deckme

I dont really wanna talk to anyone whose HUSBAND or friend or whatever is addicted to crack cocaine. I want to talk to people who KNOW what it is. I can't frickin stand it; all these years I played with different drugs off & on, more off than on, went years & years raising my kids & not doing anything. Not to say I haven't had problems... but not with addiction. Haven't used a needle but this crap is BAD. Real bad. I don't even like it, it's not fun, it's dirty, inconvenient as hell, reclusive, sly, and lemme tell ya, it sure brings out the crazy in each & every person who gets hooked. Oh & did I mention it makes you only care about the drug? First & foremost. Well I'll go on if someone who really knows posts something & I see it. Help.

phoenix

Hi and welcome.

This forum and the NA forum are for addicts.We also have the Anon forums for friends and families of addicts.I'm an addict.

I never got too much into doing crack.But I shot up cocaine,speed and heroin.I know all too well what the misery of addiction feels like.I also know that it's possible for people like us to recover.

Stick around....you'll find people here with the common bond of addiction.

phoenix

texasmamacita

so how was day 1?

i have much more going on than addiction. crack has become my coping tool.
i want to kill myself and crack gives me a small relief from the pain.
but i can't do it anymore either. it's always 1 more time.

when i have more strength i will post more.

glad you're here.

tex

Gooch

When I first got clean I wondered if I "belonged" at Narcotic's Anonymous. After all I heard people sharing their experience and I hadn't been to jail, or prostituted myself, or done certain substances. I came away thinking that maybe I wasn't really an addict. 3 years later the day I got out of jail I made it my only priority to get my ass to a meeting and figure out how those people stayed clean a day at a time.

Do you want the good news or the bad news first?


I'll give you the good news first.

The good news is drugs aren't your problem. ...........

The bad news is addiction is.....

oh wait... there's more good news.

Millions of addicts are staying clean just for today by sharing their experience, strength, and hope with each other. They don't have to use ________ anymore (fill in the blank with your drug of choice) no matter what!


Keep coming back.. go to meetings .. you'll hear what you need to if you just have some patience.

Jon

I'm one.

And I've lost count of how many jobs, relationships, friendships, trusts and years of my life I have lost to crack.

I do remember this: how it feels to be out of crack, out of money, no one to call and nowhere to go.

Want actual? How about staying up for 11 days and ending up on a respirator. Not because of the crack, but because the butane from the lighters crystallized in my lungs.


I don't ever want to feel like that again.

lavendae

Deckme--

I am 22 years old, 3 years sober, and used crack cocaine for 4 years until I got sober. I belong to Cocaine Anonymous for that reason-- I needed to talk to other crackheads, beacuse I think we go through *#!*#!*#!*#! that not alot of other types of drug addicts do.

I am also a greatful recovering alcoholic who also is a member of AA. I need both sides of my dis-ease treated, in order to recover. Okay, so there's more than two sides to my disease. You get the picture.

If you feel like you need another crackhead to talk to, PLEASE feel free to chat with me, anytime you like.

Its glad to hear/read someone else post on this site about that. I too have not found any other recovering crack users on this site.


Laven

wishIsedNO

well i did use crack for 2 years but i put heroin in its place..i know what your going through..that horrible feeling when your smokes going down and you just dont know what to do and u have that unbelieveable hunger inside u for more that u could kill ya mother if u knew she had some and wouldnt give it up..I think thats why i fell in love with dope so quickly after i did it cause i didnt know how to get out of that addiction and the dope didnt make me so crazy for it and it had a limit u didnt go along nite lighting up
But im not telling you to go out and start shooting dope..but i had friends who didnt do like me and got help, but it takes alotta strength..you just have to tell yourself enough is enough it seems like your getting close to that..At least you are starting to see how ugly it is..thats how i started getting clean too...Im glad that you found this place..and i want u to know u can private message me anytime..i hope u find your way outta of that crazy hell..and you can do it if u can really say that theres no way to win the fight to control it..so u might as well surrender and go with the flow and just let the professionals as in a rehab or detox show u how to stay away from it...i wish u the best..Jackie

phoenix

From the response it seems there is no shortage of crackheads here.But I hope you will take advantage of all the experience,strength and hope to be found,both here and out in the world.When I started focusing more on the things we had in common,rather than the differences,that's when deeper recovery became possible.

phoenix

schooner

you sound like me. i am so pissed off at coke..i hate it but can't stop...i'm losing everything and i don't give a *#!*#!*#!*#!. i feel like i have lost my mind.

HarryH

It's not what you used, how you used, who you used with or for how long you used. What it is, is what it did to you.

