detox success with suboxone : day 4

dude. cant believe it has already been four days, four FULL fucking days, without junk. wednesday, thursday, friday, saturday. four fucking days.

tuesday we used around noon and a bit later, maybe 4pm. our habit, fairly substantial this round. i certainly would have overdosed on the amount Ive been doing in a shot if this was any other year out of the last decade. about .2g of high quality ($80-$100 a g heroin) or a gram and a half of shitcrap quality tar ($30-$40 a g) PER issue. one or two issues a day. or three issues. and a rinse. of course. so that was our habit. doing anything less i wouldnt feel; doing half the above described amounts would maybe *maybe* get me well for a few hours.

the kick:
tuesday night my husband and i each swallow half of a suboxone (4mg). the important part. the key word in the above sentence: *swallow*. note, we are swallowing the half of a suboxone only a few hours after using. we aren't even sick yet; fuck, we aren't even done being high for the most part ... just out of the nod and ready for bed. obviously we sleep like babies.

wednesday morning we each take another half, swallowed. i always swallow the suboxone so that the naloxone doesnt work and i dont have to worry about being thrown into withdrawals. sometimes if im itchy and its been a few days Ill let it dissolve just to help with the disuasion from getting high. we took another half each that afternoon and another before bed. this night i dont sleep right thru. i wake up. early, like before midnight. and then wake up again around 230am or so. i take another half around 4am maybe. go to a 6am 12-step meeting. my husband sleeps thru the night tho; only gets up once to piss. and its not like i was restless, sweaty, all that shit. i feel physically fine i just cant fucking sleep.

thursday afternoon take another half. we both take a quarter (2mg) before bed thursday night. we both sleep like babies.

friday. well fuck. what do you know. we dont take anything and feel fine the whole fucking day. brilliant.

saturday (today) we took a quarter around noon just because we thought that we might maybe possibly feel just slightly "ehh". as far as Im concerned the kick is done, Im peeing clear, uncloudy piss.

the only real sideaffect i felt during this kick was low energy, and a bit of insomnia (which my darling didnt experience - he did feel low on energy).

we'd been strung out since february or so ... think we had 7 days at once point. maybe 3 days on about 2-3 occassions. just incase youre thinking "no fucking way these people couldnt have had a habit and kicked so goddamn EASILY what the fuck?!" truth is i have been taking suboxone on and off for a little over 5 years (since the end of 2007). my husband has been taking it off and on for 2 years (since aug 2010 tho we were clean aug 2010-june 2011). i love suboxone. for the most part it lets me regulate my habit so that its never out of control. ive had job since ive had my scrip. a roof over my head. no arrests. before that i was arrested 9 times in the course a year. homeless. shoplifting. unemployable.

anyways good luck to all. if you have any questions do enquire and Ill give you the best answer Ive got from my experience. xoxo

the space in between discipline & thought

so it has been a minute. a few days composing a few weeks almost rounding out a month. my apologies to whomever might care. life is life is life. and here i am again. after a sabbatical during which i learned nothing new and pleasantly reminded myself that in all actuality i dont like knowing what Im thinking or what i might think Im feeling. bah.

no days clean. thats where Im at. up north managed to stay loaded with the exception of a day, the hours of which i dont think could even be rounded up to 24 hours. my band managed to play an inpromptu show at the end of a cul-de-sac. a decent number of folks showed up considering the late notice and i think a good time was had by all despite the show being more like a rehersal than a show.

we returned back south. home. to ventura. where we continued to stay loaded. the in-laws came over for dinner, with my parents and my brothers and a travelling brother-in-law, at our place. just after dinner i did the rinse. after which i could not - for the death of me! - keep my goddamn fucking eyes open. during the moments i could keep them open they certainly werent in focus. nor open all the way. i failed at solving the opposite problem with my mouth, which i couldn't - for the life of me! - keep closed. two blatant "IM LOADED AS FUCK!" traits. an embarrassing time was had by all, except me due to the complete apathetic state that junk puts me in. the next day the embarrassment caught up to me as i doggy-paddled thru confrontation after confrontation after pseudo-halfhearted-faux intervention.

