The other night, while hanging out with friends, I seen an unopened bag of heroine on the ground and decided it would be smart to snort it in their bathroom. They said my body went cold, they frantically tried to revive me, called 911, I turned blue, paramedics came and gave me 3 doses of naloxone to bring me back.
I definitely have a history of drug use/abuse. I've done my fair share of prescription drugs and earlier in the 2010's regularly used prescription opiates until I got on suboxone. I did suboxone throughout my Comp Sci degree and then weened off of it.
After that I would still randomly try prescription opiates when they were available. If I could get my hands on them, I would do as much as my body craved which was a lot. Up to 180 mgs of oxycodone sometimes.
Since the pandemic, those prescription opiates haven't been as easy to get. But I would find myself searching the dark web sometimes trying to see how much Bitcoin I would need to find them. Luckily, I wouldn't go through with that.
About two years ago, I discovered Kratom and started doing that regularly. I did this pretty routinely for almost a year-and-a-half.
At the beginning of this Fall, I made a conscious decision to stop doing it to have more energy for work. It's been over four months since I last did Kratom.
To be perfectly honest, I randomly stumbled upon low-grade prescription opiates 3 times in the past couple of months. I say this just to illustrate that I wasn't regularly using any form of opiates before this ordeal.
But other then that, I felt like I was doing the best I ever have been. A big help there has been finding a good therapist, getting on a combination of SRI's which work for me and doing bikram yoga 2-4 times per week.
And then the night came the other day and I _overdosed_. From the time I stumbled upon this unopened bag of heroin on the ground to me waking up from Narcan was roughly 30 minutes.
I put my non-drug using friends through hell because of my dysfunction. It'll never be the same again. The rest of my social group knows about it now, too. It's absolutely soul-crushing that I could feel so good about where I'm going/how I'm feeling before the ordeal to a heroin/fentanyl _overdose_. If I was by myself, I would most likely be dead.
It's roughly 72 hours since the ordeal and things are really starting to sink in. Initially, I wasn't beating myself up about it and told myself it was "just" a one-time mistake. But it's starting to really set in, and I'm afraid that perspective doesn't take the issue seriously enough.
This came at the end of a long break from work and I happy to get back in to get my mind off of this and try to recover in time. I will also continue to do the hot yoga because I enjoy it and its therapeutic.
Does anybody have any experiences or perspectives on how to recover best from this? Thanks.
Good. Ask for their help! What is there to lose now? Maybe it won't be the same anymore, maybe they'll be able to help and you'll have some support! Losing a friend to an overdose is extremely traumatic, so if anything strive not to put them through that. Even if it means they have to know what Narcan is and where to jab it. Talk to your friends and tell them you need their help and give them an easy way to cut ties if they can't handle it.
About two dozen people from my friend group have a "WhatsApp Anonymous" group going to keep myself and four other friends on the straight and narrow after we lost a few from the group to fentanyl during COVID lockdowns. The rule is that anyone can post "!!!" to the group and someone will figure out a way to get them out of the house and their mind off their troubles. One person used the emergency squawk today and was immediately invited to a New Years eve get together (They're there now, getting drunk but at least supervised). There's no rules and no obligations but it's worked well for almost three years now.
Sorry I have no other advice to offer, I'm still working on my own addictions* and addiction is absolute hell. All I know is that the love and help of other people is the way out. For some people it's Narcotics Anonymous, for others its professionals at a rehab facility, but for most of us it's our friends and family. People who care.
You need to face facts though: Fentanyl is everywhere now and if you keep using, this won't be your last overdose. The cravings will always come back and it'll be something you struggle with for the rest of your life, but it doesn't have to define you and it doesn't have to kill you.
* Ketamine, amphetamines, nicotine, alcohol, and cannabis - haven't used either of the first 3 since COVID started
However, it does not mean you’re a bad person. You have an illness triggered by external factors. Do your best to look forward, try to understand how this mistake happened, and patch this hole.
Now, if I’m being honest, it sounds very unlikely that you stumbled across this doing the same things a non-addict would do. Were you somewhere frequented by addicts? You should stay out of those places.
Try to think like a sports coach might. You made a mistake, that happens - the most important question is what you’re going to learn so it doesn’t happen again.
Give a local rehab clinic a call, and decide if you think they will be able to help you. That's a choice you get to make.
I don't know if I have any great advice - it mostly took me time and space to heal - so patience and grit helped me most. Seeking a sense of connection to those who've experienced similar can help of course, too. There'll likely come times when you feel like you're bottoming out and its important to not use to try to pull yourself out of it. Gradually, people in my life looked at me like I was me again, and some of my closest friends never treated me any differently. Months later, someone might ask me how I was with an emphatic, concerned expression and it would annoy me since I just wanted to move on but I'd learn to let it go and recognize it as love and not pity.
Leading up to my spiraling out, substances (weed and booze in addition to the psychedelics) creeped their way into being the highlight in my life and I'd cycle them to avoid feeling like any given one of them was a problem. On the surface my life looked good - career, travel, hobbies, etc. - but I felt empty most of the time and nothing felt as compelling as getting blasted. I'm not sober but I dialed it way back and abstain from everything for long periods of time. I found Gabor Mate's talks/interviews on addiction on Youtube helpful as well as the book Running on Empty by Dr. Jonice Webb.
it probably won't help with any physical pain your body might be in though. Idk if that's a thing with opiates, they don't have the same sort of addictive pull on me that stimulants do so I've never experienced heavy withdrawal from those
Do seek medical help.