Wow! That’s incredibly generous of you. Thank you! And you pretend not to care.
I agree. The current therapist I’m seeing is not an ex-addict (as far as I know), but I’m seeing her more for the ADD/SCT, and in that respect, she’s not only a specialist, but she has it. It would be ideal if I could find a therapist in both, but that’s an extremely rare bread. Know any recovering addicts and ADD specialists qualified to be therapists?
(For what it’s worth, I did try to see a drug addiction therapist early in my journey, but he rejected me because he thought I had already past the point where I need help; he said his specialty was helping those who are currently struggling with drug/alcohol addiction.)
(Also for what it’s worth, this addiction therapist encouraged me NOT to lump recreational drugs in the same category as prescription drugs; “taking anti-depressants is not the same as dropping acid,” he said; so even with these specialists, they see the importance of prescription drugs.)
Agreed with reservations, but do note: recovering addicts serving as therapists also study psychology and want to be heroes.
Exactly! It doesn’t have the capacity for it.
You mean me personally?
Prepare to be called arrogant again. I’m not alienated from my family. I have really good relations with my children, better now than ever. I don’t get to see them all the time because my ex and I are separated, but I would hardly call that alienated. I have no doubt the separation had a lot to do with my drug/alcohol habbits (even though my ex never said it), but it was mutual. She had her own fair share of problems that I couldn’t deal with. And even though I consider myself recovered now, on the right track with my life, I wouldn’t take her back (no offense to her). I’ve enjoy life more as a bachelor than as a married man, so I call that an improvement. And as far as the losing jobs thing, I explicitely said in my posts that this happened during my 1 and a half years away from drugs and alcohol, and that it is obvious to me now that the main culprit is ADD/SCT. (Did you read any of what I wrote?). Same with the feeling of emptiness and hopelessness… that remains even while off the drugs and alcohol and has been shown to be a symptom of SCT. So yeah, it does come across as pretty arrogant that you think you know that these are caused by the drugs and alcohol. Project much?
(Unless, of course, you meant this in general, not me specifically.)
What it asks is immediate gratification. This might be drugs, but it’s alive and well even in those who have never done drugs or alcohol. The reason children throw tantrums when we tell them to eat their vegetable before they get dessert is because they have a well developed primative brain long before they develop a rational brain. It’s literally asking for the immediate gratification of dessert without earning it by eating vegetables. This is why I felt it important to be specific in what the Theoden/Wormtongue metaphor stood for: it represents neurological structures in the brain, structures which don’t only react to cravings for drugs and alcohol. But yes, drugs and alcohol will definitely be one of the triggers if one has a long history of use.
I do what? This thread is a tool to help bolt down the commitment. Announcing a commitment at the top of a hill so all can hear it is a well known psychological tool for fortifying that commitment. Not sure what you meant.
BTW Pedro, you’re an impulsive poster. Nothing wrong with that, but I feel bulldozed by your posts. I can’t keep up. I won’t let this be a distraction, so I’m not going to respond to everything you post.
Fixed Cross, I’ll try to carry on our conversation, but like I said to Pedro, I don’t want this to be a distraction (I’ve got a job interview to prepare for tomorrow). So I may or a may not, but I did read and appreciate your posts.
These first Friday nights were the SHIT though, the first year.
the second year some of them felt a little dragging.
the third year my friend threw himself out of the window and landed right there in the garden where we always smoked and had eaten shrooms the once.
Not so nice! As Borat would say.
Wow. Yeah, there is some hard truth here.
Proving a point to oneself mainly I suppose - this never had to do, whereas my dead friends all really very much did.
I already knew it was all bullshit except who and what you care about so much that you’ll do your best on their account.
That is the nature of the beast. How do you say “one must be a toreador to overcome the stubborn motherfucker”? Tengo que eres un toreador para … matar … el caracho puta de toro?
I can mostly congratulate you on your accomplishment. 1.5 years is a lot longer than you set out for.
Keep it up, Id say. You know cellular structure is only replaced after 7 years. That does include braincells too, or information to that extent was published a few years ago.
Gib didn’t seem to value mine much, where as I was writing I had the impression it would be otherwise. Annoying but educational. Addiction isn’t philosophic. Just some drugs offer some philosophic ground.
Except the diabetic doesn’t have the power to not act on it.
Unless you want to equate an insulin regime with the will to stay clean in contradiction of ones natural inclinations.
Addiction is self-valuing in terms of self-expansion.
