My Addiction
What led to my addictions: I felt the loss of my family while I was still a part of my family. It added greatly to my addictions. My parents got divorced while I was very young. My new stepdad was physically and sexually abusive to me and my sister, and he liked beating on my mother. As a result I would run away from home and act out my anger as a gangster and crook. Other guys in the projects had similar situations going on in their lives. Together we young crooks made a family. By the age of 11, drugs, crime, and booze became a part of my daily life. This pattern continued until at the age of 41 years I finally found recovery and a solution. These are the things I had to go thru and put myself thru to find the solution and get me over those scars of my youth.
At what point did I realize I had hit rock bottom: I hit rock bottom a few times. In New York I had hit bottom putting drugs ahead of every possibility. I had to pay my rent and put it ahead of eating to the point where I found myself in the streets, which oddly enough made my addiction easier to obtain. I didn't have to worry about paying rent or maintaining my home. My only concern was my drug addiction and ripping off whoever I could rip off. And New York is the place for all that. The city does not sleep. And that's where I discovered crack. It took away all my pain. Luckily for me though, in my addiction on the streets that I had never used needles. That was only because when I was an early teenager I had all this surgery done in my mouth, I had eight teeth removed and had all these needles stuck in my mouth and I was scared of needles. If not for a fear of needles I would have been using them. And in New York in the 1980's was a hot bed for intervenous drug use and disease. And I'm the type of person who would have been sharing. I wouldn't be saying this story right now because I would have been dead along time ago; in the early 1990's. I started to use in '85. Around 1988 I made a trip back to Vancouver to get away from the drugs but the drugs were sitting there waiting for me. No solution, no way out, once again falling victim to drug use, more crime, hooked up with my crime buddies again. In '89 met a girl got her pregnant, and had a baby girl. My baby girl would play a significant role later in life to my recovery. I wanted a family. There was only so much love I could get from my crook buddies. I needed the touch of a woman, the love, waking up in the morning, looking in someone's eyes and know all she wants is happiness with you.
(soon I will add more about low points; crime, jail, deaths, using people, losing girlfriends, friends and family, overdoses, etc)
My recovery: Fast forward 20 years later, after a lifetime of drug use and incarceration of 2 1/2 years and 6 months of recovery houses, countless detoxes, nothing worked. About 3 Christmases ago, I went out for dimsum with my daughter and my mother. About 3 years to this day I asked my daughter what she wanted for her birthday and she told me, "A sober father". And I said to myself, "Fuck, she couldn't ask for a stereo?!". And that idea sounded pretty good to me, but how can I do this? I had to cut out everyone and everything out of my life that in any way shape or form resembled drugs, crime, or promoting in any way anything other than recovery. So I went to a recovery house in Surrey. Lasted two weeks because I was unhappy with their program and wanted to change it. I went back home but didn't give up, like I would have. I found another place, Miracle Valley in Mission. Went thru their program. Once again I wanted to change their program because it didn't suit me. Again months later I was asked to leave. Maybe recovery is not for me? Maybe I am better on my own? That led to another month of using. That led to a stroke that happened to the left side of my body. My foot, my knee, upper leg, my hand, arm, cheek, lip, were all effected as a result of my drug use. I used to run fast, now I can't even run two blocks. Every morning and throughout the day I am reminded of my drug addiction by my pain. My drug addiction had costed me a lifetime of lifetimes and it almost killed me. I had an mri, catscan, ultrasound. There is a bloodclot in my head from a result of heavy druguse. If it didn't disappear in a month my condition might maintain like that. Here I am 2 years later and there has been no change in my pain, without body training. That stroke led me back into recovery. Not the loss of my family, the loss of my daughter, the loss of various jobs and oppotunity, the death of my father, nothing. No jail. It didn't matter. God hobbled me to wake me the fuck up and it worked. Mother fucker. (Plus I got diabetes.) I went to a recovery society called "It's Up To You". Except this time I didn't try to change their program. I got involved in the structure of their home and prorgam. Not how me, Rob could change them but how I could get into it. I went to meetings, got donations for them, volunteered, Salvation Army, Food Bank, BC Lions tickets. (Want to go to a game? Give me a call.) Started with a