And crack-cocaine did everything it was suppose to do for me. Took my right of reality into a world of misery and plain hell. It owned me. I gave up all decisions and choices. Crack had me under control. But I hear a lot of the same words from alcoholics and other addicts. No matter what they used. I used and abused alcohol and drugs for many a years.

Today I found a new life. In the halls of NA and AA. Wherever there is recovery.

Just For Today: I'll be unafraid, my thoughts will be on my new associations, people who are not using and who have found a new way of life. As long as I follow that way, I have nothing to fear.

Keep coming, it gets better

Harry

Theresa A.

Ok Ok, I am a crackhead too. I lost everything but have gained more than I have ever dreamed of in NA. I noticed someone posted they replaced it with Heroin - well, I did the same - a year of heroin and then a year on Methadone and GUESS how I got off of that stupid Crack. Still that was my best thinking since the 'stupid program' wouldn't work for me. I thanked God everyday to have traded something that invaded my EVERY WAKING THOUGHT for something just physical - even if it was only fun for the first few weeks. At least I wasn't thinking about 'that sh*t'. Life is just a circle and if you are an addict - there is a road to walk and I hope you find the program before the alternatives. Eventually there is no where else to go. There is only ONE solution - only one thing that can save your life and that is the program. I never thought it could work for me and I hang on by the skin of my teeth a lot of times because I don't always do what is suggested and I still try to control my life - I forget how horrible that sh*t is and sometimes that sh*t that I never even liked actually seems attractive. That is called my 'disease' at work. It is almost synonymous with my thoughts. My disease lays in wait for any weak moment and to be honest - it never goes away.

I can tell you how I did it this time yet I must have collected enough desire tags to shingle a house. I still find them in drawers and all over the place. I just got the first green tag I have EVER had (60 days). I have only ever had two orange ones (30 days). That stuff is the end of the end and I had to watch in horror as I lost every single thing I ever had piece by piece. I write a lot about it and there is so very much to say.

The first thing I will say today is:
Go to a NA meeting - no harm in it and a wealth of good can come
from it. There are cool people there who like to hang out, do things and have a good time in addition to recovering from active addiction. Just get to a meeting and check it out.

When I was 27 - that is when it hit me. I'd been partying my whole life 'successfully'. I thought I was grown by 27 but then I started smoking crack. I never knew what a monkey was until that happened. I didn't even realize what was happening until I looked back and saw that the things you hear about coke - the things that happen in your life - I looked back and realized I was on that road. I was losing everything and I knew what came next according to what I'd always heard.

Well, to make a long story short - here it is and I am 32. I have been asking why me for so long and that sh*t has stolen everything from me. I am trying my damnest to rebuild through the fellowship and friends I have in Narcotics Anonymous. I hang on for dear life and try not to die each day. It is a tough road and I never thought it could happen to me. I never knew that cocaine was different. I never knew what hit me. College educated, great jobs up until that point and just a partying chic. Man, life changes and there are things to come on the road you are traveling that you just don't want to see and don't need experience in. You don't have to lose everything - you can get off that ride right now through the help of NA. Run as fast as you can whether you think you need it or not. I cannot begin to describe to you the suffering that lies ahead.

Look for a meeting here at this site: http://www.na.org/

Your friend in NA,
Theresa
www.iwantrecovery.com

wakowife

deckme: well i can tell you first hand that this is one horrible drug, i startd using crack almost 5 years ago, it has been an uphill battle for me to stop. i have tried so many different times, but then somethign goes wrong in my life and i run right back to it. i know how frustrateing it can be, you want to quit so bad, and then out of no where come the cravings, have you also had the horrible dreams, they usually come after you have stopped using for a few weeks, i know for me, there are times that i dreamed that i was actually smoking or trying to hide the pipe from my husband, i would actually wake up out of my sleep looking for the pipe. from my experience when you first stop using, it gets worse before it gets better, you will think that your ok for today and they completely out of nowhere it hits you. i have been lclean again for the upteenth time and to tell you the truth, i cant even remember what day i stopped again, but maybe i'm better off not counting the days or weeks or even the months, just let one day come after the other and prey that i can stay clean for just one more day. my thoughts and prayers are with you. hang in there, i have had some clean time and i can tell you it deffinately is worth it.

Bernadette

Theresa A.

Hey:

I am in Texas, too. I have a recovery site http://www.iwantrecovery.com where we have TX events listed - fun things to do in recovery. We have pictures there of all the fun we have been having for the last 76 days - the most time I have ever had.

