DOSE:

repeated

Heroin

BODY WEIGHT:

110 lb

Where I come from, heroin has a widespread social stigma. It is commonly spoken of by the inexperienced, used in their quips to put down and compare the subject of their joke to a hardcore street addict. These inexperienced people talk about it as if they really have any true insight to what they’re saying, but until they do, I take what they have to say with a grain of salt.

I never thought I would fall in with the heroin epidemic numbers here in my New Mexico area. Yes indeed, an addict I have become. But given this difficult fact, still, this has been one ride I seriously wish I could have taken a lot earlier in my life.

I used to have a strong view against hard drugs. My mother was a severe crackhead throughout my life, and my father, who I never knew, died of a heroin overdose. I had always vowed to never repeat their mistakes, but this vow would not last very long through the course of my life. Little did I know I would fall into the shadow of my mother and, from what I understand, surpass my father’s heroin career. I began to drink heavily at the age of 12, first broke my vow against cocaine use at 15, and took a very gradual trip into the beautiful field of poppy.

My opium use began during my senior year of high school. I had always vaguely known about pills, only in that my friends would do them. But pills were never appealing to me. I was an “upper” always being, a fucking bastard Tasmanian devil crazy on booze and welcoming the occasional bag of coke. Not knowing what I was getting into, one night I drank a bottle of vodka to myself and drunkenly found a bottle of Lortabs. Thinking they were some kind of upper, I snorted about three pills and I woke up the next day stark naked next to a pile of vomit. I never gave a fuck and would stupidly do things like this while uncontrollably drunk.

Fast-forward to the end of the second semester. After a night among many of numbing myself with alcohol, my best friend and I prepared to make the 20-or-so mile trip back to his house from the small city we were in nearby. So I choke down my McDonald’s burger and pass out. Next thing I know I am on a stretcher in severe pain, having a guilt-induced cry over my sister being worried about me. My crazy friend took a nap at the wheel and took us off a fucking mountain. Many details aside, I am given my first bottle of Percocet. I don’t discover the recreational, therapeutic use of these pills yet, but only that they can take away the worst pain and make me sleep like a baby.

Throughout the next two years of my life I continue to be a psychotic drunk. In between somewhere I have an eye injury and am given another bottle of Perc’s. This is when I discover the use of these pills to just “chill out” and/or to “nod off.” But the influence still isn’t strong enough to overcome my use of alcohol. It is during this time that I really wish I could have replaced my alcoholism with my heroin addiction. Heroin would have been a far superior anti-depressant, which is what I was drinking so much for, and not to mention I had tens of thousands of dollars to support a habit. Much to my hindsight’s dismay, however, I was a late bloomer.

On to the year 2008. I become a stoner and I fully realize the magic and power of the opioid. Heroin, oxycodone, morphine, it’s all beauty as far as I am concerned. The thing that seems to be my downfall is my ability to completely look past the negative in something and just see the positive. The only thing that kept me innocent was my lack of resources at this time. My destructive alcoholic self had by now totally depleted my large bank account. Now having this terrible fact to live with plus an uphill battle of a love life, I have begun to take serious refuge in the power of pot and, when the luxury was afforded to me, an opioid in one form or the other. I miss those days. 20mg of oxycodone and I was taken away in opioidal bliss. Not a care in the world. Most of the time I would get lost in this beautiful field of poppies was when I would go see the girl that I loved. Being high would make it a thousand times better. But when things weren’t good with said love interest, they could be bad. And as mentioned earlier, I am the type to self-medicate with drug or alcohol. Only this time I had to stay in line with the law, so I couldn’t drink.

And this is where I would meet the new love of my life. Diacetylmorphine, heroin, black junk, oh yeah! At this time I was living with a cousin who was on house arrest, and also the same alcoholic who pretty much turned me into one. Having lived next to the junkies most of our lives, he finally got sucked in and brought me along for the ride. Among the harsh memories of being tortured by love are some of my fondest memories of being caressed by lady heroin’s velvet glove. One snort and I’d be blown away. I always knew something good was coming when my cousin would discreetly signal me into the next room. At first I was like, whoa, heroin, crazy. But at this point in my life things were getting completely fucked over for me and I needed something to help me cope.

