TeamNoSleep

1. We are not stupid, we’re well aware of the damage. We know that what we are doing is killing us. We know that we are hurting people. We are aware of how society sees us. We know.

2. ADDICTION IS NOT ENJOYABLE. We are not “partying” or having a good time. The party ended a long time ago. We’re fucking miserable. Many of these drugs were never party drugs to begin with. It might seem fun and exciting the first week or month, but it quickly becomes a chore.

3. We don’t keep using just because we want to get high all the time. We use to not get sick and just to function normally in our daily lives. After awhile, we’re not thinking “how am I going to get high today?” We’re thinking “how will I be able to get to work today?” And then the reason we relapse is because we can’t remember surviving without it.

4. We have massive amounts of guilt, shame, and low self-esteem. We don’t need to be called “pieces of shit” and “scum junkies” because we already feel that way about ourselves every day!! The disease tells us not to care when we lie to and steal from friends and family. The disease makes us selfish. But we are human and we feel terrible about it. We aren’t psychopaths and are more than capable of feeling remorse. The more selfish acts we engage in, the worse we feel about ourselves. But we compulsively keep dragging ourselves through dirt.

5. It has absolutely nothing to do with you or anyone else. You didn’t cause it, you can’t control it, and you can’t cure it. It is no one’s fault and you did not fail as a sister/brother/mother/father/aunt/grandpa/best friend. When we lie to or steal from you or choose drugs over you, it is nothing personal. It does not mean we don’t still love you. When the disease takes over, it doesn’t necessarily want to hurt you. It just assigns everyone the same value so they are neutral/irrelevant. Someone in active addiction is stuck in a completely internal thought process that completely blocks out the existence of other people.

6. The drug is stronger than love and values like family and friendship and that’s why we’ve chosen it over you. That is the unfortunate truth. That’s why we find a higher power in recovery, because no human power or emotion can fight off the drug on its own.

Sleep

Eat

Things I do:

Tweak

Geek

At no point should you either take abuse or give abuse. Loneliness hits us all, keep your standards as a gentleman high. Here’s some handy do’s and don’t s to use as a guide:

Do:

Let her take the first hit from a fresh bowl, always.

Be appreciative of the time you spend together, even if it ends.

Maintain your integrity

Maintain your personal hygiene

Be appreciative of your friends and family.

Check in on Tweaker friends

Encourage positive actions and thoughts

Defend yourself in a gentlemanly manner.

Don’t:

Expose conversations that were made in private.

Smoke all of a friends or loved ones dope

Burtn/Blacken the bowl

Share private pictures.

Talk shit or talk trash.

Be bitter

Compromise a friend’s or loved ones trust

Play games with a person’s emotions

Gents we’re tweakers not heathens.

You wanna know what happens once you kill yourself? Your mother comes home from work and finds her baby dead and she screams and runs over to you and tries to get you to wake up but you won’t and she keeps screaming and shaking you and her tears are dripping onto your face and your dad hears all the screaming and runs into the room and he can’t even speak because the child that he loved and the child that he watched grow up is gone forever and finally your little sister runs into the room to see what all the fuss is about and she sees you dead. The person she looked up to and loved. The person she bragged about to  her friends, the person she wanted to be just like when she grew up, the person that made her feel safe. But she’s never really going to get to grow up and smile and laugh and love because she’ll always be consumed with this feeling of missing you. And now there’s something missing from your family and they can barely look at each other anymore because everything reminds them of you but you’re gone and hurts more than anything. and you think that your mom never cared because she was always busy and yelling at you to finish your homework and clean your room and forgot to say I love you sometimes but really, she loved you more than anything and she doesn’t leave the house anymore, she can’t even get out of bed and she’s getting thinner and thinner because it’s too hard to eat. Your father had to quit his job and he doesn’t sleep anymore, every time he closes his eyes he sees his baby dead, and the image never goes away no matter how much alcohol he drinks. And at school your best friend sees that your seat is empty and she gets this sick feeling in her stomach and that’s when she hears the announcement. You killed yourself. And suddenly she’s screaming and crying in the middle of class and no one even bothers comforting because they’re all  busy sitting there staring at your empty seat with tears dripping down their cheeks and all she wants is for you to hug her and tell her it’s gonna be okay like you always did, but this time, you’re not there to do it, everything is dark now that you’re gone and her grades are slipping, she barely goes to school anymore and she ended up in hospital after taking too many pills because she wanted to see you again. the girls who used to make fun of the way you dressed feel their throats get tight, they don’t talk to each other anymore, they don’t talk to anyone, they’re all in therapy trying so hard not to blame themselves but nothing works. and your teacher who always gave you a hard time stares blankly at the wall, she quits her job a few days later. And then your boyfriend hears the news and he can’t breathe, he still calls you a lot just to hear your voice and he talks to you on facebook but you never message him back, he can’t fall in love again because every girl he meets reminds him of you, he’s never going to get over you, he loved you and he cries himself to sleep every night, hating himself and slicing his skin because he couldn’t save you and he’s never going to hold you in his arms or hear you laugh again. Now everyone who knew you, whether they were a big part of your life or someone you passed in the hallway a few times a week, they carry this aching feeling around inside them because you’re gone, and they miss you, and they don’t know why you left but it must’ve been their fault and they should’ve stopped you and they should’ve told you they loved you more and that feeling is never going to go away. And so you killed yourself