mom: "is your husband in denial or was he just trying to cover up for you?"
that said with regard to me being loaded & her (luckily!) under the impression that my husband is clean. thank god she thinks he is doing well!

as we near the end of the month the same conclusions as always arise: i wish we had more money. more motivation to live. more enjoyment in our life. i wish we did more. that our lives had more value. that we cared enough to do something to create more value. and all this would probably be possible if we didnt spend every extra dollar on junk.

everything seems to go into our gas tank or into our arms.
well, not my arm because i hit my femoral. but its all the same to me as long as the result is the same. and it is. and after all these years i want a different result. but because life is ok. because i go to work and i go to school and i have a decent relationship with my family and i pay my bills because of all of that because of the lack of emotional despair and the presence of responsible enough living i just dont have the push to clean up. i like checking out once or twice a day. i like getting high. i enjoy shooting heroin and how it makes the few problems i have (do i have problems? really? perhaps i could be a bit more financially responsible. donate to good causes. get new tires for my car. spend money on things that make me feel alive instead of asleep) dissolve in the dreamscape of my nod. Ive tried hitting bottom before & it didnt work. it briefly provided the necessary motivation to stay clean and then when things improved i got high and simply didnt go back to the bottom - being homeless for a year seemed to scar those who love me more than it did me. i dont know if it even was bottom. i had a pretty fucking alright time and enjoyed most of it with the exception of not being able to take nice, warm baths whenever i wanted. certainly learned more about myself and the world than i did from the 3 year spent getting my college degree.

so maybe its just a matter of discipline at this point. when Ive been clean the most important thing i did was not use my brain. anytime i thought : i failed. i couldnt think AND stay clean. i had to just do, without thinking. and as long as i did, and didnt think, i stayed clean. i just dont know if i have the discipline right now to not think, even if itll do me good. its a difficult thing to commit to. where is the middle ground? give me directions and perhaps Ill meet you there next month.

xoxo

and now another 7 hour drive

just. quickly. wanted to put that yesterday i endedup taking a quarter (2mg) of suboxone around noon. later around 9pm i noticed my nose running when i tilted my head down & took a half (4mg). slept like a baby. no heroin yesterday. played a show with my band in the driveway of my folks house. got pretty good attendance considering that we only posted the event around 10pm Sunday. now off for coffee. will probably take another quarter later. hoping to make it thru the city without doing anything. its just one of those things ... stuck in a car for 7 hours there doesnt seem to be anything better at the end of the road than a nice big shot of heroin to cure the aches.

suboxone : heroin

i still dont understand why this works as good as it does for us. yesterday during our seven hour drive we talked about how as the years pass more & more i believe that the kick is mostly psychological. i see people who dont want to quit try & use suboxone and they go into withdrawals even if theyve waited way longer than i ever would to take part of a sub. and they hold onto that excuse and parade the fuck out of it. Ive experienced some withdrawals with subs if i let them dissolve and if i dont wait long enough - but if i use some smack they go away and then if i continue taking the subs i continue getting detoxed without the kick.

its like how the first kick is free. i went on a goddamn 6 hour hike with a 50 pound backpack into the wilderness of tahoe with my dad the first time i went thru withdrawals. 24 hours from fixing when i started the hike. the day before Id flown from Dulles International to SFO. barely slept the night. drove the 5 hours to tahoe. climbed a fucking mountain. all the while "if i was a strung-out junkie would i really be this ok doing this? come on dad!" its like because you dont know whats in the mail you never receive it. the next time isnt quite so easy.

yesterday we went a solid 30 hours, didnt take any suboxone, felt absolutely fine. just two sneezing fits on the way up. made it to the city around 8:30pm. didnt really care to use but you know how it is with old habits dying hard. went to see a friend and its just what we do when we see her. shot a gram and a half split with my husband (the junk isnt as good in the city, i mean you can get good junk but who wants to wait?). now its another 12 hours later still feeling 100% might take a quarter or a half before bed. then a bit tomorrow and we should be done kicking. why it works this way i have no fucking clue. its just my experience. it doesnt make sense by medical standards, what they tell you about suboxone how yr supposed to take it and all that. just another reason why i keep thinking the majority of the kick is psychological.

