Sleep and Amphetamine

I went to see my ENT recently who has tested me for sleep apnea, which I don't have. He now believes that I have either narcolepsy  without cataplexy or idiopathic hypersomnia. The second is a catch all for people who are constantly fatigued which has lasted for over 6 months. Now 2 years into this, I'm happy to be close to a diagnosis. It's hard to imagine, but I sleep a lot, like 12 to 16 hours without ever feeling rested or fully awake. I miss that feeling of waking up in the morning totally alert and ready to start the day after a "good night's sleep." The next test I have to do is the "Multiple Sleep Latency Test." I hate all the paste they put on my head, and the strange little room they stick me in to sleep. The ceiling wasn't flush with the walls, and light seeped in when I was trying to fall to sleep while uncomfortable, tethered to the wall, and covered in clumps of paste. Once I finish that study, I will be able to get treatment... which is amphetamines.

This is not to say that I am lying about my symptoms or lying to get this medication (I don't think anyone would choose to do this). I just really love amphetamines and need to lose weight. When the doctor said this, I was amazed as I looked at my mother nodding. I am so excited.

The future is looking bright!

-Lucy

Mundane Moments

Pain rips through my feet and ripples up my legs... this is what a 6 hour shift on your feet will get you, besides the minimum wage paycheck. Also having arthritis (what fun!!), one of my many medical problems.

Sitting here in our upstairs living room, my toes dig into the worn down carpet and my body slumps across the couch. My blood pulses full of kratom, it's powerful andd intoxicating. It doesn't help my pain, but it does feel good. The warm yellow light makes my eyes ache, yet I continue to write--I miss writing. Even the sound of clicking keys and the page slowly filling up with words, trickling down to the bottom. Maybe I'll take some more kratom, why not? I have off for two more days, it's glorious.

I can hear my parents TV from the downstairs room, it blares loudly so my father can make out the sounds.  Sometimes it gets so loud, the vibrating voices and music penetrate our bedroom and I have to tell him to turn it down--a strange role reversal. But I'd rather hear their TV, than it go silent.

More kratom, and my heart begins to race again. It's my only goal. I can't wait to get out of this house and get an apartment of our own again--just the rabbit, R, and myself. It's nice being home with the great home cooked meals, the company of my parents, and the comfort of a sturdy support system. It doesn't change what I am though. No matter what ties me to others, I know that the only label I tie to myself is junky. Shitty word, for a shitty person, but I know who I am. I have gotten to a place where I am functioning, but I have no desire to cut this out. Why stop doing one of my most beloved pass times?

Heat rises up my back and onto my face, as a soft sweat coats my  pink cheeks. Might have to throw some more on top of the buzz I already had. The room seems to get foggy beyond my laptop and coffee table, it hugs the room and myself in this warm bliss.

Life may be mundane right now, but it feels great.

Love,
Lucy

P.S. I'll write more again, I promise. I need it for my sanity.

The Magic in a Dollar Bill

I got a one dollar tip, but really it was a one dollar tip and some H. Of course, I didn't know about the H at first, but the large amount of white powder on pressed on to it had to be tested. At first I thought it was coke, judging by the crystals, but no gasoline scent or numbing quality. Now my eyes are watering and I'm feeling like a little cloud... or a large cloud. Regardless, light and fluffy! Today has worked out quite well. I hope everyone else enjoys a lucky Friday as well! I'll probably post more about this later!
Love,
Lucy

If everything is bigger in Texas, is addiction bigger too?

I haven't written recently because I've been in the process of a cross-country move. I have finally somewhat settled in to life here in  Texas... The sky does stretch for miles, before you can see the horizon. Now it has finally become Autumn, and the outside air is crisp as the trees slowly decide to drop their leaves (most are still holding out). I have been munching kratom capsules every few hours to keep me placated without any job opportunities after applying to (I am serious) 30 jobs at least. I keep plugging along at it, both my addiction and my pursuit of a money making position.

Kratom has replaced cocaine... at least it's cheaper... and I don't awaken sobbing with a raw, bloody nose. However, I know that my daily-hourly dosing (I take between 2 to 6 grams per dose) has effected my body. When I stop, I feel slightly sick--weakness, sweats, nausea, anger, depression--so I reach back for the bag. Kratom is a legal plant which connects to opiate receptors. I would say it compares to hydro or oxy because it dose have a speedy edge on top of the glorious opiate euphoria/pain relief. I could lie and say that I only use it for my arthritis/depression, but that is not the truth (or something slightly like that).

