it’s sunday. feels like a good enough day to start over.
it was a predictable weekend. we spent all the money we had, on drugs, by friday, simple equation we keep testing. does me + you  + money= debauchery?

the answer is irrevocably yes.  so we made our way from wednesday to friday tepidly inebriated, and saturday rolled around. i felt strange. i was tossing and turning. my muscles were clenching, and i was sweating profusely. it hit me like a ton of bricks.
i’m fucking sick.
now i know what you’re thinking, “silly junky, of course you’re sick, it’s what happens when you run out of dope. did you miss this class?”  but there is always a catch. casey and i have been on the suboxone program on and off for about two years now. it always starts out with us doing our damndest to stay straight. fighting every will we have to keep clean, and keep together. it always ends up with us doing our damndest to be clean for piss tests, and fighting  every will to sell our last pill for two bags. life is funny like that. learn from it, or repeat it until you do. we are still trying.
so casey finally got booted off this program we’ve been working since march. he got final word last week. i have been off the program for about three months, since i lost my last job. we were doing okay, with just casey’s meds. well, at least i thought i was; i had a “get out of sick free” card, and he took all the piss test (you know it was a good deal) but he missed a few appointments, and failed a piss test, so he’s off. we had one more script for 14 pills. he promptly sold half of it, and we copped a half bundle.
now for those of you who don’t know suboxone, it’s a pretty good deal. put one under your tongue and half an hour later, you are well. don’t get me wrong, there is no buzz involved (i hear you can get a slight body high, but only if you have absolutely no habit). but lets be honest, certain times, you will take “well” over anything else in the world, except high, that is. so i took my pills during the week, and waited like a good little girl til payday. it was working out better than anything else we’ve tried.

so, needless to say, i haven’t been sick, unless i wanted to be. wait it out, see if you can score. if  not, the worst of it was an hour or so of mild discomfort. not the ”sick” we all know and love. desperate, angry, tired and pathetically helpless. i haven’t been there in a while, until right now. 
so that brings me to the end of the weekend, no money, and i had two suboxone left. now good conscious would say “take your meds and cool out til next payday” but my girl had another idea.
“trade you those two pills for this bag” kristi had been letting us stay at her house for a couple days. now its getting down to the wire, and bartering for whatever’s left is a common practice.

no way, i need this shit, i have to think about tommor…”okay”

i know i’m an idiot i was thinking it the whole time.
add water. there’s still time to give this back.
draw it up.  casey is gonna kick my ass.
tap tap tap, damn little bubbles, what am i doing.

push it down i am gonna be so sick…but not til tommorow.
fade to black…
and here i am. it’s two in the morning. i am going through my old routine. hot sweats, cold sweats, sneezing and aching. and all for a 45 minute buffer between me and all the shit. i’d like to say it was worth it. what do you think?
now for the question i should’ve asked then. what the fuck am i gonna do tommorow??

nw W ANTHEM FOR AMERICA’S DISENFRANCHISED
will we look back and laugh at our twisted path
or will we drive on mindlessly,
asleep at the wheel, too numb to feel
the weight of the gravity that’s holding us here?
wasting away, lookin’ for a new cause to die for
or a reason to live another day,
what would it take to make it worthwhile,
to make all ya’ll smile, and say: hey hey hey, everything will be okay

   
 
i understand that being a junky comes with certain bad side effects. track marks, poverty, and mistrust, just to name a few. i see, i’ve done some fuct up shit in my day, i won’t deny it. but this situation just didn’t jive with me. i just feel like the wrong reasons are behind it all.