meeting in Surrey. I didn't like the meeting so he told me to go to a church and start my own meeting. So I did, the next day. I went to the church down the street from the recovery house, and told the pastor, "My name is Rob and I go to the recovery house up the street. I want to start a meeting here". He said, "Really? I need the church painted". I returned with four guys from the recovery house and we painted his church. Went back 3 days later and gave it another coat. Pastor looked at it and said "You got your NA meeting!". That meeting is still operational now every Wednesday 7pm in Surrey called "Changing Ways". (Let me know if you want a brochure). Of course as you get more confident and stronger in your recovery you will start to look more presentable, look better, smell better, be more socially accepted, thus being more appealing to the opposite sex (or whatever your preferance...).And this is a difficult area in recovery because with love in early recovery there is a price. I got involved with the women. Meetings going strong, going to meetings, house monitor, volunteering, etc but none of that will count for shit if you put a mate before your recovery. Without a spriritual awakening to answer to, relationships in recovery are doomed because you will treat women the same as you did during your addiction. They will only become a suppliment to your addiction. Right to the point of where you no longer even care about the house. The new guys coming in no longer matter, other than that woman. Then of vourse the manipulation, conniving ways come back because you'll do anything to keep that addiction, which is now that girl instead of drugs. Right to the point where she leaves. And it's just as bad as being without your heroin. Your body aches, your mind aches. No one can say anything to you. She won't talk to you. You'll be kicked out of your house. A buddy might let you into his house but he won't know what you went thru. You have direct deposit which is deposited into your account. It's a large cheque, because your on disability now for a stroke you had because of drug use. $500 dollars to spend on dope today. But your supposed to work at 12 today at the recovery house. How am I going to go? Fuck them, fuck recovery. And fuck her too! Not to mention I had a 18 months cso which is a conditional sentence. I am caught after curfew which is 9:30. I go straight to Masqui prison which is for the remainder of my sentence which is another year. I spent the day using and partying with no spiritual solution, which was my only alternative. I came back home two days later, of course broke, rent money spent. The buddy I stayed with no longer wanted me to stay in his home. He kicked me out. Called the police to escort me out of his house. Luckily I had made other friends in NA from the result of the good I had done when I had followed the program earlier on. But I was only following parts of the program. I was given another opportunity. I decided to go thru the set of steps with a friend of mine who had been in recovery. AA set of steps. I was living in Coquitlam and commuting into Vancouver. I had the set of steps done in two weeks. And again back in service. It took another 90 days to get another service position but didn't have to wait 90 days to be of service. You can be of service in recovery on day one if you have the spiritual foundation required to do so. This is the most fucked up part of the story. Back in service, working the steps as designed by recovery, going to meetings, doing everything again, having had a psychic change, a change in my being. As a result of all that , the girl who had left me before decides I am again appealing. She comes back and of course without any spiritual solution same thing happened all over again. And again she leaves. Being in recovery also she is doing the things she feels she needs to do in her recovery. People in recovery dating really need to focus on whats right and whats right for them and not whats right and good for their partner until you've formed a structure and have a spiritual solution that can prepare you for eveything that may happen in your life. I got drunk one night because of it but came back to AA the next day. Again no spiritual solution. Still thinking I can run my own program. So now we're at May 2010. I see her at a meeting. A mutual friend is having a cake for her first year of recovery. She walks up to me and wants to talk. So I was nice but she kept texting me. I know something was up. There is a reason everyone in recovery does something. My motive was love. A week after the meeting she calls me. Tells me she's pregnant. I am the happiest guy in the world. I wanted that baby. I thought I loved this woman, but maybe I just loved the idea of having a faimly. So I'm on the top of the world for a week, but there was complicatons with this child, and of course fate plays it's hand. She loses the baby. Sometimes katekismic events like this bring people closer together, other times it can tear you right apart. After being in my head about her loss which tore us apart