So, Kelley had a quitmeter over at her site for how long its been since shes quit smoking (almost 14 weeks!!! yayy!!) so I decided to modify mine for how long its been since ive done Heroin. I dont have quite as long as she does but im getting there.

Time Passed: 6 weeks, 23 hours, 52 seconds
Grams of Heroin not smoked: 42
Money Saved: $2,400.00US. (Im not quite sure if thats accurate, although I dont know why it wouldnt be…it just looks like a lot of money….damn).

Anyway…its like 7am. I think I am SORT of getting used to waking up at 5AM every morning. Its kinda rough. But, I have come up with a routine.
Wake up at 5am, get Sodas lunch ready for the day, wake Soda up, keep waking Soda up every 5 minutes until its 5:20 or 5:30 and then he has to rush to brush his teeth and put his uniform on so we can get out the door. He works out in the country (sorta, its definitely not in the city) and theres this little gas station, called Andersons, the only gas station around that sells BADASS breakfast foods like sausage biscuits, gravy biscuits, ham biscuits..basically heaven because its a bunch of damn biscuits and im a biscuit eater..BISCUIT! Whys it spelled like that? Id just spell it Biscut. Oh well.
So..yeah..after I drop Soda off im gonna go to Andersons and get me some home made breakfast to eat on my way home, then come home and get a few more hours of sleep.

Im at the few more hours of sleep part now. ::yawn::

Over the course of my use and subsequent addiction to opiates, I thought that I had learned everything about them and how they work in users brains, what causes addiction, what the addiction is, etc. I was wrong. I definitely had not learned everything, there were some very, extremely important things that I had not learned about opiate addiction and how it effects users and then, what Methadone does to counteract and heal the wounds previous opiate use has caused.

Firstly, opiate addiction, unlike any other addiction, is a disease in every sense of the word. It is both a physical disease in which the user shows symptoms and illness, but a psychological one and most importantly..opiate addiction is a BRAIN DISEASE. Most other drugs we know of are only “psychologically” addictive and do not cause the brain disease that opiate addiction does. It is well known that opiate withdrawal causes intense discomfort, pain, diarrhea, muscle and stomach aches, restless leg syndrome and vomiting but it also causes a disease of the brain.

There are a lot of ways someone can BECOME addicted to opiates and then there is also predisposition to opiate addiction. Saying that one is predisposed to become an addict is in no way blaming the problem on someone other than the addict, its just a genetic, hereditary truth. First, let me explain the brain disease a little bit more and I will go into more detail about hereditary addiction.

Like most all other drugs, opiates have a direct effect on the dopamine produced in your brain, or..lets say…the lack of dopamine being produced in your brain. The opiate, like most all other drugs, causes a huge release of dopamine. Dopamine controls appetites for food and sex and after about 4 months of opiate use…without the opiates..your brain just doesnt produce dopamine anymore. PET scans conducted on the brains of heroin and other opiate addicts showed this. The addiction also has a direct effect on our Norepinephrin which controls the part of our nervous system that we do NOT have control over. When a questionable situation happens, its the release of Norepinephrin that causes the fight or flight mechanism to kick in. Opiate use suppresses this when one is under the influence of the drug so the user feels safe…literally like NOTHING can harm them. So when you dont have the opiates in your system..it triggers this re uptake of this “fight or flight” and causes intense, insane panic and anxiety.

Now, there are actual opioid receptors in our body that deal with feelings of safety and happiness. These receptors are in our spinal columns I think. There are 4 receptors that are directly involved in the effects of opioids. They are: Mu, Kappa, Delta and Sigma. Like a fucking fraternity, lol. Seriously though….the delta receptor deals with euphoria (the onset of euphoria when under the influence and the extreme taking away of euphoria when not under the influence), the sigma deals with depression (the taking away of depression when under the influence and the onset of depression when there are no opioids to attach to the sigma receptors). The Mu and Kappa deal with pain relief.