day before yesturday i finally ran into my best friend mikey, back from war for good, and looking to do some drinking. i called casey at work and told him, i’d probably be gone when he got home cuz me and mike were gonna go out and drink a little. casey didn’t mind. me and mike have been friends for years, and it’s never been a sexual thing.  besides, if you are gonna be in a relationship, there’s gotta be some kind of trust. looking back on it now, i don’t think it’s sexual mistrust, i think it’s drug-related.
so mikey showed up and we were in the pool for a while, just drinking and catching up, it’s been about three months since i’ve seen him, so time passed quickly. before i knew it casey was home and we were all just chillin, having a good time. my brother and his friends asked me to go to the liquour store for them, and mikey had to pick up a dresser from a freind’s house, so we decided to go take care of that. casey asked me to get him some food while we were out too. now here’s the fatal mistake; we took our beer with us. now, as a junky, drinking doesn’t come into the equation often anymore. i don’t know what it is, but to me, dope and booze just don’t mix well. so if you’re drinking, leave your beers at home, or you’ll never go back there.  so by this time,  i was tipsy off like three beers. we got to our friend dave’s house, to pick up the dresser, and we ran into even more people i haven’t seen in forever. we decided to stay for one beer, i mean, we brought it with us, why not have one??  two hours later, i had totally forgotten about the booze for my brother, casey’s food, and anthing else i was supposed to do. i was just living the moment.
at that point, the whole direction of the evening changed. this kid john we know from a couple years ago showed up. he’s a recovered addict, well, at least i thought he was recovered… about ten minutes into his visit, mikey and dave finally go downstairs to load the dresser, the whole reason we even came over, and john makes his move.
“so kaia, how’ve you been?”

“good, how’s your wife?”
”getting a divorce.”

“bummer, sorry” nice one kaia.
“so,what are you doing tonight, i hear you can cop dope in the city”

here we go. “yeah, i know a girl, i thought you were cool with that shit now.”

“are you ever really cool with it?” he just smiled at me.
in five minutes i was on the phone, and in ten we were in the car. twenty minutes, and i was balencing my cooker on my lap. that first desperate coke shot always rattles my cage. you can never get it done fast enough, and you can never seem to get your hands to stop shaking.  as i closed my eyes and tried to get my head-ring on, the phone rang. it was casey. understandable upset, i’d gone to cop and totally forgotten my responsibilities to them. so i hung up the phone, and went into my purse to get the money for the booze. i had to make this right before people started to get really pissed. priority check; failed.
this was about the time i noticed, all the money was gone. as well as my wallet. nice. very nice. i imediatly called casey back.
“all my fucking money is gone.”

“what, what the hell did you do with it?”

“ i lost it or it got stolen, or something.” i was about to tell him about the wallet, but he cut me off.

“yeah, or something. nice one, kaia, you like spending other peoples money on dope.” he was sooooo pissed off.

“what do you mean?” i knew what he meant.

“you take off with aaron’s money and go to cop, and then convienently get robbed. who do you think you’re fucking with?”

i was hurt, i admit it. but i had a feeling, as soon as i noticed the money was missing, that this was the way it was gonna go down. i am, after all, still a junky. weather it’s my brother or my boyfriend, they all see me the same way. there’s always that chance, in their eyes, that i’m gonna hustle them. but that’s not the case with me, i don’t pull that shit. and i certainly didn’t pull that shit this time.

“i don’t know what to tell you, baby. the money is gone.”

he hung up on me. nothing makes me sadder than that sudden dial tone. i was surprized he took my brother’s side so adamantly. i mean, we are partners in crime, even if i did rip off aaron, (which i didn’t, repeat, didn’t) casey should have had my  back. after all, it wasn’t even his money. that’s what leads me to believe, he was jelous more than anything. not of me and mikey, or a “cheating thing” but of the drugs. he was pissed i copped for another kid, and got high out of the deal. just gives you a little insight into the mind of a junky. do whatever you want, but don’t ever fuck with my drugs.
mikey brought me back to the apartment we were hanging out at. no money. we checked his car, no money. we checked john’s car, no goddamn money. i reluctantly dialed my house back, they had to hear it from me.
aaron answered the phone.

“is casey there?”

“no but i am, you know what isn’t here, my fucking money, or how about my beer.”

“i told him, aaron, i lost it, i can get it back to you tomorow.”

“what does that do for me tonight, kaia?”
”i didn’t have anything to do with it, it was an accident, or a theft.”

