A Bitter Taste

I was talking to an addict the other day. Not really for him but more for his parents. It was so exhausting, I talked to him alone, that way he would not feel any pressure from his father or other family members. As I talked to him we both saw that we had a lot in common. Most addicts do. I will not get into to much of the conversation with him because I want to respect his privacy and it would feel like I betrayed him in a way.

The first thing I said though when we sit down outside is, ‘I am going to be honest, and you know this as well as I do. If you are not ready to quit then you are not going to.’ He agreed, I do not think that he was ready. Some of the things he said to me was a quarter interested, and three quarters not. About the only thing he did say toward quitting was that he has a wife and a kid he needs to think about. I struggled with talking to him, I asked if he had withdrawals yet and he just said a couple, I do not think that he has been clean for as long a he told me he was. That saddened me.

I felt sick while we talked. I mean, I felt like I could literally have thrown up. To see the stuff that is inside me and bringing out the knowledge that he and I shared. The only thing that separated us was the fact that I turned down a different road and he is still there. But our roads were parallel to each other. I think that is what sickened me the most, I saw myself in him. If he isn’t 21 yet he was close to it, I thought of myself at that age and how much I had seen already and the things to come in the next twenty-two years. I get the same feeling when I write on my other blog site, a sick feeling that sticks with me for a few days afterwards. It drains me, I had dreams about using.

Noreen and I thought that it would help, and this is what God wants. I still think that. He puts people in our paths and we need to use everything that we have, and at times that means we have to be uncomfortable at times. She stated that she was worried that now I have a connection. I did not tell her until then I thought the same thing too. I know that if I wanted I could have scored that day. I was told some things that day that I already knew, but hid from myself. Here it was the same ideas being brought out into the open, being thrown at me like darts hitting the center of a dart board. It is okay if I have them in my thoughts because at times I can dismiss them as being silly or not something that I would seek out. But when someone reaches inside you and pulls out your darkest thoughts and shows them to you, it is different.

He did not mean to, it was the same tactics that I used. The problem with addicts is we are all narcissistic. Sociopath tendencies, I know I use that term loosely, but I feel that is the truth. Little regard for others, and we mainly like to be alone so we won’t be judged. I could not tell his parents that I made any head way, but I do feel like I gave him someone to turn to. Someone that is not in a position to judge.

I hate withdrawals they seem to sneak up on you without warning. They take over completely, like a symbiote taking over my whole body. I push away everyone, I want to be left alone and not hurt anyone with my words. I go within my self, and I do not like it in there. This is the height of the narcissistic attitude, if it wasn’t for the little bit of Doug that is left during them, then I would have no one afterwards. Curling up in the bed and becoming a shell. I thankfully have my support group, even if they say nothing they are in the back of my head, the part of my brain that it has not touched. My kids, friends, Church family, and Noreen. You see Noreen is there to pull me out of it. Letting me get away from the world for just a minute and bringing me back in when she knows I need to be back in.

She takes the brunt of all of it. The mood swings, me snapping at nothing but all I see is the mountain of trash and I need someone up there with me. It is like a dream when the words of untruth are coming out of my mouth. She has told me she knows then that I am having withdrawals. I like to think that I have gotten better, but now sometimes I will not even talk, just listen to her and know that I keep my mouth shut until it passes. This worries her too, so I salute Noreen. A person has to be strong dealing with an addict.

I am always taken back when I come out and admit to someone that does not know I am an addict. I told one of my nephews and his step-dad at Christmas that I am an addict, and they just looked at me, like, ‘Yeah, what else is new?’ My nephew even said, ” Yeah, and..?” This has happened when I tell people that I did not think knew me well enough to think that. As I talked to this guy, not a kid he lost that title a long time ago, I realized that I never hid anything. I always wore a label no matter what I had on my body. No matter what clothes I wore, or how short I cut my hair. Nothing could hide the sign that hangs around my neck.

D.