to where we no longer talked. Being in the head over the loss of the baby, I could not understand why God would bring her back into my life then take the baby away and her. I had so much comtempt for God. Spiritually bankrupt I spent another day using both alcohol and drugs. That was in September 2010. So coming back I sought those people who lived and worked in recovery who also had lives outside of recovery. Members of society. I had thrown myself into NA and AA and had no other life. What I needed and what the program tells you is that there is a spiritual solution. So I started surrounding myself with people who had years in recovery, who went thru similar things to what I had; losing jobs, homes, wives, etc, who were now strong in recovery, who could help me in recovery. Who could take me thru it and show me how to do recovery, not just take me to a meeting. Do you want someone to make dinner for you every night? Or show you HOW to make dinner? I started volunteering at Coastal Mental Health. People with multiple disorders and drug addictions. Coastal is about one block away from the Recovery Club. Alot of the clients there were intimidated by the AA and NA meetings up the street. The guys on the Harleys, nice cars, pretty girls, etc. Some of my friends in Coastal would make it to the meetings. Some of my friends in the meeting would never get asked to talk and share because if their looks or character. That bothered me. So I asked the facilitators if I could start a "Big Book" meeting there. I have a line by liner version of the Big Book. Six or 7 of us would meet every Thursday and we would read and every one felt a sense of participation. These are people no one would normally let share or would not share at Coastal. They were safe. I was working in the kitchen at Coastal and at Recovery Club and someone at Coastal said why not go back to school so you can get a job to get paid? So Dec 2010 I was attending church a minister there knows everything I had just told you. He welcomed me into that church and they let me volunteer at the church. I went to Native Education College (NEC) and they let me write a test, which if I passed I would be eligible to take their courses to graduate high school. They also told me about a Health Care Assistant course I could take. I failed the first test. I asked to take it again. They said I can try two more times to pass it. They gave me tutors. I took the test again and I passed it. I was so happy that fucking day. I had not done grade 10 math since 1982 until this day. As a result of passing the test, the first day of school would be January 5, 2011. Addressing the psychological and physical war on drugs within myself it had to be attacked on all fronts. Smoking cigarettes is my number one health hazard. Every cig is 10 mins of my life wasted. If I smoke 20 cigs in one day that would be 200 mins of my life wasted that one day making me weaker, which is also $300 per month. Which is the final solution in recovery; complete withdrawal from all toxins in my body. I am 44 years old and done enough drugs to kill a small European country. Stopping drugs and booze brought me back to life, quitting smoking wil bring me back to life. December 26, 2010 I meet a spiritual Guide at a meeting. Not in recovery, but a Healer all the same. Giving me love, strength, and having tolerance for my shortcomings. Knowing exactly where I'm at in my recovery. Having the strength to put down the cigarette, together we enter into the year 2011. Jan 5, 2011 A great day in history. First day of school since 1984! Today is Feb 5th. Today is my 32 day without smoking, one month in school, zero absentees, B- in computer science, C- in math, B in psy, which is my strongest class. Recovery is not just about asking for help when you need it but giving thanks and helping everybody; not just those in recovery. Finding a blanace in life. Meetings and volunteering will not keep you sober, life still happens, you need to be prepared for that. Setting goals and striving towards those on a daily basis. Being productive on a daily basis is the only recipe for success.
How recovery has changed my life: Today I can be counted on and trusted. I have a relationshop with my family. My daughter loves her father. A son I never talked to now has a relationship with me. I have opened doors. In addition I am going into areas that used to frighten me but I now have confidence to attempt the things I never would normally attempt; Music, career, schooling, being a father, finding my native roots which I used to be ashamed of. I got tired of seeing life go by and not be a part of it. It's nice to walk outside with your head held up high. I am started to feel more energy from not smoking for one month. Just ask my girlfriend. I am now also in a healthier relationship with a non addict, learning and wanting to listen, trying to understand and cater to her needs because I am no longer a greedy bastard, wanting to know her and listen to her, not wanting for any reason to give up.
I am lucky, my addiction didn't kill me. So I am choosing life.