The last part of the disease is the effect that opiate addiction has on our endorphines. Our bodies have opioid receptors in them because our bodies produce chemicals naturally that can latch onto these receptors and cause similar effects to opiates and opioids. Those chemicals are called Endorphines. They are super similar to Morphine and they moderate our moods, promote pleasure and manage our reactions to stress. So when someone is high on opiates, it makes sense that they are very laid back, easy going, etc..and when they are not, they are anxious, and very defensive (which would explain why Soda would run from the police even without having drugs on him). The cessation of opiate use explains the often erratic and illogical actions of the addict. Someone who has never used opiates gets a normal amount of endorphines into these receptors, whereas addicts are constantly overloading the socket, so to speak. Four months of continuous opiate use causes the body to stop making endorphines on its own. So when you quit and have made it past the gut wrenching physical withdrawals…you have no dopamine or endorphines. And it takes a VERY VERY long time for the body to begin to make these on their own again with no help from an opiate. Thats why its so easy to go use again. Its not just a matter of “quitting.” If you think it is, then you obviously have never been in this situation and you need to shut the fuck up because you arent qualified to even form an opinion on this subject

So now, back to the hereditary nature of the disease. Research has now shown that children with one opiate dependent parent have a chance of inheriting a depression which, a lot of the time, leads to addiction when they are anywhere between 18-21 years of age because around this age, their dopamine will automatically begin to decrease and their body will stop making endorphines. This causes the person to be depressed and they will seek out ways to become happy. For some this means countless trial and error sessions with SSRI’s or anti psychotics or other pharmaceuticals that often times do nothing so the person goes on to experiment with self medication- illegal drugs…and when they experiment with that opiate..BAM. Theyve hit the mark. Now, a lot of these people dont have the money or the mens or the hook up to continue use..but for many…they do. And this is the start of an evil cycle.

Methadone helps this by speeding up the process in which your brain creates dopamine and endorphines again. Not only does it have a profound chemical effect in that it allows the brain to begin the process of building up natural dopamine and endorphines, but it takes the user off of the streets. Science and medicine are finally beginning to realize the huge effect opiates take on the human brain and the disease they cause, and our government is reacting accordingly by legalizing methadone. Methadone clinics take addicts off of the streets and into medical facilities where they are properly taken care of and supervised by trained medical professionals. Addicts no longer have to go out and commit a crime in order to just feel “normal.” Methadone is not just “replacement therapy,” it is also medical supervision, doctors visits, therapist visits, support systems…everything an addict needs to recover properly in an environment where opiate addiction is understood and treated for what it is and the user is not frowned upon and looked down upon as scum. The addict now has responsibilities he or she must take care of at the clinic, whether it is keeping up with their receipts and take home dose bottles in their lock boxes, to maintaining their appointments with their doctor, counselor and support groups.

There are a lot of high strung home makers who get bent out of shape when a methadone clinic is going to be built nearby. Let me inform you…

These people have no right to even have a sayso in the decision simply because they are judging based on the term “Methadone Clinic” and giving into preconceived notions, stereotypes and stigmas about clinics when in fact they know nothing because methadone treatment is 100 percent confidential and unless someone tells you they are on methadone..YOU DO NOT KNOW. If you sat outside a clinic and watched the people who came in and out of the facility…you would not be able to tell if it were just a normal doctors office, or lawyers office, or any other normal public facility.
Addiction does not discriminate, anyone and everyone can become addicted. Ive only listed like..two ways here. There are corporate addicts who maintain a 6 figure income who became addicted when their doctor over prescribed them, there are mothers who were given narcotic pain killers after the birth of their children, there are grandparents, parents, children, businessmen….people from all walks of life and these people are making positive change in their lives.

I am one of those people. No one would know unless I told them. Now I have.

Oh baby. Im so tired.
Man, from the Government
Man, from the tax board
Man, in the public school,
Man, owns the golden rule, yeah.

