[Allan]

I, after many many years of srug and alcohol abuse and addiction, have finally found something that is working for me now. As all of you know, this is an ongoing process of trying different things in order to stay clean.. I have now been clean and sober for 4 years. never thought that would happen but I did it one day at a time. I try and use what I have been through to try and help others. Like they say, "you have to give it away to keep it." In another mental health site and one before that I was a moderator of addiction forum because of the help the administration could see that I was giving to others. It IS a give and take place though. I also recieve new things from what people post. I first started out with alcohol when I was 13, my last drug of choice was herion. Herion was REALLY hard to kick. I did it on my own though, going through all the withdrawls and other side affects on my own. When I had told my Doctor about this after it was over she told me that was a BIG mistake because I could have died from going through all of that. But I learned alot going through that and I use everything I have been through to try and help others. I said I started when I was 13, I am now 47, so this gives you an idea of all the different and harder drugs I went through that stopped working and had to find a new one that would give me what I wanted. Well, guess this gives you a little about what I have been through and where I am at now. Today is all I have because I do not know what tomorrow brings. I wish the best for all of you and want you all to know, I have been there, gone through that and know what it is like.

Allan

[dogtanian]

wow, well done you! kicking heroin seems to be so hard, you deserve credit for doing that, especially alone. i'm impressed and i'm sure your experience and advice will be helpful to many. xx

[shadowalker164]

Allan,
Welcome.
I to have been sober a few 24 hours myself. It's good to have you here.
I as well have managed to get myself strung out on almost every major class of drug that one can get strung out on.
I walked away from a heroin addiction, I walked away from Opium, I walked away from crystal meth, as well as codeine and other assorted downers.

The one drug I never walked away from was alcohol.
I never wanted to.
It did things FOR me that no other drug could or would do. It was my higher power. But sadly alcohol isn't a loving God.

I tell guys that alcohol can't do anything TO you unless it does something FOR you first.
If a few drinks turns this world from a lonely, hostile existence into a warm inviting place to live, you will go back to that place again. Who wouldn't? And in time, the naked reality of the world as it is becomes intolerable. We change our world with a few drinks, and then a few more. In time we come to absolutely depend on alcohol to simply exist. I couldn't imagine life without it. And after a few more years of black out drinking, and watching everything that I gave a damn about washing away in a river of alcohol, I couldn't imagine life with it either.

That was the jumping off point.

But God has a strange sense of humor.
God wrapped up the finest gift I could imagine in wrapping paper that looked like pure misery.

My grand sponsor used to tell me all the time that his alcoholism was his best asset. I thought he was crazy the first time he told me that. I know what he meant now. That crisis in my life was the turning point. Out of the crucible of active, painful, pitiful alcoholism was borne a new man. It is a gift. And I never fail to say thank you for it.

I did not know what I did not know. I wasn't at all sure that what those guys in the rooms were telling me would work in my life, but I was blessed with no more good ideas.

Not one of us got to the rooms of AA on a winning streak. Not one of us was walking lightly with the birds singing overhead, a warm breeze at out backs and a smooth road ahead. Stuff has got to get real bad before we cry uncle. You may find many kindred spirits around the rooms if you take the time to look.

If you can identify with anything what I have written, cut yourself some slack,

On the road to the good stuff,
Richard S.