now the trick is to stay busy. cartwheels and such.

got to play a show at 5pm tonight. late notice. itll be amazing if anyone shows.

oh, speed.

so brilliant me! we must go north tomorrow so see my folks, who will then return with us south and stay two nights. the house is a disaster, a mild one but still ... its just barely not tidy enough for house guests. as i mentioned in my previous post: it is time to kick. what goes with a messy house and time to kick? speed!!

my brainium decided it would be brililant to get a little bag of speed last night. i envisioned myself cleaning up the house with the drive and attention to detail that only comes with using speed. i am not a fan of speed meth chrystal crank ice glass whathaveyou. i am not one bit of a fan. so i thought perfect! its time to kick! and when i do speed i spend hours introspective and always come to the conclusion that i want my life to have value and that using takes value away from my life (at this point - 10 years ago that was not the case as what Ive learned about myself by having a habit is invaluable. Ive learned more about myself and the world by getting a habit than by getting my degree from college.) Plus my husband turns into a wonderful loving attentive partner when on speed.

Well i have to jet but let me sum it up: the house is not clean. my husband played poker on the phone for 9 hours. and because we have the 7 hour drive tomorrow we have to sleep tonight which means we ended up using smack anyway. but i took a quarter of a sub so i should be set tomorrow to continue kicking comfortably.

suboxone

took half a sub today, this morning, upon waking up. felt like shit; thats actually a gross overstatement - my nose was running and i felt anxious and restless. this is standard. normal withdrawal symptoms 18 hours or so post-fix. theres a weird kindof comfort that comes with initial withdrawal. things seem brighter. the anxiety more than anything else is what keeps me fixed to the junk.

the best method Ive found for a quick kick is to take a sub on day one, fix then or a little bit later, and then cross my fingers to continue taking subs without the smack for the next two days. Ive literally fixed, taken a sub, then shot up - all within a 5-10 minute period; Ive never read anywhere about this being safe and read/heard from multiple sources that it isn't ... but that hasn't been my experience, its never whipped me into withdrawal but i always swallow it. i dont let it dissolve. this seems to make the naloxone irrelevant and conveniently avoids the taste of the pill. Ive been doing this for the last five years when i feel like i need to cut down or take a break or just want to save some money.

i need to drive north to see my parents and friends this weekend and while north i make a point not to fix which means kicking. i also want to save a bit for a new camera. and even if our habits cost us $30 a day it still fucking adds up and could be better spent elsewhere.

Ive found that i can kick relatively smoothly in three days. i dont take the subs for any amount of time longer than necessary as i have so many friends just as strung-out on suboxone as they were on heroin or opiates. methadone is fucking horrible as it leaves you just as much a zombie as when yr strung-out, without the worthwhile rush of the needle. back in 2005 i sucked down methadone for six months and ultimately decided to kick it with heroin. i felt better on smack than on the pink magic liquid that the zombies (most of whom seem to require canes) migrate to the clinic take. at least its natural. i just figure if yr not going to be on smack than why be on anything?