It rushes over my head, like the waves I played in as a child, then it pulls me down, deep in my chest to my stomach. My stomach and head buzz along happily, and I don't know why this can't last forever. I don't want to do much more than drugs, and make crafts (I'm right now crocheting a beautiful elephant--I'll post it when I finish tonight!). I know that that is wrong, what we're taught to look down on, but I've always wanted to do drugs to the fullest without other life 'obstacles.' I mean, I want a job right now so that I can get out of the house, but if I won the lottery jackpot, I'd ration it out every week and use some of it to keep my fully loaded all day-everyday-24/7/365. I don't have kids, I don't have responsibilities besides myself and R. But I know that I'm not being a "good citizen" if I "choose" this path.

I sweat more and more, my body is apparently in it's own sauna. I dread going to the gym in an hour with my mother, since I will only sweat more. I've been losing weight, having gone gluten-free and working out multiple times a week. It's hard since my arthritis has been worse than it has been in years. My shoulders have become effected, and are very painful, as well as my back and knees acting up. My mother doesn't give me much of a choice, even though right now it's my time of the month and my cramps are terrible. She thinks I'm lazy I guess, but it's probably that she knows I'm horrible about starting things and never seeing them through so really it is helpful. Just today I feel like my guts are in a vice.

Life in Texas is strange...it's hard to remember that we're no longer home sometimes. R and I are sharing a rental house with my parents. It's huge, with two floors. We stay on the second floor and have a bedroom, bathroom, and an entire huge TV room to ourselves (which is awesome) as well as two bedrooms being used as storage of everyone's stuff. My parents stay downstairs with the kitchen, dining room, and a smaller TV room. The rabbit stays up in our room, while their cat roams the house. It's nice and is keeping R and I at a much more stable level than previously. My parents would have needed a house about this size anyway because of all their furniture, so we don't have to pay rent. We simply help with groceries and other things we use. It's nice having a home cooked meal and sitting at a table with my parents each night. I feel more like we're a family than I have in a long time.

R is happy to be here with us, and my parents like him a lot, so it works out quite well. R's parents are very demeaning to him, they only help to lower his self-esteem because they believed in him the most of all their children (one who got out of prison this year for selling POUNDS of coke/weed and another who is a senior in college that is more athletic than studious). However, their nice gestures do really make him feel great which makes me happy. His mother wrote him a lovely note on his birthday about how much she loves him and how he will always be her little boy (I cried with joy reading it). R is the sweetest, most caring, intelligent man, and it is more than great when his parents acknowledge this because I can feel how his heart and self-esteem swells.

I have to go make some lunch before I head to the gym, but I'll be back later to post about some other things that have happened. Also, I've been off coke since May (aka 6 months)!! It has a strong pull, but we've been able to stay away (not that I haven't wanted to fall back into its arms).

Later!
Lucy

P.S. This is a picture of R and I at a car fair in our town in TX a few weeks ago!

Reality Hits Hard

I've been battling a string of bad luck lately. I guess I'll list it out: finally found job (that barely paid), totaled car (during 1.5 hour trip home from horrible job--which ended the job), kidney stones (OUCH!), and not being able to re-sign my lease (aka moving back with rents in a few days)... However, I haven't done coke since May until today! It's a last hurrah before I move back to my little town where I have no connections. That and the oxy is really putting me in the right state of mind.

Soon I'll be off to a new city with R--a new adventure to embark on together.

I definitely need a new adventure.

-Lucy

"Closer to Heroin than Soccer"

I'm ready to leave this country. Perhaps it's simply that I need a change, and the only one I can fathom would be to find a new scene. New York is slowly become the keeper of my past life. My parents house is being sold, my family here is dead, and I am left with an ever changing world that constantly out paces my own gate.

OR am I choosing to stay stuck?

I don't know it's exact meaning, even though the feeling bares down on me. Tonight I mourned the loss of Craig Ferguson on the Late Late Show. He is retiring in December, and with him die my first favorite late night tv show. It was always a Friday night treat to watch his show, starting around the age of 16, in part because I would be up late getting high--why sugar coat the truth? But I do love his show, his stand up, his writing, really he is one of my favorite celebrities. I am sad to hear about his retirement, but R pointed out that instead I should try and look forward to what he'll do next. I think that I should take the advice, coming from the most persistent cynic I know (and love).

