I don't really consider myself an addict (my T confirms this), but I could use a little support breaking some long-standing bad habits with substance use. But I have a lot to say about it at the moment, so apologies for a long post...

My pdoc is forcing me to quit smoking weed in exchange for ADHD meds, which I need pretty badly in order to work. They will be doing urine tests - probably the first one at my next appointment in a couple weeks. This is really pissing me off. I feel like I'm a teenager being grounded, and it's the first time I'm being treated as though I can't be trusted to manage my own health. If I were ready to quit, I could walk away; forcing me to quit just makes me angry and resentful. It doesn't help that I'm having a particularly irritable mood swing!

Part of the irony is that I have very few observable side effects from weed, and it's substantially more effective than the anti-anxiety meds that they gave me (hydroxyzine hcl, PRN, but I won't touch it unless desperate because of side effects). My main reason for using is admittedly self-medication; I'm pretty much always subject to low-level anxiety, with the occasional mini panic attack, but they won't give me benzos either. I'm not stable on meds yet, so my only real crutch is being knocked out from under me when I'm feeling particularly wobbly.

And then the other part is alcohol. I vastly prefer weed to alcohol, but the only thing they've told me about alcohol is to "keep it to a minimum." Alcohol, however, is contraindicated for all my meds and there's a whole slew of problems that go with it. If I were weighing evils, weed would come out a saint compared to alcohol.

There's no acknowledgment of the fact that if they're making me give up weed, I'll most likely drink instead - which I told them from the start. When I'm hypomanic, I'm a binge drinker, and it wouldn't be unusual for me to have a dozen drinks in an evening. For quite awhile I was drinking every day - occasionally just a glass of wine with dinner, usually two, but sometimes the whole bottle. Moderation is not my strong suit...

I really, really worked to cut my drinking down to almost nothing. By my count, in July I had about 150 drinks, and in November (when I was dx'd bipolar) I had 7. I'm worried that giving up weed is going to push me back over into semi-alcoholic behavior. My T wants me to put together a "moderation management" contract but I'm so bad at moderation, I don't know if I can do that.

At the moment, I'm so irritable and anxious that I've actually been thinking about smoking cigarettes again. This is the most unbelievable thing to me; I quit smoking in 2003 and have not missed it at all, until every other vice except my daily shot of espresso was taken away. And now I can't stop thinking about it.

This feels like a train wreck waiting to happen.

I'll get through it somehow, but I could use a little support. I apologize for the long post, and feel like it somehow doesn't belong here because I'm not "technically" addicted, but I hope it's OK since I'm struggling with getting substance use under control.