So the occasional using didn't last long. No matter how hard I was trying to "control" it, it was beginning to consume me again. I had no idea what my addiction had in mind for me. It wasn't long before I was buying morphine again. My boyfriends neighbor and the people that hung out in that crowd were into needles. Something I always said I would never touch.
The pills I was buying were strange. They were capsules you could pull apart with all of the little beads inside. They were tough to crush up and snort. I did that for a little while. One night my boyfriend and I went over to buy some morphine, and I just said "fuck it" and asked for a needle. With a look of shock they handed me a clean needle and I shot up for the first time.
I was so high, I blacked out for a while. I was hoping to drive home, but I could barely move. My boyfriend gave me some coffee to wake me up a little, but I proceded to drop my iPod in it. (It survived.)
You hear needle users talk about how they fall in love with the needle. I always thought they were nuts. But they're not. The whole process becomes a drug in itself. Getting the spoon ready, drawing the drugs up into the needle, finding a vein, watching it register , and the high hits as soon as the plunger goes down.
It wasn't long before I was back to my lying, thieving, cheating ways. I ripped off anyone I could to get more of my fix. My use was out of control yet again. I was shooting up at least ten times a day. I used at work. I finally managed to land a full time job as a nurses assistant on NOC shift, so it was a little easier to get away with for a little while anyways.
I used when I came home. I started squeezing the gel out of fentanyl patches and using that. If you know anything about fentanyl it's 10 times more potent than morphine, and I would use three days worth at once. Sometimes I was slapping myself to breath, I would hit my head on the sink nodding out. I always had the hiccups. Opiates depress the respiratory system.
I would come home when my parents were getting up, go into the tub and shoot up once more before bed. I would always have a needle loaded and ready to go for when I woke up in the morning. If I couldn't find a vein in my arm, I used one in my kneecap.
If I ever had marks from my using I always said I had a violent patient, or the cat scratched me. I was getting close to the breaking point. Work suspected me of using and stealing narcotics, but couldn't prove anything. My disease always had a strangle hold on me, but this time it was breathing down the back of my neck. It was only a matter of time before I dropped dead.
I was sick of lying to everyone, I certainly wasnt fooling myself. I was so broken, and empty. Traci was gone, but I knew she was in there somewhere. I was sitting on my parents front porch having a cigarette. My phone was in my hand. My higher power had to be watching over me, because I called a friend of mine who worked with Koinonia. He answered and I poured my heart out to him. He asked if I was ok, and if I could survive a few more days. He said he would call the next day with my bed date for respite.
He called on a Monday and said I would go in Wednesday. I typed up a letter for work and said I needed to take a leave of absence for personal reasons. I told my parents I thought I was losing my mind and decided to go in to be safe. I figured I would drop the bomb on them later on. I kept using right up until the morning I went in. And it was lime deja vu, my brother Joe picked me up to take me and almost a year to the day later I was back in treatment again.....