Nothing can replace any drug except a stronger drug, in all other cases, the self-valuing is constrained and needs to value its being-constrained in terms of itself - it must say “I am an addict” to no longer be an addict in action. Like “I am a hothead” doesn’t mean you absolutely need to knock the crap out of someone every now and then, you just realize oh wait Im rather hot-headed, lets have a glass of iced tea and play some races.
“Except the diabetic doesn’t have the power to not act on it.”
Except neither does the addict, really. This is why only an addict can be trusted to treat addicts. Only an addict understands this. Anybody else, no matter how well meaning, will always in the end consider it a thing about will power.
If an addict had a choice, they would choose drugs lol. The will power is fine. That’s not the problem.
It’s decidedly not about choosing not to. In asense, rehab is very Nietzschean. Freedom not to means shit. The Dwarf laughs at that. “Why not?” he knowingly whispers. Freedom to is what rehab gives.
In experiments where mice are hooked on morphine, they eventually stop eating alltogether and just go for the morphine all the time. And die. Does that sound like power not to to you?
But even with such a clear example, you would not understand it. Only an addict would. And that’s fine, we don’t ask you to. But that’s why addicts are treated like shit.
Can you choose not to take a shit?
Experiments indicate the urge to do drugs in an addict is 10x stronger than the urge to drink way-ter.
To explain how some, like Gib, ALLEGEDLY spend up to 1 1/2 dry, my therapist used to sy: yeah but a smoker can go on an 8 hour flight and not even feel a craving. Because he knows, as soon as that bitch lands, he’s smoking half a pack right there.
But he’s already decided, he’s not plotting to or considering, he already in his mind is set upon, to do amphetamines (that’s what ADD medication is).
Some people are genetically wired in such a way as that they can spend a whole year doing morphine every day and, even though they will have physical withdrawal after, they will be fine quitting. It just, their system isn’t affected. Something in how genes make a brain in addicts makes it so that as soon as it understands that it can be at once flooded with that amount of neurotransmitters, nothing less will do. Literally. You understand this philosophically. But not… physically. Treatment has been developed to deal with this, but I won’t go into it. There’s no cheating treatment.
Here’s the kicker, and in some place deep down all addicts know this: it is not that your life is fucked so you do drugs. It is that you make sure your life is fucked so that you can do drugs. The drugs are the deciding element. Drugs are simply more important. There is not even a vaguely close second.
I guess that would be my struggles at ATB, especially being canned. At that point, I was more than a year into drug abstinence, and so I figured: this has to be the ADD/SCT. More recently however, I’ve been wondering if it’s the fact that I’m selling myself as a senior developer and I prove to be a disappointment to my employers when they find out I’m not quite at that level; I should be a senior, though, as I’ve been doing this for over 15 years; Maybe the ADD has been holding me back from gaining the appropriate expertise. It is considered a learning disability after all. And I’m sure the drugs didn’t help.
I knew I had ADD since grade 3, and SCT is something I learned about much later, but still when I was doing drugs and alcohol. The real switch in my mind came when I got canned, though. I realized that quitting the drugs and alcohol has done nothing to ameliorate my job situation, and so the ADD/SCT must be playing a much stronger role than I thought.
True, he doesn’t choose it, he just doesn’t have the strength to avoid it.
I don’t have much experience with Shamanism or its madness, but what you say makes sense. If what you’re going for with drugs is that kind of madness, then shamanic madness might well serve as a substitute. The deep fulfillment I mention probably doesn’t (unless that’s what the drugs did for you–give you a false sense of fulfillment), but it can be enough for one to say: why would I risk losing this by doing drugs?
Oh, for sure! Drugs can give us experiences that we end up valuing far more than anything life could offer us. But they need something to start with, something natural to life itself and then amplify it ten-fold.
Something that can be brought back to sober reality. It’s uncannily similar to the teachings of Eastern philosophy.
Ah, so to become greater than you ever were even with the help of drugs. ← That certainly is a holy grail if ever there was one.
Sure! Point taken. Amphetamines can be abused just as much as any other drugs (AFAIK), and the potential for addiction is there all the same (I think). I’ve been taking it for 3 days so far. It’s helping with the moodiness and fatigue, maybe a bit of self-control. Not so much the cognitive deficiencies that come with ADD, but that’s just a subjective perspective. Will have to discuss with my therapist.
Yes, originally I wanted to do a year, but I wanted one full year of detachment from anything holding me back from reaching my full potential, and that included my book. I finally published my book on Dec 5 2018, which is why the 1 year really began then. I’m still holding fast to a commitment not to do the drugs which were actually harming me (alcohol, caffeine, and cannabinoids) with no expiry except maybe retirement.