Im everybodys slave. I made you my slave.
You said…This Id Do For You.

If it would help, to give the world back what it gave..then I would. I would. I would for you.

You say my eyes are crazy eyes. Well, sometimes they are and so are you.
And if you wonder, what I would do, I would do anything if I could. You know I would. I would for you.

Tonight, I was talking to a friend of mine who has been having some struggles with depression lately. Now, most of you who know me are probably saying “uh oh!” hahaha. I suffered with depression every minute of my teenage life. I was diagnosed as Bipolar Disorder/Manic Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder (which turned into Panic Disorder just a little less than a year ago) at a very young age. This was something that, in time, I learned to celebrate. I know, that sounds weird, right? Well…it is a part of who I am and everything that has made me who I am is worth celebrating. Not just the good stuff, but the bad stuff too because those things taught me some extremely important lessons.
I know how hard depression can be. Chemical or situational..its very rough. I have grown much bigger than my Bipolar Disorder. This in no way means that I do not feel depressed anymore, or that I do not ever feel manic anymore. It just means that I have learned to identify my symptoms and work through them. Not everyone is this lucky.

Now, with all of that said..I do not EVER party with the pity partyers. I do not sugar coat things for them, I do not give in to their pity partying. I dont party with ‘em. I am not going to oblige them. Theres no reason to. That isnt help. They dont need someone to say “ohhh oh my gosh, I am like, sooo sorry, you poor baby.” That shit doesnt help. It makes them worse, it makes them wanna cry some more. They need a fat hit of reality, even if it sounds completely rude. It doesnt mean I dont care, it doesnt mean they cant cry on my shoulder. It just means im NOT GONNA LIE. Reality doesnt lie.

So, onto the point of my story. I was conversing with a friend of mine who has had some problems with depression recently. I think that he is also dealing with quite a bit of self pity. I was just suggesting things that could possibly make him feel better and it hit me..MASSAGE! Its called massage THERAPY for a reason. I told him “You need to go get a massage! It will make you feel soooooo much better. The power of human touch is A-MAZING!”
His response was:

heh thers only one person ill let touch me and that a significate other lmao (sic)

My response to this was “Wow. Thats really fucking stupid. No offense.” Lmfao. Dont you love it when someone says something completely offensive and then says “no offense” at the end? I am guilty as charged on that one, over, and over, and over again. Yeah, anyway…I said “Dont ever underestimate the power of human touch. Its extremely powerful. Immensely powerful. There is NO need to sexualize human contact. Human contact is essential to our mental and physical health.”
So he said”

lol i guess you can see it that way but growing up without affection, if a female puts her hand on me my heart will flutter and if a guy does he must want to get hit (sic)

My response was “Guess what? Thats part of being human.” He told me that touch is a very personal thing to him. Well, touch is a personal thing to everyone, as it should be, because it is very powerful, however, just because something is personal or even sacred…that doesnt mean that it should be reserved and hidden. Not to mention that one would think that if someone is depressed and has stated verbally that they hate the way they feel and they want to feel differently…they would be willing to try just about anything. I supplied him with a few links about the power of human touch.

He says:

well ill just keep having logic failures and wait to be touched untill i find someon (sic)
well i grew up without a father, my mom maybe hugged me twice, and my bother and sister were much younger than me, and we moved all the time. what does this have to do with anything. maybe having touch from anyone other than who i want it from feels rather alien like a guinnee pig running up your pants(sic)