Please stop complaining that your plug takes too long to get to you.

Yes, I understand you’re coming down and need to get high. That’s not my fault. Maybe if you called when you noticed you were running low you wouldn’t be bitching that I’m not there yet.

Contrary to popular belief, I have a life outside of serving you. I have friends. I have a family. Sometimes I even spend time with them. I’m not always gonna be available when you want me to be. Again, plan ahead.

I will get there when I get there. You are number 4 in the que. It’s quite possible someone ahead of you bought me out, which means I have to re-up first. Which also means there still might be a few people ahead of you.

When you tell me you need $60 worth, but every time I show up you only have $40 because you had to buy food and gas or whatever… You quickly become less of a priority to those who have $60 when they tell me they want $60. And no, I don’t want that VCR from 1998. Please be kind and rewind and have what you say you’re gonna have. Or wait. Patiently.

Sometimes, if I have 4 people to serve on this side of town and you’re 30 miles away, guess where I’m going first…

Often times, I have to adjust my travel pattern based on where I am and where I’m going. It’s not always as simple as getting in the ride and going directly to you.

You know how when I delivered last time, you wanted me to stay a little while and hang out, smoke a bowl and you told me stories about your life? For one, I really don’t care about your day, no matter how convincing I am when I pretend to be interested. Second, the 3 people in front of you all did the same thing, burning an additional 5 hours of my personal time that I’d rather spend in the quiet comfort and safety of my own home.

Please remember, I don’t want you to wait as much as I don’t want to wait, but sometimes, or even all of the time, waiting is part of it. If you aren’t willing to put up all of your money, get in your vehicle, use your gas, lose time away from what you were doing, leave the comfort of your home, and take the enormous risk of being pulled over and searched and possibly go to jail, simply because you are out at 3 am and a bored cop has a gut instinct something may be going in because he recognizes your car at strange times at strange places, if you aren’t willing to do or even do what we do, then you have no right to complain it takes me 4 hours to get to you. Plan ahead.

Just remember, when I’m running behind on your schedule, I’m also running behind on mine. I don’t enjoy driving all over the place all night. I’d rather be at home, getting high like you’re about to do. Except I can’t because I have 2 more stops to make. So either volunteer to drive to where I am at or wait for me to get there. But when I hear you complain about how long it takes me to get to you, it only makes me take my time.

• it’s not the towering monster you were told about in D.A.R.E.

• it’s not a swan dive into addiction, before and after photos they plaster everywhere

• you don’t have to smoke or shoot up to get results, eating it lasts longer

• how normal you feel for once in your life, look at how productive you are! people just don’t understand….right?

• it gets expensive. fast

• “you’ve lost weight! you look great!” never sounded better

• on that note, you’re spending less on food so is it really that expensive?

• the reasoning will always sound good to you

• “just to get through ____” is the biggest lie you’ll tell yourself

• the supply WILL dry up and nobody prepares you for that

• the shady things you’ll do to score are things you can never take back. and believe me, you won’t realize just how bad those things are until it’s too late

• withdrawals fucking suck

• you can stop after the withdrawals subside…