I talk a lot about how I did it these couple of months. I have been posting at a site called CrackRecovery. The front page of it has pictures of rock so I wouldn't suggest going there. However, you can get in to read all the people talking about crack the back way: http://www.ipcamera.info/forum/

Well, I hope to see you around or hear from you!
Theresa A.

ButterflyChaser

I have no idea bout crack, my drug of choice is/was Crystal/Meth (just as bad) from what I hear, anyway, just wanted to say Good Luck to you!

Theresa A.

Well, Butterflychaser - my drug of choice was MORE like yours too. In the end it just all lead back to coke for me. That was my final drug of choice which is such a screwed up phrase (drug of choice). That implies that I liked the stuff. I always hated it but I just wanted - my mind / body just craved it and I didn't even like it! It implies that I had a choice. I have a choice today but I am not even going to go there with choice back then.

Thanks for responding!

texasmamacita

glad to see others out there like me. i AM going to a meeting in 6 hours.
i will die if i don't stop. have been scraping the last of the devil i sold my soul too.

thanks theresa for the info. i have the sites bookmarked.

there is a little recent history on me in bi-polar forum. "devastation"

i know i can't to it alone. please help me not give up......

i'm terrified

Theresa A.

Dear Texas:

I posted some stuff about how to stay clean today - advice on staying clean at the crackrecovery site. I copied the first part up above - the advice on going to a meeting. The second part is as follows:

I pulled up some information - advice to a friend I sent some time back. This was in the beginning for me, too and this is what I was REALLY telling myself in order to not use. Not using is hard - it is natural for us to want to use - we are addicts.

I read the chapter in The Basic Text titled Recovery and Relapse a lot. It's funny because I called it Relapse and Recovery until just recently. That is a Freudian Slip if there ever was one. Yet now I notice that lots of people say it wrong - I heard two different people with some cleantime say that at a meeting last night. Now that I am aware of it I hear it. I read Recovery and Relapse TWICE last night - once on the way to a meeting and once before bed because someone suggested I read it again. It is really an amazing chapter for a crackhead...it's like magic and not always GOOD magic. Our disease - our thinking, that is will read what it chooses to read from it. Long before I had any cleantime I read it finding 'loopholes'. It says things like 'Relapse can be the destructive force that kills us or leads us to the realization of who and what we really are'. Well, when I couldn't get clean I'd think that must be what I needed. It says that our resistance to change seems built in and only a NUCLEAR BLAST of some kind will bring about any alteration or initiate another course of action. So - I walked around for so long saying I needed my NUCLEAR BLAST before I could get clean. Yeah - I knew what that meant - someone had to die or something had to happen. Well, it didn't...it happened inch by inch as I lived in that 'dereliction' they talk about...They talk of jails institutions and death as our ends in the book and I have come to realize that DOES apply to me...I do qualify yet as much as you hear those 3 discussed you hear little about the 4th one mentioned in the book - dereliction which is that space in between living and dying where you wish you were dead but couldn't keep smoking if you died.

Needless to say when I began reading that chapter and for years I used it as an excuse to keep on using. Of all the great things the chapter talks about - an addict can still find a way around the system and besides, as a crackhead, who needed an excuse to use? I mean those patterns that grow and grow until it is time to use because it is now. I recall it got to be time to use as it was Friday, time to use after 5, time to use when it rained, when it got dark, when I felt good, when I felt unhappy, when good things happened and bad things, when it was hot - I mean when the sky was ANY SHADE OF BLUE became time to use. It is such a trap because then when we start feeling guilty about all the stuff we are screwing up - we use over that and we are screwing EVERYTHING up! We lose jobs, friends, posessions and so forth and we blame ourselves so we use some more to cover that up. I used DRUGS to have a good time for many years but crack used me. I just 'want' period, despite the consequences. My mind doesn't seem to differentiate between good and bad crack experiences - they were all bad. My mind just wants and that scares the *#!*#!*#!*#! out of me.

There is only one way to live - I know this today and even knowing that sometimes doesn't seem like enough. We are dealing with a force that is destructive and deadly but you and I both know at some point it is hard to care even about that. I read once something about becoming a 'wandering crack junkie'. Ewww. Feel the burn. I got chills just now typing those words. This disease is the only disease that tells us we don't have a disease as our worlds fall down around us. The big answer is NA - we will gladly share it with you. It is a simple program - a set of tools to use against this *#!*#!*#!*#! and I have tried EVERY SINGLE THING I could come up with to stop smoking until I felt - even with the program - that I was just a lost cause. I will talk more about feeling that the program wouldn't work for a 'crackhead as bad as me'. I really had given up all hope.