Funny thing about me is I always liked vinegar. I liked to slice up a cucumber and soak it in vinegar with salt and pepper, and, being a weird child, when finished eating the pickle slices maybe I’d drink the vinegar. Now I found myself in a love affair with shooting this shit up my nose and it smelt just like my old favorite vinegar. How weird. In the pre-tolerance, pre-addiction days of snorting heroin, it was just as effective as IV-ing would have been. Once I squirted that stuff up my cranium all I’d have to do was wait a few moments and I’d feel that beautifully familiar feeling: a tension in the back of my head, a warmth pouring over me like the heater coming on during a snowstorm, and all my worries and cares waving me goodbye. If I would be really high I’d have an itching marathon, much like what would happen when I would do my occasional line of OC40. The bad thing about OxyContin was its price tag. I’d be paying like 50 bucks for an OC80, only to do half of it and give the rest to my favorite girl. But with heroin, all I needed was 20 bucks and I’d be set for the day.

Between the months of August 2008 and April 2009 I continued to be just an occasional heroin and OxyContin user. It was after this time by which I had abandoned my love for pot and became a drunk again. But now those fucked up hangovers were nothing to worry about because I always knew where to get the magical remedy somewhere near me. Having now got into a fully committed relationship, I took us both down the path from which we could never return. Using on the weekend slowly segued into using the entire weekend, on to using during the week, on to using each day. By October I was seeing my dealer just about each day. And I had to be using while at work just to satisfy my cravings. Yet I still hadn’t become physically addicted somehow. I would not experience a withdrawal until February 2010. And what hell in the hall of discomfort that is.

The one thing I have left is that while being a full-blown addict, I haven’t completely degraded myself. I still give the illusion of being a relatively clean guy. I take care of myself, and I don’t fuck people over to feed my addiction. There are days once in a while where I have to be sick. I’ll try all I can within reason to get us a fix, but if all options are exhausted then we just have to suffer it out. Any junkhead knows how this is. I still have not shot up. I am afraid. Afraid of the painful and afraid that I will like it too much. But what keeps me from doing it is that I have a high tolerance now, so I don’t think shooting it can help my case too much more. I still am very curious though.

Right now I know no less than five or six people to get from. Throughout my short career I have learned the trade fairly well. I have handled all sorts of shit, from solid hard rock stuff, the infamous tar, and the powder, all of which have come in different hues from light tan to black. I’ve spent a lot of money and have built up a habit I wish I could contain. I recently moved up to buying by the quarter ounce. Normally this should last a while, but having stuff that is all cut up and a high tolerance isn’t very good for longevity of the stash. It is rare to find a potent batch that only a 20 stash will get me high. Now it takes about a half gram just to feel it. It’s a hard life being addicted, I’d love to get clean but it’s just way too easy to fix. And I love being high. Thinking about living life on the straight edge really sucks. A strange thing I live with is a strange pride in being a heroin user. I get weird pleasure out of thinking of myself as a Junkhead. Typical musician. In my opinion, heroin isn’t nearly all the bad as they make it out to be. Avoiding withdrawal is a bitch once addicted. What people should be putting down is not the drug, but the things one will do to get the drug.

Scoring the drug is an innuendo all its own. Playing the waiting game fucking sucks when you're sick, but once I get that stash in my hands all is well. I feel better just holding it and knowing the cure is on its way. I sell here and there to get by, but selling can be hard when you don't have enough to keep the ball rolling. I always come up to a dead end. I just use too much. My nose loves that vinegar too much.

I wonder when and if I will ever shoot up. As I write this, I am thinking about shooting my next hit. I seriously think I'm gonna have to because we're almost out of dope and we have no money for the week. And for some reason if I shoot my next hit I have a feeling it will go a long way. But I've never hit myself before, not sure if I would even be able to get it done properly. I have a hugh vein sticking out of my ankle that would be easy to hit, but thinking of having to bear the pain of poking myself keeps me away from doing it. I really don't want to break my thing of only snorting it, but shit it isn't doing much anymore. I don't know, maybe just try it once to see what it's like, and if nothing great I won't do it again....

[Reported Dose: '3 grams per week']

Exp Year: 2010	ExpID: 87904
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 22
Published: Nov 11, 2015	Views: 3,569
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Heroin (27) : Retrospective / Summary (11), Addiction & Habituation (10), Unknown Context (20)