Now, here is where I will discontinue the conversation between my friend and I and get into my rant. There is no reason why being touched by someone should feel alien. Now, I realize that there could be trauma in many peoples lives that changes the way they feel about being touched and this is not what im talking about. That is a whole different situation that you wont find me discussing here.
In our “advanced” Western society, it feels alien to us to be touched by another human being that is not someone we are fucking. This simply is not the way things should be. We have forgotten about one another. We have forgotten how important it is to just hug each other once in a while. In a society that is so technologically advanced, we have abandoned ourselves spiritually. We have been left to fend for ourselves alone in this world, without the aid of our brothers and sisters because we have sexualized the human body and human touch so much that it has become taboo to embrace someone when they desperately need it. If two men hug, they are “gay” (as if being gay is some horribly negative thing). If two women hug, all the sudden they are lesbians who were only put upon this Earth as sexual objects of perverted 40+ year old mens desire. Its absolutely devastating that we have been so thoroughly brainwashed into abandoning each other. There are societies that have existed upon this earth for centuries that have entire medicinal arts based solely upon touch and the energy that is passed between two humans when they touch. There are martial arts based completely on the energy that flows throughout everything in our universe, including our own bodies.

The benefits of human touch are not only hailed in “alternative” Eastern medicinal practices, but in our own Western medicine as well.

I hate that our society has put such sexualized stigmas and taboos on touching each other. The positive energy passed between two human beings when they exchange touch is so powerful, it is love and I think that it is painfully obvious that our world needs as much love as possible right now. Hug someone today. Hug someone that you normally would not hug, I can PROMISE you that it will not only make your day, but it will make theirs too!

If you guys would like to learn more about how essential touch is, check out the following links:
Pleasure/Power
WebMB Power of human touch.
Reiki using human touch

^_^

I wrote about my panic attack when it happened..I guess it was a little over a month ago now. The doctor once again put me on medications that I dont necessarily want to be on. I am very much against SSRI’s (anti depressants) and I refuse to take them. They also gave me Benzos which are miracle cures for anxiety but I also do not want to be reliant on a narcotic, even in situations where I am having a panic attack and I need it to STOP.

So, tonight a friend of mine and I were talking about natural medicines, she told me that shes going to start taking something for depression or whatever and it got me to wondering if there are any natural medications for anxiety. Now, I knew of Valerian root and how it was compared to Valium. I have taken Valerian root before but its been so long I cant remember the effects. After some studying, ive decided to pick some up tomorrow and start taking it daily to see if it aids my anxiety. Hopefully it will. Ive got a lot of hope for natural remedies, I think they are the way to go.

Ill be tracking my progress.

Ive always been really against self centered narcissism. I wrote an entry very similar to this one, even though I cant remember what its called. It was about the image of American women and the effect it has on young American women.

Ive heard so many PRETTY girls say things like…
“Oh, if I had the money, id get my nose done, my boobs lifted, tummy tucked, facelift, a little botox…” yadda yadda yadda.
All the while im sitting here thinking, are you fucking kidding me? Youve gotta be fucking kidding me. Why? Why would someone do something like this to themselves when they look perfectly fine? I remain completely convinced that its got NOTHING to do with how they look and EVERYTHING to do with how they think they are “supposed” to look based upon what society and America thinks is “attractive.” Which is generally some skinny, bleach blonde bimbo who doesnt know the difference between left and right.

However, I sort of understand where theyre coming from now (not the bimbos, the perfectly fine women who want to slice their bodies up like pumpkin pie so that they can LOOK like the bimbos.)
A lot of people would say that I am pretty. Im 5’5, 120LBS and generally..pretty decent looking I guess. So, I was watching Howard TV and there was a girl on there who Howard discovered and he thought shed be great in Playboy so he called Playboy, had them take a few pictures of her, and she ended up as the centerfold. Now, Howard and everyone in the studio was totally GUSHING about how pretty this chick was. She looked like fucking..Jessica Simpson. Typical blonde girl who wears high heels, a lot of makeup, and too much lip gloss. Regardless of all this, I kept finding myself thinking “Man, I wanna be pretty and girly like that. I want to be able to walk around in high heels, have perfectly smooth tanned skin, bright white teeth, smelling good, etc.” Now, I dont know WHY I kept thinking this because..im totally decent looking. My boyfriend was appalled at what I ws saying and couldnt understand why I kept saying “I wanna be pretty like THAT!”
But, its a very hard thing to ignore. When you see women who look like typical porno bitches getting a lot of attention and getting praised..you want to feel pretty like that too. Even if you are already pretty and individual.

