AFTERMATH: Something For The Shrinks

 

Hi, thank you for dropping by.

As you may know, the first 22 episodes of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013).  You can read this here, or preview and buy it at amazon, if you're into that kind of thing.  It has three very good reviews, and I would really appreciate as many as I can get.  Nowadays, this blog is concerned with the aftermath of addiction, stories of living in the same neighbourhood in which I nearly killed myself, tales of temptation, repulsion, and boredom, and, I hope, hope.  And here is today's tempting morsel...

Also, here is a youtube link to my most recent song, which I'm quite pleased with, so if you'd like a listen, here it is...

I'm Too Tired To Kill You

Below is an article I was asked to write for Therapy Today.  It's a very condensed account of my addled and addicted life, and I hope the counsellors found it enlightening.

IN THE CLIENT'S CHAIR

I was working for a counselling service, but depressed.  Since losing much of my sight to a childhood illness, aged nine, I’d felt disconnected from my peers, less-than, in particular around girls, and abuse in my early teens added fear and guilt to the mix.  Then, boarding-school for the blind cushioned my sense of difference, but two universities, filled with sighted students, had me feeling like a minnow in a seething ocean.

So, in my mid-20s, I sat behind my desk at the counselling service, but the cracks in my life were widening to fissures, low spirits, worsening sight, and paralysing shyness keeping me stuck in all areas, so I sought the help of counsellor from our in-house register.  I spoke about how I’d been visiting prostitutes as a quick fix for my broken love-life.  It was during this time I called on Debbie, a working-girl I knew, seeking my usual dose of company, comfort, and closeness.  At her door, hidden in the labyrinth of a neglected estate, I knocked, and waited, but a gruff redhead called Sandra opened the door, and invited me in.  Debbie was at the shops.

In the semi-lit living-room, she asked if I smoked.  ‘Smoke what?’ I gauchely enquired.  There was regalia on the table, but I couldn’t see quite what.  ‘Shit, white, crack,’ she replied.  I’d smoked a bit of dope, had an E once, but barely heard of crack - but I was so down, and malleable, that I accepted, and drew in the innocuous white fumes with her blessing.  Within days, my life was in freefall, with job, flat, finances, and numerous friendships falling by the wayside, and twelve years of full-on addiction ensued.

I attended my local drug-service for months on end, where counselling, relapse-prevention groups, hypnotherapy, ear acupuncture, reflexology, shiatsu, copious herbal teas, left no impression on the hardened kernel of addiction at my core.  I was then referred to a residential rehab on the coast, but my designated counsellor left me feeling more damaged than I had on arrival, and, after five months, I returned to London to immediate relapse.

I began attending twelve-step meetings, and must have gone to hundreds, but found the ethos of the ‘disease of addiction’ unconvincing and stifling, and the general atmosphere one of compassionate collusion, in which conformity to the ‘message of recovery’ was requisite, else you might get left behind, a straggling heretic, doomed to chronic relapse.  The fact I fitted this description quite nicely was enough for me to eject myself, on embarrassment grounds.

Beyond despair, I returned shamefaced to my drug-service, and a new counsellor offered me a short course of something called Intuitive Recovery.  For me, it was a catalyst.  A class taken by two former crack-users focussed on the ‘decisions’ of addiction, rather than the ‘disease’.  It also questioned the twelve-step notion that one was ‘powerless’ over this alleged disease.  It seemed to be offering facts to go away with, rather than asking us to sign up to a twelve-step-style ‘spirutual program of recovery’.  I felt like I was being handed back an identity that meetings had overwritten in a spidery hand, casting a web in which I felt enmeshed, resentful, and obliged to talk.

I’d found myself in meetings speaking about the abuse I experienced, then leaving feeling unsettled, exposed, and sometimes with confusing feedback still ringing in my ears, like the oft-used phrase ‘have a look at your part in things’, which, in the context of abuse, had me feeling even more shame.  The Intuitive course, because it wasn’t offering an ethos, a lifestyle, allowed for counselling and therapy, but wasn’t parading as either, whereas I’d felt subsumed in the twelve-step setting, an awkward nonconformist with only bad news and even worse views to impart.