my suboxone kick normally goes something like this:
depending on when i last fixed Ill either take it first thing in the morning or last thing before bed. i tend to wait 12 hours or longer. i take half of an 8mg subxone pill. i dont let it dissolve, i swallow it. its much more comfortable if my stomach isnt empty, if it has at least a little something in it. if i take it in the am Ill fix later in the day. this morning i took it around 8am and fixed around 1pm. the trick is to wake up and take half or a quarter on day two and not fix later. most of the time i make it through day two clean. when i do this its been my experience that i feel absolutely NO withdrawl symptoms. i can be kicked in three days, sleep fine eat fine no cravings and as long as i have shit to do i dont have to worry about my number one trigger which is boredom. i only get symptoms, really really mild (think of being dope sick 24 hours in, super manageable) symptoms, when i take the sub and dont fix at all on day one. the symptoms leave with my next dose of sub. on day two i take another half sub (4mg), again swallowing it. if Im feeling antsy about fixing later i try to let it dissolve so Im less tempted. then Ill take a quarter or another half before bed (2-4mg depending on how long Ive been strung-out and what my mental state is if Im motivated to do it or if Im just doing it because its time to). day three Ill take a quarter when i wake up, sometimes I wait until later in the day. at this point it doesnt even really matter if i take any, with the exception that I tend to have no fucking energy if i dont take any. thats pretty much it. Ive successfully done this a shitload of times over the last five years, basically using suboxone to regulate my habit. Im lucky because I dont have the obsession to use that i used to when i first started out shooting smack. now its just smack. not a god a goddess nothing special just a fucking drug that makes being alive ok for 12 hour increments of time. its a coping mechanism, nothing more nothing less. something to do when i dont know what to do with myself.

but i want to save up and get a new camera. so its time for a break.

tomorrow or sometime after then

i have this thing about starting a kick on an odd-numbered day. its probably just my junky mind eliminating half the possibilities half the opportunities half the year as potential clean dates. tomorrows the 31st of august and i especially like the last day of the month as a kick date. i like time off on occassion.

over the last 9 years - since july 3rd 2003 when i decided i wanted to shoot heroin until i died (i turned 27 and re-evaluated that decision) - Ive put together more than 11 days clean on 3 seperate occassions. on each occassion i wanted something that conflicted with shooting smack. 

Ive been to rehab 3 times, with my longest stay being 9 days when i was 21 and my shortest stay being 4 days at age 24. the third time i went - fully my idea, unlike the first 2 times - i was 27 and got kicked out on day 6 i think. i doubt Ill ever go back to rehab unless i really need a vacation. the longer i use the more i recognize junk as a coping tool. 12-step, exercise, religion, work music whatever : these all work as coping tools as well. when i started shooting heroin on a daily basis it was because i was in emotional pain and didnt know how to cope. i didnt want to feel anything and i didnt understand why/how people got strung-out on heroin until the moment it became clear : heroin is liquid apathy. the cure for pain, albeit temporary. it also makes life incredibly simple black&white focused. when strung-out Im well sick or high. what matters most is heroin everything else is secondary and it dictates my schedule makes my decisions sets my days priorities. nothing is so serious.

the first time i managed to stay clean for more than 11 days followed my release from custody to county parole. my parole officer tested me. the conditions of my release included getting a job going to 12-step meetings and reporting weekly. i went to meetings. i got a job. i enrolled in school. i reported and i stayed clean. i didnt want to go back to jail. Id done 6 months for grand theft auto and before i went in Id actually kicked - tapered off - as part of this huge plan i promised myself Id execute that involved getting off the streets and living in a house with a white picket fence for foreverafter. when i went in i hated the drug and i thought my time with it over. using dreams were nightmares Id wake up heart racing afraid of kicking. i genuinely considered myself done. with almost 10 months clean, two and a half months out of custody & with two weeks after being off of parole, with no one to test for and jail not hanging over my head i made a deal with myself that if someone offered me oxycontin Id do it. someone just happen to the next day. i did it. got 30 days. fell into a relationship with another junky and off to the races strung-out again i went.

the second time i wanted to join the swim team at the local junior college. i quit smoking cigarettes quit smoking crack and shooting speedballs and heroin two days before i jumped in the water. i didnt realize at the time that the swim team i joined happened to be state champions with practices twice daily (am & pm). it felt so fucking good to be in the water again - i swam competitively for 10 years before leaving high school at age 16 for college 4,000 miles away in Montreal. i swam attended school with a full course-load and worked full-time. age 26 going on 27 at this point. it lasted for a little over 3 months: two weeks after i quit the team due to feeling overwhelmed (on the recommendation of my sponsor) i started shooting-up again.

the third time love got me clean. we got high once together. i kicked. stayed clean for 10 months. until he left me for prison. that was august of 2010. now its 2012.