Dublin keeps rolling around as a good city to dive into first. It is the gateway to Europe from the U.S. and one of my favorite cities overall. I don't know, our friends talk about Colorado in a few years, or maybe back to NJ. Who knows...

I want to apologize for my absence over the past few months. I have been sick since March and rolling around in a pit of physical/emotional turmoil has not felt very interesting. Some new experiences have been had, but it felt like a slog through time. This warmly lit apartment seemed more like a tomb, and my parent's house a skeleton from my past life.

Long Island calls out in the distance, for me to come fulfill my promise made at 11 years old. I imagine it like Dorthy in the field of poppies... maybe if junkies were poppies. Our friends are interspersed with them too, and our conversations often draw me into a negative line of thinking. I haven't done it yet, but I know that I am alarmingly close to making a hell of a bad life for myself. I really have been applying to jobs so that I can rebuild my self esteem. I would say that I haven't been as even keeled or as happy as I have been the past few days (even being sick) since my grandmother's passing. She is still in my thoughts a lot, I trace her reflection when I look in the mirror at my own face, and pictures of us together continue to make me weep. Weep may not be the right word, it is as if all of my life force pushes out in a forceful shower of tears and sobs, my mouth gasps, and my face leaks. I can't help it, I love her and miss her more than I have ever missed anyone.

This is my year of losses I guess. But I'm here, and I'll be back...
Don't you worry ;)
Lucy

Up in Smoke?

I turn 23 at midnight. Chemicals power me on wards, at this point nothing else could. I remember when I turned 18.

 I think my long term on/off relationship with sister midnight and her many forms has murdered my memory.

I enjoyed an orchid show with some family and R earlier today. It was beautiful, but my breathing and back/hip pain did not allow me to totally enjoy it. Replacing my human needs with speed to gently push me along became sickening by the end of the time, so we left for home while they continued on beneath the voluptuous green houses.

I've stayed inside our apartments futon both out of pain and exhaustion. The clocks tick down to midnight and I feel excited about another 365 days of consciousness.

But the only clock is on the TV. Fuck. 23.

Snow In-doors

We sat silent in the movie theaters on Valentine's Day as "The Wolf of Wall Street" played out across the screen. I  thought it looked like a smaller theater, I imagined it was chosen as the projection room since it had been playing for quite a while now. All of the blow being poured into their noses and across any hard surface to rest for a few seconds before disappearing once again. I couldn't help being drawn back in for one more night of passion and blow.


It took 2 days of ruminating on whether or not to give into these temptations before we called our friend. We had all the suppliea given to me by the needle exchange and although I opted out of looking for my own veins (which always hide and require great patience) and instead helped R hit his own. After not filtering last time which lead to us vomiting and shitting our guts out, he prepped everything thoroughly. I watched jealously as he began to line up the spike on his arm. His hands shook as I repeatedly told him to lower the angle of the needle, until I could not watch and suggested I do it for him. He didnt mind the help, as I easily slipped it in on the outside of his left arm, I registered blood and pushed down the plunger. It was so easy that I honestly felt a small amount of jealousy. It dissolved as I cut myself a fat line and railed it. Pleasure rushed through my body, and eventually turned into want, which pushed me to repeat the process over until it was gone and my nose was raw.

Tea helped me drift off into a warm satisfied sleep.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman is Dead and so is my Grandmother

My grandmother passed away a week and a half ago. I knew it was coming, but only for a few days before she finally "left" as she called it, her fingers fluttering upwards off the hospital bed a few days before. I had been suffering a virulent lung infection which kept me from spending as much time with her as I would have. She had t cell lymphoma, and her blood count was at it's lowest ever. But she had all her hair--one of her final joys. We brought her home to die, and she passed without pain in her sleep.

I am still in disbelief.

I realized as I thumbed through her wedding album, and loose pictures, that my face was so similar to hers it was eerie. Being an only child, I have always longed to see myself within my parents faces, but never found a true similarity that made me feel complete. However, pictures of her youthful, rosy cheeks and creamy white skin like mine only made me miss her more. I remembered visiting the library with her as a child; it was one of our favorite places to go together and she would read me stories or as I got older I would read the books myself. Those mystical transporters that lined the dark shelves of the children's wing, waiting for me to pick them up and open them. Then running my fingers across the books that lined their tiny tv room, including Death of a Salesman and some John Le Carre novels to the left of my preferred chair. Their house was the beginning of my great love affair with reading and finally writing.

