Why Oh Why Don't You Just Stop !?

I guess that's where "Its a simple program" comes from??  I have no problem stopping...I did it every time I passed out or overdosed or ran out of what ever it was i was doing. My problem was staying stopped.

Why didn't they just sop??How many times has that been said by family, friends, police, judges, misinformed physicians, or under educated professionals? I have heard it from so called LCSW & addictionologist ...Gee, Why did I not think of that???dam...I must surly suffer from some learning disability....

The truth of the matter for me is, Addiction is by all means the most complicated disease to understand.

when I was 14 yrs. old I was cutting hay and was to close to the fence row and a limb knocked me of the tractor and into the mower. A sickle mower. Looks like a giant hedge trimmer. Well it dragged me about 500 yards before finally cutting my right leg off and filleting my left leg to the bone from the knee down. I lay in the hot June heat for over seven hrs before I was found. Never passed out. Infection almost killed me but I was fitted with a prosthesis and was good as could hope to be in that day and time after numerous surgeries and a very long recovery. I lost most of my bodies blood supply and with all the surgeries I received around 45 units of blood during the summer of 1979.  What was not known then was in 1979 blood was not screened as well as it is today.They paid cash for donor blood. Blood which had diseases like Hepatitis C which was totally unknown to the medical profession then. So for 35 years I was being consumed by Hep C virus and had no Idea. Just knew I felt bad most of the time but thought I just needed a more powerful drug. Was seen by many docs and my liver functions were Always elevated. However when they seen the amount of prescribed dope I was getting they had their answer to that..case closed. If they only knew of all the drugs I was buying besides that they would have surly fainted.

In 2006 I went jaundiced. was a yellow as a pumpkin. had a gall bladder full of stones...remove gal bladder and case closed again. They did the surgery laparoscopicry. When the surgeon looked through the scope he said he could see the scaring of my liver from the years of cirrhosis that had turned it into a concrete football.I do have several complications that goes along with cirrhosis and it is no fun. However God has seen fit not to let me go just yet. I'm on the Transplant list and my health although not good...is actually better than most in End Stage Liver Disease.

My point in telling that is all this bad stuff is a walk in the park compared to the fight with the disease of addiction.I've been through a hell that only an addict knows. Just like all of us have. We fight a disease that has no cure and if left untreated will kill us. How do we do it?? A day at a time. And our reward is beyond anything we could ever imagine. My thinking is that we are the chosen ones that have been selected to experience this, why? I do not have a clue. But after going through what you and I have been through and we can look at ourselves in the mirror and be thankful for going through it...is all the evidence I need that a Higher Power is at work in my life and chose the right ones.

I am grateful To be clean and in recovery today.

Mama Take This Badge From Me

Yesterday, I had Lunch with probably the only woman I have ever loved in my life .We Met In Memphis Some 10 years ago. I was 4 years clean at the time and just divorced from my wife. Less than a week latter, I had a kidney stone the size of a walnut removed surgically that left me flat on my back (Supposedly) for 6 weeks. But for some reason we were UN-separable. She took care of me and didn't have to.  I doubt at the time if I was willing to do the same.

Time passed I healed and being the addict that I am, I latched on this beautiful lady with everything that I had!  Fell T-Totally in love with each other. Man what a ride!!! We traveled all over the country with the company i was working for. Never been more happy and content in my entire life.... So much so before I even knew what happened she was my Higher Power. Fun, Fun, Fun, If it feels good we did it. But I did not use....Did not have to..she made me comfortable in my own skin. She was now my HP and My Drug of choice.

With all going "perfect" for me for the first time in my existence on this planet, I was to soon find it necessary to make things even better. ....It started slow.just doing a few a day. I could manage this!  With no more need to attend meetings, work my program nor pray to God for help to stay clean...I was back in a desperation that even my new higher power could not help.

As we sat there Yesterday....going over the good, ..She suddenly lost all expression and her eyes were full of brutal truth but also hurt and pain and disappointment  "do you remember the day you looked at me and said.....We have decided its time for you to go?"........  of course I had no clue. I only remember begging her not to walk out that door.....for what was then around the 10th time she had. But this was to be the final one

Through the Grace of God I started over that day. I ended up , that time a ward of the state. I was sent to a mental institution because by all standards I was crazy as hell. Soon the docs and psychiatrist, physiologist, counselors labeled me what I always will be. Just simple addict suffering some days and living some days with this disease of addiction.

It has been my experience that some people are put in our lives just for a season. ...They make such an impact on us, we find it hard to believe that they were only meant to be.that....I also find that God does the same thing with this old junkie....Today I know who I am and who has me.

Oh....BTW......We continued to talk till the late afternoon yesterday. And not one time did I want to jump up and tear her cloths off....well, maybe once.    We did more than mutually agree that we would be having many more lunch dates to come.................

Clean/jft  

I'v Got Wild Stareing Eyes and I have a Stong Erge to Fly...But I have No where To Fly to...

  Time to stop carrying this load  around with me. This heavy load of "what the hell if "  Has about broken my back and caused me alot of suffering that did not have to be.