“I DONT BELIEVE YOU”
that pretty much said it , right there. no matter what i said, noone was going to believe me.  aaron told me casey said “fuck you” and went out for the night.  i went to a girlfriend’s house for the night. no use in going home unless you have what they want from you. and i couldn’t have the money til the next morning. so i settled in at a house where beer and weed are the two main food groups. tell you what, nothing give you that mix of a rush and a shame wave like secretly shooting dope in a friends bathroom. but, hey, i don’t make the rules, i just live by them.
when i did get home, i gave aaron his money, and we were cool. things with casey were a little tougher. he left the house and didn’t come home for two days. didn’t go to work, was just out on a revenge bender. you know how that is, when you feel left out of a score, you settle it on your terms. well, for my indiscresion, i paid. two days of no phone calls, worrying, wondering. when you are living the life of  two addicts, the worst case scenario runs through your head alot.  for all i know he could have od’d and been stuffed behind a dumpster.

 if i learned anything from this experience it would have to be; if you want anyone to trust you, buy your booze before you cop your drugs, hehehe. but seriously, if you want people to trust you, do what you say you’re gonna before you do what you want.

mikey and i have been best friends for almost ten years. it’s been a long arduous road, but i love him and i always will. we have way too  much history to just give up.
for instance, he was with me the night i ate bad acid and had a psychotic epsiode (seeing god will give you a special bond with someone, i guess)
i was the only one of our friends who stuck by him when we were 18 and he got his brand new girlfriend pregnant, and immediatly started fucking another girl. i know he was wrong, but it doesn’t mean he should be abandoned by eveyone.
we have a special understanding, because no matter what happens in our lives, we don’t judge each other, we try our best to help and see each other through it. it’s important, becuase in life, there aren’t alot of people that love you no matter what.
mikey has been in the military since we were 19. he’s been deployed to every warzone on the planet. sometimes i think he’s got an addiction to danger. as well as everything else. see, mikey and i are good for each other in alot of ways, but there’s one way we don’t do so good. the drugs.
since we’ve known each other, we’ve been balls out party kids. it’s just in our nature. so this last time he came home from iraq for leave, it was the same story.
“hello”

“kaia, it’s mikey”

“oh my god, where are you??”

“i’m home, can you pick me up?”
i was out the door and in my car before he even hung up, i’m sure.

as soon as he got in the car, it started.

“so kaia, i wanna party, can we do something?”
”of course we can do something”  we headed to the city and came home with some coke. it came to my attention, as he tried to pass me a line of coke, that i needed to go over a small detail with him first. i went in my purse and took out my set of works.
the look on his face, i can’t even explain it.
“what’s this shit, kaia?”

“ i thought you read my emails, about the trouble i’ve been in the past few months”

“i thought you were talking about the pills and shit, the oc’s the fentanyl patches, i didn’t know it was needles and shit.”

“heroin, mike”

“you’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” he stood up, and did another line of coke. this was looking bleak.

“come on, man, i’ve been getting shit from everyone for this, i don’t need it from you.” now, normally this would be alot to ask of someone, but we’ve been through too much for him to get freaked about this.

“i don’t know,” he’s pacing the floor “it’s dangerous, it’s dirty”

“you fuck hookers on like a regualar basis”

“just tell me you use clean needles” mikey’s a medic in the army, so he knows his shit when it comes down to it.

“i try my best”

“damnit, kaia” he sat back down, he looked at me for a long time, for a second i though maybe this was too much to ask.  “well, do you want some coke or what” he asked.
so i took my line, put it in the cooker, and preped my shot. i was pretty enthralled with my work, but out of the corner of my eye, i noticed mikey watching me work, with intensity. not talking, just drinking his beer and watching me. watching me draw it up, watching me tie off. he didn’t take his eyes off me. blood register, and push down that plunger. my head started to ring and i sat back on the bed. when my rush was done i sat back up, and there he was, staring. he didn’t say a word.
hours went by, and we got back to being just best friends again, laughing and drinking. soon the needle didn’t even seem to exsits, we were just partying, like always. soon we were out of drugs again. so i called up my friend alex that lives in the city.  alex is a certified crackhead, and he can get the best deals in town. so mikey gave me his hazzard pay and we transformed it into rock. presto chango.
we sat up at alex’s house for the rest of the night. we smoked almost 200.00 out, and after the sun was up, we sat on the couch while alex struggled with sleep.
now things between us always get weird when we put 24 hours under our belts. i knew it was only an hour or so before my dope girl opened up for business. so i laid it on the table.
“feeling pretty shitty, huh?” i asked him.