Rob H.
recoveryblog@yahoo.com
What led to my addictions: I felt the loss of my family while I was still a part of my family. It added greatly to my addictions. My parents got divorced while I was very young. My new stepdad was physically and sexually abusive to me and my sister, and he liked beating on my mother. As a result I would run away from home and act out my anger as a gangster and crook. Other guys in the projects had similar situations going on in their lives. Together we young crooks made a family. By the age of 11, drugs, crime, and booze became a part of my daily life. This pattern continued until at the age of 41 years I finally found recovery and a solution. These are the things I had to go thru and put myself thru to find the solution and get me over those scars of my youth.
At what point did I realize I had hit rock bottom: I hit rock bottom a few times. In New York I had hit bottom putting drugs ahead of every possibility. I had to pay my rent and put it ahead of eating to the point where I found myself in the streets, which oddly enough made my addiction easier to obtain. I didn't have to worry about paying rent or maintaining my home. My only concern was my drug addiction and ripping off whoever I could rip off. And New York is the place for all that. The city does not sleep. And that's where I discovered crack. It took away all my pain. Luckily for me though, in my addiction on the streets that I had never used needles. That was only because when I was an early teenager I had all this surgery done in my mouth, I had eight teeth removed and had all these needles stuck in my mouth and I was scared of needles. If not for a fear of needles I would have been using them. And in New York in the 1980's was a hot bed for intervenous drug use and disease. And I'm the type of person who would have been sharing. I wouldn't be saying this story right now because I would have been dead along time ago; in the early 1990's. I started to use in '85. Around 1988 I made a trip back to Vancouver to get away from the drugs but the drugs were sitting there waiting for me. No solution, no way out, once again falling victim to drug use, more crime, hooked up with my crime buddies again. In '89 met a girl got her pregnant, and had a baby girl. My baby girl would play a significant role later in life to my recovery. I wanted a family. There was only so much love I could get from my crook buddies. I needed the touch of a woman, the love, waking up in the morning, looking in someone's eyes and know all she wants is happiness with you.
(soon I will add more about low points; crime, jail, deaths, using people, losing girlfriends, friends and family, overdoses, etc)
My recovery: Fast forward 20 years later, after a lifetime of drug use and incarceration of 2 1/2 years and 6 months of recovery houses, countless detoxes, nothing worked. About 3 Christmases ago, I went out for dimsum with my daughter and my mother. About 3 years to this day I asked my daughter what she wanted for her birthday and she told me, "A sober father". And I said to myself, "Fuck, she couldn't ask for a stereo?!". And that idea sounded pretty good to me, but how can I do this? I had to cut out everyone and everything out of my life that in any way shape or form resembled drugs, crime, or promoting in any way anything other than recovery. So I went to a recovery house in Surrey. Lasted two weeks because I was unhappy with their program and wanted to change it. I went back home but didn't give up, like I would have. I found another place, Miracle Valley in Mission. Went thru their program. Once again I wanted to change their program because it didn't suit me. Again months later I was asked to leave. Maybe recovery is not for me? Maybe I am better on my own? That led to another month of using. That led to a stroke that happened to the left side of my body. My foot, my knee, upper leg, my hand, arm, cheek, lip, were all effected as a result of my drug use. I used to run fast, now I can't even run two blocks. Every morning and throughout the day I am reminded of my drug addiction by my pain. My drug addiction had costed me a lifetime of lifetimes and it almost killed me. I had an mri, catscan, ultrasound. There is a bloodclot in my head from a result of heavy druguse. If it didn't disappear in a month my condition might maintain like that. Here I am 2 years later and there has been no change in my pain, without body training. That stroke led me back into recovery. Not the loss of my family, the loss of my daughter, the loss of various jobs and oppotunity, the death of my father, nothing. No jail. It didn't matter. God hobbled me to wake me the fuck up and it worked. Mother fucker. (Plus I got diabetes.) I went to a recovery society called "It's Up To You". Except this time I didn't try to change their program. I got involved in the structure of their home and prorgam. Not how me, Rob could change them but how I could get into it. I went to meetings, got donations for them, volunteered, Salvation Army, Food Bank, BC Lions tickets. (Want to go to a game? Give me a call.) Started with a meeting in