While I stayed at my parents house my blood-oxygen level dropped to 89%, which is 10% less than it should be for a 22 year old who doesn't smoke or have asthma. It was terrifying and confusing, as I waited for 9 hours in the ER to be discharged without anyone really knowing what was to blame besides a possible viral lung infection. As my breathing got better, I began to feel stronger, more like myself. Then I had a horrible bought of urinary retention which lasted for 24 hours and ultimately ended in my bladder being filled with a catheter for five days. I can finally piss on my own, after using some laxatives to help my constipation due to kratom extracts. I used them to keep my arthritis pain at bay... as well as keeping me high. We both know it'd be a lie for me to say it was not for the high.

At least I'm back in Queens, where I can make myself tea far from the watchful eyes of my parents.I gave my mother some kratom when she pulled a muscle in her chest shoveling. It "took the edge off" she said, so I felt happy to help in some way, even if what I gave her she would most likely frown upon. I doubt she realized based on the feeling that it was an opiate because she didn't seem bothered by seeing me take it. I don't know, perhaps it was a small reprieve.

Tonight, our friends are coming over to watch our favorite show collectively: "Workaholics". How ironic that none of us work anymore having both been laid off. They may be getting a ride down to NOLA on Friday, to live on as street punks and train hoppers. It makes me nervous that I'll never see them again, but I hope not.

All that can be done is to wait and see.
Lucy

Long Overdue Post

So much has happened since I last posted that I don't know where to begin... but I'll try and fill everything in as best as I can:

The week before Christmas I was hospitalized voluntarily to be put on suicide watch. I realized that I was feeling very suicidal and did not want to kill myself (because I know that life is precious even if it feels hopeless sometimes). It was the first time I've been in a psych ward or in some way been taken out of the rat race to relax that actually helped. I felt much calmer and much more positive upon leaving and heading into the holidays.

R and I spent our holiday in Texas seeing my mother's side of the family. This was positive in many ways but brought up a lot of stuff for both of us. I ruminated on the decisions I'd made that had taken me to this point, as well as my parents' (especially father's) disregard for my poor life choices. R compared his own family to mine it seemed and felt the loneliness of being rejected by his family yet them still expecting him to accept them and care about them. We are at very different points in this path, but we both are trying to work it all out as best we can. Of course, I drowned my sorrows in hydrocodone syrup and pills of all sorts, while he did his speed and pulled on his e-cig day after day. We did our best to get through the highs and lows together. Overall I enjoyed my time there, especially reconnecting with a cousin who hadn't acknoledged my presence in years (verging on a decade it seems like), but now that she is off of heroin (didn't know she was on it) she was really warm and actually really cool to talk to. It's sad that she went through something like that for us to reconnect, but at least she's on suboxone now. I've been dwelling on this reconnection a lot, and I'm sure it will come up again later in my musings.

For New Year's Eve, R and I dropped two and a half tabs each which was glorious. However, our original plan to go to see our friend's play with our other friends who were doing sound turned out to be unsettling for R--as well as being in the backseat for the scariest ride of my life (and the driver was sober). The house we entered to go to the show was full of people and strobe lights and smoke, dudes with dreads and others with pristene baseball hats turned to the side came at us from all angles, and others called out offering drugs for free or for sale. I was mesmerized by everything around us, and felt as if I was inside some skit from 90s SNL, while R began to quietly freak out beside me. I had been convinced that if either of us were to freak out, it'd be me considering the events of the past few weeks. Luckily, two of our friends showed up to save the day, and picked us up before the music started, returning us to our car. After some sobering up (and seeing a neighbor watching us through his window), we headed back to Queens for a quiet night in, tripping in the serenity of our apartment--we were even able to see the fireworks from our window.

Now that life is mostly back to normal I've been trying to get our apartment cleaned up and get myself back on course. Okay, so the apartment cleaning has not been going well and is beginning to bare down on me now that there is no room in the sink left for dishes. That's barely the tip of the iceberg of chores/responsibilities I need to take care of but have not started dealing with. I know it's bad, but I have been taking my meds daily and talking to my therapist which is in my parents'/doctors' eyes the most important thing (aka taking care of my mental health). I don't know how well I'm doing at that but at least I'm doing something.

The tea is kicking and the temperature is so low (-8 when I went outside at 5am for breakfast, now it's 4 degrees at 9:45am) even in my apartment that I can't deny myself the joy of crawling back under the covers. I will write more later on today.

-Lucy