I am still not condoning this mindset. I still think its idiotic to want to get plastic surgery, and its stupid to be anorexic (might get blasted for that one). Basically, I think its ridiculous to try and permanently change yourself just to look how you think other people want you to look. Everyone should be happy with themselves. Difference is beauty. I do understand this mentality a little better though. Id never go as far as wanting to go under the knife to change myself, but I did feel, for a split second, like I wanted to buy a pair of heels. When you see certain girls getting a lot of attention, you sort of wonder why you dont get that same attention. I guess thats where me and a lot of other girls begin to differ. Once that initial thought in my mind passes, I stop giving a fuck. But, there are a lot of girls who never stop giving a fuck and take it really seriously and they end up looking like Tabitha Stevens.

Its a really sad thing though. That societys image of what is sexy and beautiful has become so, limited. So, so completely limited, that a GREAT majority of girls (and guys now) are walking around looking and acting like clones of each other. Gawd. There are no classic beauties anymore. Everyone fits a certain image. Very few people stray out of that image and that image is really infecting the brains of soo many young girls who just cant get past feeling like they arent good enough because they dont look like the girls on TV.

Anyway. Its like..8:30AM and I havent been to bed yet. Ive got a horrible migraine and its just..torturing me. Ive taken 4 ibproufen and..theyre not freaking working. So, I watched some Howard TV, thought a little, and decided to write this entry. Pardon me if it doesnt make sense..my head hurts and im pretty tired. Its almost pointless to go to sleep now though..ill never get up. Or I could REALLY REALLY discipline myself to just take a nap and get up no matter how tired I am.

I think ill try that…again.

Ok..quick edit.. I do want to comment on the Imus phenomenon. Im so sick of hearing about it..but..I gotta write about it.

For those of you who dont know (if any of these people exist)…
Imus is a radio talk show host. His show is simulcast on MSNBC in the mornings. Recently, he made a comment about a womens basketball team that is a primarily black team. I think there were two white chicks on the team. He basically called the team “Nappy Headed Hoes.” A lot of people thought this was very racist, and of course, Al Sharpton got upset. Imus proceeded to go onto Al Sharptons talk show and apologize. When his apology was not well received, Imus said “Wow, I just cant get anywhere with you people.” Which proceeded to piss MORE people off. Imus was suspended from CBS radio for two weeks and MSNBC CANCELED the TV simulcast.
Initially, I thought this was totally insane. I heard someone on TV say “Imus gets fired for saying nappy headed hoes, and ludacris wins a grammy for it.” And I totally agreed with this. I saw NOTHING racist about what he said and I thought the whole ordeal was STUPID.
However, tonight while watching Howard TV, Howard was talking about how he used to work with Imus at WNBC (I think). He said Imus was horrible to him when he first started, and then when he started to go up in the ratings, Imus started to kiss his ass. Howard said that on one occasion, Imus went up to the black secretary whos name was Brenda, and he called her a nigger. Howard doesnt like Imus, so, if Howard was the lying type, it would make sense that hed like to spread that kind of rumor, however, I dont think Howard is the lying type (lol) and Robin also knew about this and I really dont think Robin would back up some bullshit story. So now, I kind of changed my tune.
Apparently Imus was confronted about this multiple times, one time being on Larry King Live, and Imus didnt even deny it. So, im glad MSNBC fired him, I hope he gets fired from CBS radio, hes a stupid racist fuck. We dont have room for people like him in this world.

BUT…heres the but..
If he had just ONLY ever said “nappy headed hoes” I would stand by my original feelings and say I dont think it was racist and I dont think he should be fired, etc.
I will post here what I posted on a forum I go to…I typed this before I knew about Imus’s “you people” and “nigger” comments. But, these are my general feelings on racism and race.