Surrey. I didn't like the meeting so he told me to go to a church and start my own meeting. So I did, the next day. I went to the church down the street from the recovery house, and told the pastor, "My name is Rob and I go to the recovery house up the street. I want to start a meeting here". He said, "Really? I need the church painted". I returned with four guys from the recovery house and we painted his church. Went back 3 days later and gave it another coat. Pastor looked at it and said "You got your NA meeting!". That meeting is still operational now every Wednesday 7pm in Surrey called "Changing Ways". (Let me know if you want a brochure). Of course as you get more confident and stronger in your recovery you will start to look more presentable, look better, smell better, be more socially accepted, thus being more appealing to the opposite sex (or whatever your preferance...).And this is a difficult area in recovery because with love in early recovery there is a price. I got involved with the women. Meetings going strong, going to meetings, house monitor, volunteering, etc but none of that will count for shit if you put a mate before your recovery. Without a spriritual awakening to answer to, relationships in recovery are doomed because you will treat women the same as you did during your addiction. They will only become a suppliment to your addiction. Right to the point of where you no longer even care about the house. The new guys coming in no longer matter, other than that woman. Then of vourse the manipulation, conniving ways come back because you'll do anything to keep that addiction, which is now that girl instead of drugs. Right to the point where she leaves. And it's just as bad as being without your heroin. Your body aches, your mind aches. No one can say anything to you. She won't talk to you. You'll be kicked out of your house. A buddy might let you into his house but he won't know what you went thru. You have direct deposit which is deposited into your account. It's a large cheque, because your on disability now for a stroke you had because of drug use. $500 dollars to spend on dope today. But your supposed to work at 12 today at the recovery house. How am I going to go? Fuck them, fuck recovery. And fuck her too! Not to mention I had a 18 months cso which is a conditional sentence. I am caught after curfew which is 9:30. I go straight to Masqui prison which is for the remainder of my sentence which is another year. I spent the day using and partying with no spiritual solution, which was my only alternative. I came back home two days later, of course broke, rent money spent. The buddy I stayed with no longer wanted me to stay in his home. He kicked me out. Called the police to escort me out of his house. Luckily I had made other friends in NA from the result of the good I had done when I had followed the program earlier on. But I was only following parts of the program. I was given another opportunity. I decided to go thru the set of steps with a friend of mine who had been in recovery. AA set of steps. I was living in Coquitlam and commuting into Vancouver. I had the set of steps done in two weeks. And again back in service. It took another 90 days to get another service position but didn't have to wait 90 days to be of service. You can be of service in recovery on day one if you have the spiritual foundation required to do so. This is the most fucked up part of the story. Back in service, working the steps as designed by recovery, going to meetings, doing everything again, having had a psychic change, a change in my being. As a result of all that , the girl who had left me before decides I am again appealing. She comes back and of course without any spiritual solution same thing happened all over again. And again she leaves. Being in recovery also she is doing the things she feels she needs to do in her recovery. People in recovery dating really need to focus on whats right and whats right for them and not whats right and good for their partner until you've formed a structure and have a spiritual solution that can prepare you for eveything that may happen in your life. I got drunk one night because of it but came back to AA the next day. Again no spiritual solution. Still thinking I can run my own program. So now we're at May 2010. I see her at a meeting. A mutual friend is having a cake for her first year of recovery. She walks up to me and wants to talk. So I was nice but she kept texting me. I know something was up. There is a reason everyone in recovery does something. My motive was love. A week after the meeting she calls me. Tells me she's pregnant. I am the happiest guy in the world. I wanted that baby. I thought I loved this woman, but maybe I just loved the idea of having a faimly. So I'm on the top of the world for a week, but there was complicatons with this child, and of course fate plays it's hand. She loses the baby. Sometimes katekismic events like this bring people closer together, other times it can tear you right apart. After being in my head about her loss which tore us apart to where we no longer talked. Being in the head