“yeah, how are you doing?” he’s rubbing his eyes, pacing again.

“well, at 8:00, my girl kristi gets up, if you could let me borrow 50 bucks, i could get straight and we could go back to my house and chill. get you some beers or whatever.”

“you mean dope, kaia?” he just looked at me.

i figured it was worth a shot cuz we were so spun out on coke and shit, and i really needed a fix, or i was gonna start to cry. “yeah, dope.”

“okay, call her up, i’ll let you borrow the money”

nice nice nice nice. i grabbed the phone and called her up. the deal was done and we were to pick her up in an hour.
the next hour went by like time was standing still. that cracked out time, when all you wanna do is come down, and the finish line seems so far away. i did feel bad, for asking for the money, but he had like five grand, and i was gonna pay him back. it was his idea to go out tonight anyway, i mean, i was just doing what he wanted me to.
my internal rationalization helped my pass the time, and pretty soon it was time to get kristi. we left alex’s house without making a sound, cuz if he knew we were going to cop, he’d wanna get in on it, and that just wasn’t happening. so we made it to the car in stealth mode and i preceded to speed profusely to kristi’s house.
we made the switch to her car, cuz i was too cracked out to drive, and we started the trek to the dealers house. kristi re-ups in the morning, and we made it just in time for her run.
“you look like you’ve had a long night, sweet thing.” she laughed

“you don’t even know, girl” i giggled, putting my shades on and settling in for the ride. i expected a nice quiet ride, but mikey had other ideas.
“so kristi, you guys get high alot together.” he says

kristi just looks at me, i nod my head, if he really wants to know, let him have it.

“yeah, baby, we get high alot.” she said, smiling. “but kaia’s been doing good, only a few times a week. that was a baldfaced lie, at that time i was with kristi everyday, getting high all day. but why tourture the poor kid.

“do you guys like it?” he asked. he sounded like a little kid, asking questions at career day. i felt a little guilty. poor innocent mikey.

“it’s not an ideal situation, but it has its good points” kristi answered.

“i wanna try it.”

there goes my poor innocent mikey  idea. “no fucking way.” i said, turning around in my seat. “no way in hell i’m letting you get high. not on my goddamn watch.” this was gonna totally ruin my high. wait until this shit gets out, crucify me, why don’t you. besides, mikey does enough shit on his own, i didn’t wanna facilitate.
we pulled up in front of the dealers house.

“okay, who’s got the money, three bags for fifty bucks” kristi put her hand out. i knew exactly what was coming next.

“either i get one of those bags, or noone does” mikey, you suck.

okay, what would you do, on the brink of dopesick, coupled with a 12 hour crackbender, with your best friend, who introduced you to every drug you ever did, except this one….i still felt like an asshole.

“fine, whatever, just give her the money, please.”
kristi came back to the car, and we wern’t even out of our parking space before i was fixing my shot. two bags in the cooker, “please watch the bumps, kristi” and bang, fixed.

i sat back, put my sunglasses back on, and let it go.
that’s all i needed. we can figure out anything now. it’s all good. i looked back, and there he was, staring at me again.

“kaia, if i want it, i’ll find it with or without you.” it’s like he was reading my mind.
we got back to kristi’s house, and mikey sniffed half his bag. after which he fell asleep. no big deal, just take the edge off, like i said. he hasn’t done it again.  he went back to iraq, like he does every time. no more than what it was, early morning come down.
but the trouble with mikey is that you never know what’s gonna happen next. he got court-martialed a few weeks ago,due to an indiscretion he’s yet to disclose to me,  and now he’s home for good. and i worry about what he’s gonna fill his time with. i wasn’t worried before, cuz no matter what went down at home, he was alway on his way back to a controlled environment. now he’s free to do as he will, and that’s usually trouble. i haven’t seen him yet. i can’t wait, and i’m scared at the same time. we can’t live without each other, but living with each other, well, it’s a rough ride.

