come down off of that and I am wondering if maybe this has not been exacerbating my depression.

I have a very obsessive mind, too and I am not sure the weed has been helping me. I obsess on things for whole months at times.

I ended a relationship with a 56 year-old pot head about five months ago. He is a "high functioning" pot-head though, and makes good money running his own business and is a successful DJ too that everyone loves in the electronic music scene, but I can tell it is messing with him anyway.

During any argument he was totally irrational, not willing to accept any responsibility for anything, he was somewhat deceitful and of course, everything was all my fault in the end.

I have had a hard time detaching from this relationship, but in deciding to quit weed, I feel it gives me even more of a reason to stay away from this person (at least for a long time as a friend or fellow collaborator for now).
I never would have been able to quit weed if I were still with him.

I have been wanting to quit weed for a lot of years on a deep level. At the same time, I feel it has been one of my best friends and I am not sure how I am going to cope without it.

I have been using it to mask a lot of life stress and depression and loneliness. I use it to change my mood, but wonder if it isn't messing wtih my mood even more.

I suffer from chronic pain and severe headaches as well and was about to go and get a medical marijuana card. But seriously, I can't just use it medicinally, so that is no longer an option.

I am involved in a "scene" of a lot of artists and DJ's and the like and just about everyone I know smokes a LOT of weed. And that's just normal for them. A lot of them are also into doing harder drugs much too often - E, acid, and coke mainly.

I'm just at the point where I am sick of watching everyone get totally baked all the time as if they can't get through a day without it. And most of these people smoke way more than I did.

I used a vaporizer, which just made what I had last longer. I am glad it is gone, but I have historically not been able to get through much more than a couple of weeks w/out weed.

The summer before last, I managed to quit for three weeks and I felt a sense of poise and clarity for a while, though I was uptight a lot and anxious. I think the hard thing will be not being used to feeling clear and present.

I am also not a high-functioning pot-head due to my other problems, so I need all the extra energy I can get if I want to get through life and really go after the things I want.

I also realized that if I truly want a healthy relationship, then I need to leave my options open and would just as soon find someone who doesn't smoke pot at all. I will never get that chance if I am still at it.

I just feel lonely a lot and that I have failed a lot in life though I have beat other addictions. I can beat this one too. I really hope I can stick with it.

I do not really like the whole 12-step thing too well and have always felt fundamentally at odds with the roots of it and the religious connotations, but I am thinking of going to some NA meetings just to get some support and give me a place to go when I feel like I can't take it anymore. I know this is going to be hard and if i can pull it off, I know my life will change for the better, ultimately.

Thanks for listening.

Cat

Am I a real alcoholic? Can I always maintain control of my liquor consumption once I have started drinking? These last three paragraphs are here to help us decide for ourselves if we are in fact alcoholic. This definition of an alcoholic does nto include any of our stereotypical thinking of what an alcoholic is. This definition does not rest on "living on skid row" or "drinking all the time." It bases its definition solely on one's ability to always control one's consumption and one's ability to stop drinking altogether if a good reason exists.


Does this depiction roughly identify us? Of course, we don't fit this description exactly. Perhaps we don't expect we will ever exhibit some of these symptoms. Though, we never expected to be exhibiting the symptoms that we are suffering right now. If some of this description is too accurate to deny that it describes us and if we are having these things happen to us, perhaps we are alcoholic also.


These are not rhetorical questions. They are placed here so that we will ask them of ourselves. Our lack of an adequate answer to these questions, that ring so soundly of the truth, shines a bright light on our predicament.


Have we reached the point where little can be done for us? Have we reached the point where there is little hope for our recovery? Having arrived at the point where there is little that can be done for us, where is it that we can turn for a solution? Admitting that we have arrived at this point is the first step in recovery.

Drank late last night in the morning. Puked my guts up this morning. Feeling very bad. Liver hurts, stomach hurts. Heart beating all weird. I am a binge-drinker, and I usually only drink alone. I have been truly battling this for several years but just got serious about recovery today. I called my counselor and my girlfriend and confessed the true level of my problem. It felt pretty good, but I may lose my girlfriend because of it. I usually have problems after going three or four days (when my symptoms go away). After I start feeling better I let my guard down and slip right back into it and binge until I get sick, usually drinking for at least 2 or 3 days straight. Any hope/encouragement from fellow bingers? I need to start going to a group. My counselor recommend I go every day for the next two weeks. How do I find this many meetings in my area? I live in Orange County, CA, and couldn't find very many meetings going on anywhere near me this week.

It wasn't until I was a year sober, mostly doing meetings, meetings and more meetings that I realized although not taking that first drink was/is the most important thing I do each day, that simply not drinking was no longer enough.

The untreated 'ism' (I, self, me) was still very much alive and well.

I listened to a speaker tape the other day where the speaker talked about all the untreated cases of the 'ism' that are in the rooms of AA.

My sponsor called and shared with me the other day a good example of the untreated 'ism' in an alcoholic who had remained dry for 8 months, but choose to walk away from AA and not do the work necessary to ensure sobriety, rather than being dry.

He received a call late night from this fellow whose girlfriend had just walked out on him, and his solution was to drink and take sleeping pills and drink some more, take some more sleeping pills, and then call someone in AA.

Thankfully a local AAer (my sponsor is an over the road driver and was out of state at the time) also got involved, called the police (no one wanted to find the chap dead of an OD the next day), and the guy was taken to the hospital. They did manage to get him up and responding in his home after the police arrived, but better safe than sorry.

This was a sad reminder to me to pay very close attention to whether I am actively working on the 'ism' in my recovery, or just sitting at meetings and talking the talk.

Hello fellow sobriety pilgrims,

I haven't posted or even lurked in quite a while. Life is busy and focused elsewhere, but that's good I guess.

What's keeping me from drinking? Oh yes, I still get the occasional strong urge to "relax" with that tumbler full of golden, smooth, Canadian Velvet on ice.

I was looking back at an entry from Aug 13 in my journal: "Praise God (my hp) as the momentum and healing continue. I continue to be impressed with the intertwined relationship of alcohol abuse and other abuses. Give up the one, and the others become manageable."

That is what has been keeping me sober. Fits of un-managed anger, or lust, or womanizing, or irresponsible internet behavior... Being sober means these other monsters loose much of their power. And, not indulging in them, takes pressure of needing to drink. The vicious cycle.

Thanks for letting me share,

Paul