Okay, back to the letter. I had a friend who was having a hard time staying clean - he has a few less days that I now. Any addict that can stay clean for just ONE DAY is a miracle, mind you. Like I said - writing helps ME in the process because it reminds me of the things I NEED TO HEAR.

Wow - this is funny - I just noticed the date on this and I had 3 days clean when I wrote this but you know - I have been trying to get this program since the first time I went to treatment in 1998. That's the trick sometimes - just to keep coming back because it does work.

I said: You said it yourself several times about knowing that it won't be different. You can play the tape through right now. Are you trying to use that Thought deal about saying the cravings are not welcome? Give that a try. (He would say everytime he had a using thought - You are not welcome, all using thoughts are being handled by my Higher Power) Sounds like you are like me in the fact that you just think too damn much. My mind just takes me back out. What I have found is that if I turn on the radio - not on songs that say "I'm a loser or try to stay sober feels like I am dying or I'm *#!*#!*#!*#!*#!*#! up cuz you are" - that is my favorite music - the top alternative, I guess, yet I have been putting on Classic Rock as it all seems pretty positive like "Let the Good Times Roll" etc. Anyway, I find if I put on music loud enough and that doesn't mean too loud just loud enough that it distracts me - I can't run with my cravings. I read something the other day about a lady saying she sings because you can't sing and think about using at the same time. Try to 'thought stop' as our minds take us back again and again which I guess is just our disease talking to us.

Lastly, the book says "You never have to use again". That is a tall order so it also says just don't use today. Try to stay in the moment as I mind f*ck myself with that one too by thinking Yeah and then at midnight just do it again, huh? That sounds like eternity which it is but I have no business thinking about the past too much or the future. I need to be right where I am right now and that's all. I'm in the right place and so are you. And if we just Shut Up and Listen, God won't give us anything we can't handle. I think we sit here saying...but I can't, I just can't. We list all the reasons we can't...I'm depressed, I'm unique - no I really am! ...look at my track record, I just can't do it and all the while God and everyone else we let talk to us and most of them are doing the deal, are saying just SHUT UP and listen. Stop Thinking, Keep it Simple Stupid...we think too much so we need to find ways to shut that down. The book says that All feelings will eventually pass. They are just feelings. If we could just find a way to truly live for the moment as being clean right this moment is obviously all we are asked to do and isn't that freakin' simple enough? Don't use no matter what...not right now.

The book says (In Relapse & Recovery) that we are never forced into relapse - we are given a choice. It also says it is important to remember that the desire to use will pass - we never have to use again, no matter how we feel. I can't find where it is in my book but somewhere the NA Program says, We have NEVER seen a person who lives the program relapse. The trick there is learning to live the program but once we stop trying to 'justify our using' we do have a choice today.

Well, there's you a little meeting since you can't get to one right now. The answer is in NA. Period. Stop thinking, take suggestions. Period.

Together WE CAN!!
Theresa A.
www.iwantrecovery.com

witchlin

Well there is one here too (crackhead) but recovered for a long time now though Im currently watching my not so better other half go threw recovery painfully.
I have a web page that I started and Im collecting stories of CH and loved ones and whatever. I will be doing Heroin after I finish the crack section and Im 27 years clean from that. I started it mainly cause everywhere I went there were loved ones of crackheads jumping down my throat the second I expressed much at all. No offence to them at all, some of them I have great respect and admiration for and have made some friends, but I am and have been on both sides of the fence, not sure where I belong, so I started my own little thingy with my own twisted views and would love someone to suggest more stuff I can put up there or just challenge what I have to say.
http://members.rogers.com/witchlinblue/
If anyone would like to share their story, talk, or just to give me s**t, there is a link there to email me.
One day at a time, no one can do any better than that.

Witchlinblue
http://members.rogers.com/witchlinblue/

Theresa A.

Hey - I am about to go check out your site. I was just sharing today at another site I think you might be interested in - I shared in response to someone saying heroin will take away crack cravings. Been there, done that.

The site is a crack recovery site. The main page has pics of crack on it so I don't go in that way - the forum is here:

http://www.ipcamera.info/forum

The post I'd like to share with you is here:

http://www.ipcamera.info/forum/viewt...r=asc&start=15
well - it is on this page and starts with "Heroin? Hmmm. Let me tell you a little story!"

I thought you might be interested in the crackrecovery site for ideas about your site. Let me go check your site out! My site is www.iwantrecovery.com

Together WE CAN!!
Theresa A.

Jon

witchlin and Theresa,

It would be great if you would post a link to our message boards on your sites as well...

Thanks for being here!