Beginning of the End

Yesterday I blogged about my thwarted suicide attempt. You can read about it here. Today I thought I'd talk about something else- my dependence and addiction to the prescription drugs I've been taking for the myriad of ailments I have.

And again, I'm not looking for sympathy or pity- I just wanted to start sharing my experiences in hopes that someone who's having a similar tough time can relate and feel a little less alone knowing there's someone else out there that's gone through the same thing.

I expected recovery would be difficult and so far everything is meeting my expectations. I've been using prescription painkillers for awhile (the right way), but after I was in the hospital and things started to get worse again, I started to use them the wrong way.

What can I say? There's so much talk about using these kinds of pills the "right way" that it's almost impossible to NOT think about the "wrong way" when you're pushed up against a wall (mentally or physically) and things aren't going well for you. Before this, I had done well- I knew there were times were my body hurt like hell, and I overused my medication. I was paid back with feeling so lethargic and stupified that I could barely function and I fell asleep at the drop of a hat- certainly not safe for anyone, most of all my children. But abusing it to take the mental pain away- that was a recent thing.

It started around the time I was in the hospital in November. I was thinking about trying to kill myself again. I didn't have a plan yet, but as I remarked to the intake doctor, "I'm pretty resourceful, so it wouldn't take much to come up with one." When I got out, I still felt not great, and even though my family was monitoring my meds, I still found ways around it to get more pills. It didn't take long for me to admit to myself that I just had to be off of the pills for good, and during one blowout with my husband, I flushed them. I cannot explain the duality of the feelings I had at that time. I was happy, extremely happy, on one side to be getting rid of them, on the other, a huge voice in my head was screaming at me, "What the FUCK are you doing???? That's GOOD SHIT, man!"

Since then (and it wasn't that long ago- less than a week) I've been in withdrawal, which is no fun but I feel like I can see a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe someday a life that's happy, pain-free or at least less, and unmedicated. We'll see. Stay tuned.