6 months

[xp_daredevil]

I met with my therapist today and got my 6th months sober token. I've gotten one every month since I stopped using again. It's been harder recently, the past two weeks or so, but I'm determined to stay clean. I thought the holidays would be hardest, but they weren't so bad. Good and bad days are normal, I've got to remember that. And one bad day, or even a series of bad days, doesn't mean it won't get better.

I don't know if the picture came out, but I tried to take it with my phone. Hopefully you all can see it.

Comments

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Dude, it can't be that hard, right?

Can't you just like, wank more or take some xanaxes whenever you want to go use illegal drugs?

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

You can't trade one addiction for another, dude. So no Xanax. That's how all this started - I got addicted to legal prescription drugs.

I go to the gym a lot, gives me a new focus for my energy.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

But they come from a doctor. That means that you won't give you enough to get addicted to them, right? It's like, here's your two for the week.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

what part of "I got addicted to prescription pills my doctor gave me" did you not get?

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

But if they're monitering it and know that you could get hooked, it should be fine, right? It's insane that you're not allowed to have anything when you'd think they'd just dole it out at doses low enough to make sure that you don't get hooked again.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Still, no. First, now that I've been addicted, my body responds psychologically and physiologically to some meds and things. And secondly, because my body is acclimated to those meds, it doesn't respond unless the dosage is high enough. That's part of why people can OD.

There are a lot of meds that people go on that they cannot stop cold turkey, but have to be weaned off and whatnot.

I would rather avoid any medications that I might get addicted to.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Fair enough.

That does kind of suck.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it does.

Whether it happened intentionally or on accident or whatever, I still have to live with it the rest of my life.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

You don't get some sort of pass because you were using stuff for what was it, incredible migraines or whatever?

I mean, you weren't just trying to get stoned all the time.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Nope. At the core of it, addiction is addiction. I don't think ANYONE wants to become an addict, but when it happens, regardless of why, it's all the same.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

So, let me just see if I have this straight - you can get addicted to something say, because you have to use it because maybe you're in stupid amounts of pain or whatever

but,

because you're addicted to it, you're never allowed to get medical treatment for anything that might also involve say, pain medication for your actual pain again?

Dude, that's the most incredibly freaking stupid thing I've ever heard.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

No, not quite.

I can get medical treatment for pain and whatnot with pain meds, if I needed it and it was monitored by a doctor. Right now, I'd prefer not to and don't need it.

That's not what you said above though - you said I should take Xanax, which is an anti-anxiety medication and not something I need to take right now because part of going to therapy and all that is to learn non-medicinal ways to deal with these things if possible.

I am still more susceptible to accidentally becoming addicted to something again though and I don't want that to happen. Maybe when I get my 5 year medallion it'll be different, but right now, this is what's best.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Okay. I think I get it now.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Okay, cool.

So what's new with you? How's college life?

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Got stabbed in the head. Hair's growing back from where they shaved it at least.

But I'm not really in college - didn't get around to applying, so I'm doing a kind of ... applied course in art, with a friend.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

I heard something had happened, but didn't realize that! Damn. Uncool, dude.

Gotcha.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Yeah. It freaking hurt. I missed Christmas and all.


Yeah - I'm learning a lot about paper and things, right now.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

I am so sad that you haven't even asked me about the paper stuff.

(Like there are so many different types and the way they take ink and the texture, the age, the fibre content, the way they look... it's an entire freaking science. Basically, paper is very important.)

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

I'm very sorry?

Paper is paper...? Sometimes I can feel the difference in types....

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

You can probably smell the difference, and feel the way some bends differently, is thicker, thinner...

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

well, yeah. but it's just paper still.

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but the paper determins what you can put on it. The wrong content on the wrong paper is just weird.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

oooookay.

how so?

[x-artie.livejournal.com]

Okay, basic example: a dollar bill uses a specific kind of paper. No matter how well you copy it, the moment you touch it, it's you're going to know it's fake when you touch it while say, you'd never see an important document on newsprint or something really old on copy paper, so you can feel the way the type is pressed into it.

There's more to it than that, like the way different places use different paper for different things, but that's the basics.

[x-daredevil.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but I can't tell a $1 from a $5 by touching it.