Pardon the slight radio silence…  Had a technical glitch which has been fixed.

In keeping with the questions asked (which you totally can still do…  Ask away) I have the questions asked by Mickey.

What helped you battle your drug addiction? What keeps you up?

What helped me battle…  It is a hard question.  I never actually participated in a rehab program of any sort.  What happened, is in the span of 3 days:

• I found out that a drug dealer was after me for the bad debt of my ex-boyfriend (mistakenly believing the ex would care.)
• Left my apartment because those I lived with left, and I couldn’t stand those who moved in.
• Started for Northern California with my brother, and a hundred bucks in my pocket and all my worldly possessions.

I didn’t actually MEAN to get clean.  But leaving L.A. meant the dealer after me would forget about me.  And moving 350 miles away meant that I didn’t know a soul – including those that could give me drugs.

I lived in a church dormitory.  A friend was living there, and they decided to give me a break.  Possibly the best thing that ever happened to me.  There was no privacy.  We literally had cubicles (like in an office), and shared a bathroom and showers (although we had individual curtains.  Boys separate from girls.  And that’s where I went through withdrawals.  I’m not sure I even knew what they were at the time.  I just remember that one girl asked me to go to church with her every couple of days – other than that they left me alone.  I suspect they were keeping an eye on me, but didn’t want to intervene unless needed.

After that – it was fairly easy.  I still thought about speed pretty much all the time, but didn’t know how to get it.  I was in a strange city, with no car, and no clue the place to go.  So I used the opportunity.

There was one after effect that I had a hard time with, which was insomnia.  My longest go on speed was no sleep or food for 12 days.  I drank water, but I didn’t want food – it grossed me out when I was high on meth.  But my usual was about 48 hours up, sleep, 48 hours up, sleep.  Well, my nocturnal clock was all messed up, so even though I wasn’t chemically stimulated I still couldn’t sleep!  I had finally found a job at a drug store (ha! – I’m so not kidding!) and they had these cd’s on sale…  Sort of like musak, but really good.  Instrumentals.  Anyway I would listen to that cd at bedtime, and ONLY at bedtime…  Eventually I was able to “cue” myself to going to sleep.  To this day, I still have the CD (over a decade later) and it is still relaxing to me.  It was another 3 and a half years up north, and then we moved back here.  By then, I’d met and married my husband, and had my first child.  I have no interest in screwing up my life.  I know no one who could get it for me.  I’ve been clean since October of 1997.

And she had another question – unrelated I think:

To quote Father Arrupe, have you ever fallen in love, a love that makes you wake up in the morning excited for the day?

Yes.  I have.  I’m still in love with my husband.  Although, I think it’s grown to a more mature, and all encompassing love than that first swooning infatuation.  He was not my first love, however (he knows this.)  I was in love twice before.  Both, however, I believe I lost me in it.  But most definitely it was love.  But Oh my Gosh was it destructive.  With Poe, however, it’s a strong, committed, respectful, honest, two way, fun, breathtaking kind of love.  It was fast.  But we just plain knew.  And now we’re over the decade hump – and yes I would marry him again.