 i’ve been trying not to get high so much lately. my dealer went to detox, and we are trying to save money for vacation. i thought i was going to be miserable, and bored. i’m not working, so i thought sobriety would drive me slowly insane.
in actuality, i’ve been doing yoga, meditating. i’ve gotten two interviews for jobs next week, and i’ve been reading, alot of spiritual, energy work stuff. i’ve signed up for classes in the fall, and i’ve been spending alot of time outside, with my brothers and casey. 
its been so long since i’ve CHOSEN to be sober, and it feels so good.
but we slipped up today. and i feel only about half as bad as i think i should . isn’t that how it always is, during the honeymoon phase. when you don’t have a habit, and everytime you get bags you get super fucking high. i shot up after lunch, and i was jammed until almost eight. it was nice. really nice.
but that’s how it gets you. seduce you with both ends of the cycle. in the beginning, you feel so good about yourself, clean, doing things, learning things, being a whole person again. and then when you do get high, it’s so goddamn good, you start to think “well, if i could keep it like this, just get high in my spare time, then i’d have it made.”
but that’s impossible, the scale always  tips, and you are back to copping everyday, just to get straight, not even to get high. you are back to being broke and seeing your family in your spare time instead of seeing your dealer in your spare time.

but i don’t want to see it that way. each step you take gets you that much closer to your goal, no matter how small.

 i want to see this as the beginning of the end, not just another trip on the carousel.

way before i ever stumbled into the land of opiates, i had a love afair with a girl called “crystal” the following in something i found scribbled on a napkin in a tweaker house i was staying at…i thought it was worth saving.

empty eyes and washed up dreams,

lifetime of unfulfilled need

fallen sunshine, remember the coast

friendly faces, but who do you know??

red faces, different stages

can’t seem to stay away from these fuct up places

my body’s on fire, my life is a mess

i’m sick of these memories

i can’t seem to forget

07/10/2000

it was friday, and i was on the hunt again.  casey and i called up our dealer, kristi, and most of our money was spent in less than an hour.
we found ourselves in a familiar situation, sitting in kristi’s living room, getting high, swapping gossip.
i don’t know if it’s a junky thing, or just people in general, but whenever i get high with anyone, the topic always falls to whoever’s not there that day. he said she said bullshit.  i do my best to stay out of it, putting in my occasional “no way, he really said that?” with fained outrage, while doing my best to just enjoy my ride.
that was the attitude i had on friday, until kristi started in on a pretty juicy story involving our friend marc.  it sounded like a good one, so i finished fixing myself, and got comfy for story time.
marc is a good friend of ours.  about 26 years old, lives w/ his parents, always has.  he’s been using on and off for about 10 years.  he’s had some impressive runs with clean time, but it never really works out for him.
mary is a friend of his we get high with sometimes.  she’s his age, and her history is pretty similar, with some important differences.  her parents are loaded, and just so happen to look the other way when she pilfers their wallet for money to cop.  they also take care of her two young kids while she bed hops the poshest rehabs in the state.  her addiction has been a somewhat comfortable one.
marc and mary have been friends since they started getting high, early in high school.  so when thursday came, and mary called him on the phone, it was part of a pretty long string of dope binges they’d been going on.  she’d already called me three times that day, but i’ve been trying to cut down on weekday using.  even though she usually treats, i let it ring, and i’m really glad i did that, now.  but marc can never say no, and mary knows that.
mary gets to his house, and lays the catch on him. “i actually don’t have any cash today, marc”

“what do you mean? then why did you come all the way over here for?” marc is irritated already.

“well, i’ve got an idea. if you can spot me til tomorrow.” famous junky last words.