Nonsense! I value your posts plenty! But like I said, I’m busy with stuff and can’t keep up. So I have to be frugal.
Zero_Sum,
Merry X-Mas to you too my fascist friend! Good to see you still kicking around. How are you and Wendy? How goes the fight to tear down the fabric of modern society? I rarely frequent ILP anymore–just not the same without the drugs–so please tell me how things have been here.
Pedro,
Nothing. I just wanted to reply to your posts and found that you posted again right before I was ready to hit the submit button. I said ugh. I want to be thorough in reading everyone’s posts and being sure to reply where appropriate. It kinda seemed like you were on a never-ending roll. But even if you wrote all those in a notepad file and posted only when you were sure you had nothing more to say, I’d still have difficulty keeping up.
A long time ago, you said:
Then I said:
And then you said:
Thank God!
I know, but that’s just a word game. You mean something different by it than what I mean. You mean that addicts will always have an addictive personality (or perhaps, the potential for the drug abuse to be reawakened at the slightest trigger). I mean, addicts can commit themselves to not taking drugs (successfully!). I take that as obvious, and that both meanings are valid in their own contexts. And there’s certainly a time and place for each. At an AA meeting, calling yourself an ex-addict means you’re in denial. Calling yourself an ex-addict to a girl you’re trying to impress, however, is just honesty–you’re telling her you used to do drugs but you don’t anymore. Can you imagine the miscommunication if you told her you were a drug addict? Try explaining that to her after she walks away.
Look, Pedro, if you’re going to insist that there’s no difference whatsoever between taking prescribed medication to help with ADD and a junkie feeding his addiction by shooting up, then you’re living in a bubble that I can’t pop, nor will I expend the energy to try. Let’s just agree to disagree, shall we? I’d tell you to get out of my thread, but I know I can’t stop you from posting. So I’m just going to have to tolerate your annoying judgements and misconceptions of my life choices.
I’ll tell you one thing though: that itch I mention? The I-told-you-so one, seems to be the only thing driving you in this thread. I don’t think you care for me at all. You come in acting all altruistic, with noble intentions, taking the higher road, but when it comes down to it, I’d say you’re jealous. You see a man who has done what you could never do, not alone. I suspect this is especially stinging to you because, like all addicts, you had to turn to something else to fill the void that drugs once filled, and that seems to be this AA recovery cloud you’re riding high on. It means everything to you–your world, your self-worth, your identity–and you can only feel good about yourself if you can play the part of the wise seasoned veteran, the one who has graduated to a level of maturity from which he can impart wisdom to those struggling along the path he once walked. You need us in order to give your life meaning. So when I come along and don’t fit your rigid preconception about how drug addicts are supposed to behave, how they’re supposed to feel, what their psychology is made of, etc., you don’t know what to do except to doubt the veracity of my words and construe taking care of myself with ADD medication to be the equivalent of a junkie shooting up. This is about you, you’re need to re-validate yourself. Your words are not that of sound advise, they are the cries of neuroticism. You may be clean, but in the words of Random Factor, “something is not done with you.”
I don’t expect you to believe anything I say or take it at face value. It is simply my duty as an addict who has undergone treatment, to make sure you heard it.
Worth noting that a non-addict would have not taken offense at anything I said.
“Calling yourself an ex-addict to a girl you’re trying to impress, however, is just honesty–you’re telling her you used to do drugs but you don’t anymore. Can you imagine the miscommunication if you told her you were a drug addict? Try explaining that to her after she walks away.”
I told a girl I am an addict. This was after she noticed how I freaked out every time booze made an appearance (I was in my second year of recovery, but it still irks me). Trust me, I did not say ex-addict. If I’m an ex-addict, why should I be scared? Tricks the Dwarf plays. Anyway, I had to peel her off me.
Like I said, the shame is the first thing to attack.
Yeah, I don’t believe I cheated on my year and a half off because, you know, I was there.
Of course, he wouldn’t! What you said wouldn’t be about him! (or you wouldn’t say it.)
Dude, she obviously inferred you were a recovering alcoholic from the context. D’uh! She saw you freaking out over the alcohol, probably noticed you weren’t drinking. Put 2 and 2 together, and voila.
Try this: go somewhere where you can pick up girls. Walk up to one and start a conversation. Tell her you’re an alcoholic or drug addict. Don’t set it up so that she can infer from the context that you’re recovering. Report back about what happens.
But even if you wrote all those in a notepad file and posted only when you were sure you had nothing more to say, I’d still have difficulty keeping up.