 Found out Friday  That the HCV has cleared my system, It  is no longer detectable!!!!  Not totally out of the woods..I still have 35 more days of treatment the the 3 months test to see if I am still HCV clear.. Its still a dam good thing and I do not have very many dam good things that happen in my life, so its very big to me!!!!

However being clean and sober today...Is all I need.



jft

For 3 Stange Days

I'm still here and still CLEAN!!  Have had a bunch of test and procedures done. If I didn't know better I would swear this bunch of  med professionals are trying their best to save my life..lol  Dam good bunch that's for sure.

My liver has reached a point of leveling off. It seems the cirrhosis has stopped or my liver started working a little more. I have been sick like I had no idea a human could get. My enzymes are still off the chart but functions show that my liver is doing what it's suppose to just in a very mi-nute way. I'll take it though.

I have not found it necessary to use through all of this and that is Gods doing for sure. I always do come through the hardest time without even thinking about using. Its those everyday "life on life's terms" situations that will put me back out there in a second if I'm not spiritually fit. So I'm still doing what I did in the beginning...and it works just as it did back  then.

clean jft

I am still living with your ghost!!

I am as sick as I can ever remember... This ole tore up liver is letting me know how bad I treated it and he is pissed off big time!!! Thank God above and some GREAT physicians that treated a sick man... Not a low life addict.. So many times in the past I would go to doctors and tell them something is wrong with me I just know it...After a little history was taken and The words RECOVERING ADDICT came out....well, my time was done and so was his, hers...But I had a Diagnosis .....I felt so bad and my belly was swollen the size of a nice watermelon..and oh yea even that jaundice and yellow eyes could be explained sometimes!!   It is the disease of addiction or better known around here as,,,,a Damn ole dope head... I am very lucky indeed to even be considered for the transplant list......so many others will never get that chance..... And I'll be in Nashville Tn. at Vanderbilt medical center First thing Monday morning!!!!

My liver has started making ammonia. This causes me to be crazier and more confused than normal...Its just one of the things that suck with a failing liver. I am starting to tolerate it much better than 6 months ago and Now I can't even hide behind ......lol  I'm crazy as hell naturally LOL!!!

Send Lawyers Guns and Money.....One more time!!

It looks like another month has finished beating on me....(oh poor me..lol )This little 28 day runt has certainly left some hard healing wounds on me and my soul to say the least.    I have court at 1pm tomorrow for being indicted on 1 count of sale of a schedule III drug..Hydrocodone. Found out that my own home county That I reside in, was also out to get this ole recovering junkie .So there went another 2000 dollars to the bail bondsman to pay my20K bail. But I am very thankful for his service........

3/4/13.... Gonna quit bitching for a minute. Went before the judge today and same thing happened that happen in the other county that I have charges pending. Just appointed me to the  public defender after finding out I was on disability due to being right below knee amputee, hepatitis C and advanced cirrhosis.   Dam I hate this. I don't have a clue whats going to go down with this, I am supposedly on camera selling a hydro to a dirtbag informant. If I know only one ounce of truth about me it is that I have NEVER sold a pill in my entire addiction career!! Buying pills?........ well that's a different story! I can remember buying loads of pills with the intent of selling some several times in the past, but I always wound up using every dam on of em!! LOL!! Just like the good addict that I am....lol,  Any way, So i am definitely staying with the truth. Not worrying bout this to much, I have an appointment at Vanderbilt University Hospital in Nashville on Friday the 8th. I am fortunate enough to have a chance to be placed on the transplant list. My liver doc in Jackson has connections there and after my condition was reviewed by the docs, Hematologist at V'bilt, I was contacted immediately by them to "get to them asap" ! I'm ready, been sick as hell these last few weeks and some days I do feel like I am dying. Just taking it a day at a time.... 

Wow is all I can say for the past few days.  Shellie and I have been attending a lot of meetings lately. 5 days ago my front bridge broke when I fell so hard that it knocked all 3 front teeth on the bridge out! Dam! White hot pain seared through my face and out the top of my head like a hot poker!! Have been dealing with the pain with Ibuprofen  and doing surprisingly well controlling it. I guess the reason nothing would help my pain when I was using except hard narcotics is the fact I never tried anything else.. I do have an appointment with my buddy the dentist on Thursday to get started on the repairing of my mouth. Not looking forward to it at all. I hate dentist and the pain that they cause..I tell my friend that I think he gets some kind of enjoyment causing pain as a dentist. He just laughs and says " Yea and I cant wait to get you in the chair ole boy"....and now he gets to!!  He is aware of my history has known me all my life so I dont have to worry about talking him out of some pain pills that I cant take. My disease will no doubt be wide awake telling me this a time that is justified for me to get some legal dope.And yes it may very well be but my allergy has grown so sever to all narcotics that I know if I take just one I will not stop until I am back in rehab, locked up in jail or covered up in the cementary. I am just not ready to take that chance again right now.

But its only Tylenol

This was more dangerous to my health and is what caused my liver damage. My doc says " you have done more damage with this one drug than you did with all the others you abused combined".... and its avaliable without a prescription at every store and corner market in America. And is also in most all drugs that are abused today. ..Just goes to show that anything associated with addiction has a potential hazard.