“but i’m broke, mary, i don’t get paid til tomorow.” marc’s mind was racing by now. money money money money.  you know, that frenzy you get into when getting high is dangled in your face like that.  “there’s the piggy bank.”
in marc’s parents living room they keep one of those big spring water jugs they call the piggy bank. it’s for his niece, and they put change and spare bills in it, and every couple of months they put it in her savings account. marc never touches it, unless faced with extenuating circumstances, like these he faced on this day. he always has the money back before anyone can notice. .
so he took about a hundred dollars in bills and quarters, and they went to the city. next thing you know, they are sitting in kristi’s living room, setting up shots.
“thanks so much, marc, you are always down to party.” mary said, tying off her arm. “ i get my welfare check tomorrow, and that money will be back before your mom gets home from work.”

“yeah, cool, mary, that’s fucking imperative”
so everyone gets off nice, and the conversation falls on that inevitable topic: getting clean.  i don’t know why, but if you get a bunch of junkies high, all they want to talk about is getting clean.
“i’m so sick of this shit, you guys.” kristi starts alot of talks this way “i’m calling detoxes tonight”

“yeah, i know what you mean, always broke, no one trusts you. i’m already on a list for a bed in boston:” mary said, which is ironic, cuz she’s never broke, and her parents never question her. and mary’s always on a list for a bed, so i can see why there were no red flags for marc.  she dropped him off at home about an hour later, with a promise to call friday morning, as soon a she got her check.
can  you see where this is going?
right about this time, the phone rings at kristi’s house. it’s marc.  he’s looking for suboxone, cuz he’s broke, and he’s sick, and guess who’s not answering her phone today?
i can’t help but get involved now, it’s all too fuct up. so i tell marc i’ll call mary’s parent’s house.
“hello”

“hi, this is kaia, is mary home?”

“no darlin, mary’s in a program in the city.  she’ll be gone for a while.”

“oh, well that’s good for her, when did she get the call from them?”  come on, take the bait….
“i think she got the call monday, she wanted to wait til her welfare check came, so she could buy some food for the girls, then she went shopping on wednesday, and left for the program early this morning.”
jackpot.
“well, thanks, maybe i can go up to visit some weekend”

“yeah, maybe, thanks sweety, bye now.”
i hung up the phone and shook my head at casey.  what a fucking hustle.  it was gonna suck to tell marc he got played so hard. mary used “shopping” as code for copping dope.  so she got high with all her welfare money, then used marc for his money, knowing she wasn’t gonna get him back, and was leaving for rehab the next morning.
you gotta hand it to her, she played it like a true criminal.
so i picked up the phone to call marc.  silly boy; no matter how long you’ve been getting high with someone, if they’re a hustler, you could always be the mark.

so, we have been super broke for the past month or so. casey and i are at the end of our rope. i haven’t worked since may, and we’ve lost everything. the basement we were keeping our worldly posessions in while we are staying with my parents, it has some kind of moisture problem, and everything i own is covered in mold. its a sad death for things. taking it all out of boxes, deciding which pieces to try to clean off, and which ones should be put out of their misery. it’s hard to let go of the past.

i’m trying to stay positive. i believe it all happens for a reason, and maybe this is the only way i was going to let go of the past, to have it ripped out of my clutching hand. so next time i move, i won’t bring any of that useless baggage with me. no old notes from high school, no stuffed animals from abusive exboyfriends, no blankets from childhood that should’ve been garbage years ago. none of that shit. just me and casey and our new begining. i’m starting to feel better about it all.

we are supposed to be getting our car put on the road next week. i see this as a mixed blessing. see, we’ve been doing better staying clean, without a car. i guess that goes without saying, but it’s true. we even saved up the money we needed to give our tour friends for camp bisco. (a summer festival we’re going to, we rented a house, and needed 200.00 for the down payment.) we actually handed them the money yesturday, it was such a huge thing. i was so proud of us. we held onto that money, didn’t call anyone, didn’t spend it. i know it’s not alot, but it made me proud. because everyone says the last thing to go is the things you really love to do. when you start using instead of going on vacation with your mom, or when you use instead of snowboarding. when you give up who you are for what you use.   if we don’t go to shows, we are hopeless junkies. but we can still get it together for tour, and that means alot.

so i sortof don’t want to put the car on the road. because that will give us that freedom back. sure, i’ll get a job, but that’s just more money to spend on shit. i don’t want to be negative, but i know how it works. we aren’t using cuz we can’t. no money no car. give us the car, which leads to  money, and you have two addict on the hunt again. the probability is overwhealming.