over the loss of the baby, I could not understand why God would bring her back into my life then take the baby away and her. I had so much comtempt for God. Spiritually bankrupt I spent another day using both alcohol and drugs. That was in September 2010. So coming back I sought those people who lived and worked in recovery who also had lives outside of recovery. Members of society. I had thrown myself into NA and AA and had no other life. What I needed and what the program tells you is that there is a spiritual solution. So I started surrounding myself with people who had years in recovery, who went thru similar things to what I had; losing jobs, homes, wives, etc, who were now strong in recovery, who could help me in recovery. Who could take me thru it and show me how to do recovery, not just take me to a meeting. Do you want someone to make dinner for you every night? Or show you HOW to make dinner? I started volunteering at Coastal Mental Health. People with multiple disorders and drug addictions. Coastal is about one block away from the Recovery Club. Alot of the clients there were intimidated by the AA and NA meetings up the street. The guys on the Harleys, nice cars, pretty girls, etc. Some of my friends in Coastal would make it to the meetings. Some of my friends in the meeting would never get asked to talk and share because if their looks or character. That bothered me. So I asked the facilitators if I could start a "Big Book" meeting there. I have a line by liner version of the Big Book. Six or 7 of us would meet every Thursday and we would read and every one felt a sense of participation. These are people no one would normally let share or would not share at Coastal. They were safe. I was working in the kitchen at Coastal and at Recovery Club and someone at Coastal said why not go back to school so you can get a job to get paid? So Dec 2010 I was attending church a minister there knows everything I had just told you. He welcomed me into that church and they let me volunteer at the church. I went to Native Education College (NEC) and they let me write a test, which if I passed I would be eligible to take their courses to graduate high school. They also told me about a Health Care Assistant course I could take. I failed the first test. I asked to take it again. They said I can try two more times to pass it. They gave me tutors. I took the test again and I passed it. I was so happy that fucking day. I had not done grade 10 math since 1982 until this day. As a result of passing the test, the first day of school would be January 5, 2011. Addressing the psychological and physical war on drugs within myself it had to be attacked on all fronts. Smoking cigarettes is my number one health hazard. Every cig is 10 mins of my life wasted. If I smoke 20 cigs in one day that would be 200 mins of my life wasted that one day making me weaker, which is also $300 per month. Which is the final solution in recovery; complete withdrawal from all toxins in my body. I am 44 years old and done enough drugs to kill a small European country. Stopping drugs and booze brought me back to life, quitting smoking wil bring me back to life. December 26, 2010 I meet a spiritual Guide at a meeting. Not in recovery, but a Healer all the same. Giving me love, strength, and having tolerance for my shortcomings. Knowing exactly where I'm at in my recovery. Having the strength to put down the cigarette, together we enter into the year 2011. Jan 5, 2011 A great day in history. First day of school since 1984! Today is Feb 5th. Today is my 32 day without smoking, one month in school, zero absentees, B- in computer science, C- in math, B in psy, which is my strongest class. Recovery is not just about asking for help when you need it but giving thanks and helping everybody; not just those in recovery. Finding a blanace in life. Meetings and volunteering will not keep you sober, life still happens, you need to be prepared for that. Setting goals and striving towards those on a daily basis. Being productive on a daily basis is the only recipe for success.
How recovery has changed my life: Today I can be counted on and trusted. I have a relationshop with my family. My daughter loves her father. A son I never talked to now has a relationship with me. I have opened doors. In addition I am going into areas that used to frighten me but I now have confidence to attempt the things I never would normally attempt; Music, career, schooling, being a father, finding my native roots which I used to be ashamed of. I got tired of seeing life go by and not be a part of it. It's nice to walk outside with your head held up high. I am started to feel more energy from not smoking for one month. Just ask my girlfriend. I am now also in a healthier relationship with a non addict, learning and wanting to listen, trying to understand and cater to her needs because I am no longer a greedy bastard, wanting to know her and listen to her, not wanting for any reason to give up.
I am lucky, my addiction didn't kill me. So I am choosing life.
Rob H.
recoveryblog@yahoo.com
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