Why I can't ever bring myself to try Heroin. It changed my life without touching it

** Somewhat long story, but it has a true moral to it...


I am am definitely one of the most destructive addicts there is..I've tried many things, but I can never bring myself to mess with opiates any longer...one day that I experienced changed my life forever..

Long story, but this is why that drug still causes me nightmares after what I experienced. I met a really cool dude in rehab, we were actually rooommates during our stay at inpatient treatment. We went to the same sober home after discharge time, and were roommates there as well. We built a close bond and a brotherhood for lack of a better word. He was in treatment for heroin addiction, and I was in there because my poison was shooting coke, pretty much nothing else. But me and him lived almost identical lives in our addiction..We eventually left the sober house and found an apartment to split everything with 50/50. I found a job instantly, and started using again. I actually told him of my downfall, and he said he had found a connection for his smack and had bought 2 bags within a week of movin in, so he was as guilty as me.

I did my cocaine here and there, and he was back on his heroin..He started gettin really bad, and lost his job and I was putting both of us up with the o/t I was working, and I didn't care. He's my "brother". I remember one night before heading out, he said he was able to score a bag with some money he borrowed, about a gram worth...and that he was going to get as high as he could.

The next morning, changed my life forever and I am sure his as well.

I walk in from work, come in through the back and assumed he was watching tv..heard it..I said what's up lazy ass? (In a joking context) no response so I walk in the living room and I see he has O.D.'d and had the damn rig stickin out his arm..I panicked and forced myself to STOP. He was breathing so shallow I was about to perform CPR, a nurse had taught me how to do it correctly, the tips of his fingers as well as his lips were blue. All of a sudden I remember something, when I left him 5 bucks on his night table so he could get a pack of smokes, I remember seeing a vial of narcan. I rush back there to get it, grabbed one of my points and struggled to find a vein the whole time I am thinking my brother is gonna die if I don't hurry. Found one, gave him the shot and he started slowly coming to. I called 911 before the narcan search just in case, made sure my cocaine i had on my person and his dope were flushed. He came to before paramedics arrived, and all I could do was hug him and tell him I am so lucky, I thought I was gonna lose my best friend.

Doing that, saving a life, gave me a rush that was just overwhelming. As much as I have felt like shit, or hated myself in the past. I saw myself as sort of a hero, and if I could quit using I wish I could enter the paramedic field, I have to save more lives because that feeling you just can't get from anything else.

But I can't ever do heroin, not after that, aftr I thought it was going to take my friend away for eternity. He's clean to this day since that, however I am not. He's still the bigger and better person, I believe that.

 

I find that people usually do what they want to do.

Identify your dope using triggers and change your behaviors when you face them. Choose to do something productive instead.

I assume that you were detoxed - that you were clean and no longer addicted. It's all choice after physical detox.

Talk back to your "dope brain" and tell it that you don't do dope anymore. Make yourself proud.

Good luck.

 

One thing I see a lot is self-judgement..."he is the bigger and better person"... no you are equals. Just as everyone else. You did something helpful for your friend and now it is time to value your own life and relationship with yourself, just as you did your friend's life and relationship with him.

You can do it...and going into paramedic services is a great initiative and motivation for you. Thanks for sharing your story.

 

Thank you, of all the harm I have caused during addiction, saving his life is probably the only reason I am proud about who I am and what I did and that may have been the only redeeming value that was added to my life..I felt like I was meant to help people as everything happens for a reason and for some reason I was meant to come home AT THAT TIME, JUST IN TIME, to make sure he didn't die, and I want to save future lives after that because I never felt that genuinely good about myself, until I had his life in my hands and I was doing what I could to make sure he stays alive and breathing and telling him its going to be okay I won't let you die..

 

Damn. Good job not freaking out and saving your buddies life. Hope your road to recovery is possible in the near future, you have to make that decision for yourself. Good luck man.

 

You're "proud" because you did something that nearly any inherently decent human would've done had they reached your friend before you did? Cool bro.

If you can honestly say that you've "never felt that genuinely good myself" than you were in that situation then you are a pretty worthless being. I can't even bring myself to call what you did that day 'selfless' because what exactly did you even give up that day to save your friend? the way i see it, you showed up, saw him dying, called 911, gave him some fucking narcan, threw away your stash, and now, because he's alive, you can stand proud, chin up, because you happened to come upon your brother right before he was ready to die and he's alive today because you did what every other non-evil person on this planet would do. congrats.

what exactly is even the point of this post? you don't do one particularly harmful drug because it nearly killed your friend but instead do some other harmful one, and this means...?

Or is the point that you can spew platitudes about how heroin "changed your life without ever having touched it" because you saw the drug very nearly kill someone very close to you. That's so touching.

I have news for you: most people have not touched heroin for the same reason you haven't: because they've seen what it can and has done to others. I hate to ruin your oh-so-poignant moment you attempted to share here with the forum but there is absolutely nothing to be gained or learned from your story. This could've been summed up in about 60 words or less:

Two drug addicts go to rehab; share a room.
Become good friends.
Leave rehab, enter outside world still drug addicts; share a room.
Find job. Do drugs.
"Brother" found dying. Brother calls 911, flushes drugs, applies narcan. LIFE SAVER!
Brothers still drug addicts - wants to change world by becoming ambulance man.

 

Actually what you just posted, didn't add to this forum's readers. Be the change you want to see, maybe?

 

The real question for the OP is then

Can you deal with someone dieing? It's great when you can save them, but allot of times you won't be able to. Can you day in day out see people dieing, and not only dieing but suffering allot from the OD's, the car accidents etc. Will you take that home with you?

Paramedics is great but understand what your getting into.

 

Way too harsh, dude.