i  hope it doesn’t end up that way. i’m not saying i’m gonna be perfect, i just don’t want to go back to an everyday habit. that cosuming hunt for dope that kills the idea of doing anything else. “what, go grocery shopping, not unless i get high first”

looking up from the bottom, i see alot of possibilities, some good some bad. it’s up in the air, which way it will go… but at least we got our money for camp. that’s a start.

i guess it goes without saying, but this life can get real old. i’m just fed up with it all. with not having an apartment, not having my car on the road, not having anything.

i’m sick of arguing with the love of my life over half a bag of dope, i’m sick of being dopesick, seeing him sick. i’m sick of getting ripped off and not trusting my friends. i’m sick of lying to my mom and hiding my arms. i’m sick of applying for jobs and worrying about whether or not i’ll pass their piss test.

i’m sick of trying so hard to stay clean all week, and blowing it all on payday. i’m sick of getting high and then hating myself once the needle is out of my arm. i’m tired of being a cliche. little junky girl.

i’m tired of people hearing you are a junky, then automatically assuming they know you. “all  you people are the same.” and they think that you’re problem gives them free reign to cut you down, say whatever they want. you’re not a real person, afterall, you’re a junky.

i’m tired of family and friends giving me that look. like i’m a terminal cancer patient. ” it’s so sad, she was so young” i’m sick of people giving up hope on me.

i’m sick of being the only who thinks i can change. i’m sick of noone else thinking two weeks clean is a big deal. unless i’m perfect, unless i’m flawless, it’s a waste of time.

i’m sick of feeling like i have to answer to everyone. and i guess that’s where my real problem lies. if you are gonna try to beat this shit, you have to do it for you, noone else.

the funny thing is, it didn’t even occur to me that i was trying to beat it until just now. i haven’t really stopped to think of it until now. i’m struggling, really struggling, with my addiction. i just never admitted it before. it’s all fun and games til you’re a heroin addict. then the rest of your life will be a struggle.

this is a letter i recieved from a friend, doing 9 months for parole violation.

dear kaia:

what you said last time about us being down, it doesn’t sound dumb coming from you, nothing does.  i understand everything you say to me, how you feel, everything you go through, i’ve been through in this life of sticking needles in my arm (legs, feet, neck, whatever) for over 13 years now.  i just hope you never have to get to the point i have; working the streets, coming to jail, getting raped, beaten, watching a person die right in front of me. just living the life i do. it doesn’t bother me anymore. i have become comfortable in this world i would wish on no one. but that feeling of being numb, not caring, is so much better than the pain i hold inside. i don’t use to be high, i use so i don’t have to care. to be so fuct up i don’t know what the hell is going on. you didn’t see me back in december when i first got arrested, only in march when they let me out for a two week high.  i was just getting started, kaia. when i use i use to kill myself. i don’t stop, i don’t sleep, i don’t eat.  marc can tell you how i get, it’s sick. but i still look out for my friends as best i can, as long as i’ve got no shitbags around me like my co-defendant trying to rip my friends off.  i seriously would’ve died if i didn’t get arrested in december.  you could see every bone in my body. i was in a cocaine psychosis. my grandmother just died. i was on 145mg of methadone a day, still shooting dope, eating xani-footballs and doing huge coke shots. i hadn’t slept in god knows how long, i shot up with pond water and got a huge bacterial infection in my whole body. i had to go to the hospital everyday for IV antibiotics for a month.  you wanna see a junky you don’t ever want to become. i have a heart of gold for other people, even if you’re using, but i hate myself. and i use to die. i don’t ever want to see my friends like that.

when i read that my heart broke. this girl is only three years older than me, she’s been a streetwalker for probably three years, she’s told me stories that made me cry right there in front of her. and it didn’t have to be this way, but it is. what can you do, except keep writing, cuz at this point it’s like holding the hand of a terminally ill friend. you know there’s nothing you can do, but be there, and try to  make their last moments hurt a little less.