The Intuitive approach helped me isolate my problems, the first of which was my crack use, which had to stop to help me begin repairing other areas.  I reconnected with my doctor, have a suitable antidepressant, am seeing a new counsellor, and working on things without running to the secret, quasi-sexual bolthole of crack.

It was the language of ‘addiction’ and ‘recovery’ of twelve-step fellowships that troubled me, plus the notion that one was ‘powerless’ of the ‘disease’.  It felt like a linguistic coffin, even though others seemed to flourish within its confines.  Intuitive Recovery, fact-based, with no unspoken threat of relapse for those who wouldn’t believe, felt offered rather than proffered.  I learned about the brain’s relationship with pleasure, and how addiction is a predictable state for the brain to adopt when presented with certain stimuli.  In short, I trusted the message, largely because it wasn’t parading as a ‘message’.

I’ve never been one for conforming, and if there was a club for outsiders, I doubt very much I’d join.

And that is all I have to say today.

AFTERMATH: Phantoms

 

Hello, thanks for passing by.  You may already know, the first 22 posts of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which you can buy as a kindle on amazon, if you do that kind of thing.  I appreciate all readers and reviewers...there are three good ones so far, but all reviews are gratefully received.  Also, here is a song I just wrote about the seductive nature of pleasure...it would be great if you'd have a listen. 

 

Here is the youtube link to my song  ...  Revenge Of The Sirens

 

So, begging over, here is today's post...

 

PHANTOMS

 

Today I saw a ghost.  Although the soul apparently can't die, the dim gleam in these eyes looked as close to death as I've seen.  The body was hobbling on, the mouth justifying its continuing existence, even though the State apparently wasn't, having cut the ready supply of money the body had got used to.

 

The figure (we'll call him Rob...because that's his name), was hobbling shapelessly down Goldhawk Road, where I live in London.  I'd met him in rehab five years ago...he turned up for about three weeks in the middle of my time, until it was decided he had too many mental-health issues for a non-psychiatric facility to cope with...so he packed his rucksack and went round the corner to Psycho Lodge.  It was kind of clear he had some 'extra' issues, as he'd agree with everything I said, regardless as to whether it was right, funny, or even half-interesting.  He agreed habitually, which can't have done him much good in the ragbag world of addiction.  And this is why I was half-surprised to see him...somehow he'd managed to stay alive, even though everyone and everything around him seemed to be banking on him dying quite soon.

But there he was, Rob, haggard in drop-in denims, saluting me with a face more malnourished than the £2 a month crew you get on afternoon TV.  I said hello, as if pleased to see him, which I half was, or maybe wholly was if you put the two halves together, for they were the half that was polite and social, and the acrid demon, curdling inside, that fancied scoring, which would have been so, so easy.  I could tell he was sniffing around this particular dog's arse, with his too-easy cordiality, and stationary way of holding you in place, even though you were in motion just moments ago.
  'Hi Rob,' I said, mock-cheerfully.
  'How you doing?' he asked, effusive and impatient to get to the meat.  'I saw you by the market the other day...I called, but you disappeared behind some railings.'  I waited.  'Where were you off to then?  Up to no good, were you?'
  I tried to ignore the drug-allusion.  'I think I was just going to buy some pyjamas,' I said, lying, but I thought the quiet absurdity of the situation deserved a dash of Dada, in the form of a false pyjama-purchase.
  And it did nonplus him slightly.  'Oh right,' he said, seeming to wonder what to say next.  But he came good.  'I'm living round the corner now, with Sonia?'  The woman-lure had been planted.
  'Oh right,' I replied, feeling a wave of enticement in my lower-gut.
  'Pop round if you want...'  And then he threw in the killer.  'I'm just waiting to see X-Man,' (a dealer, real name Gavin), 'I can call him if you want to chip in...?'  I felt like a chess-piece, two moves from mate.
  Perhaps cos of recent boredom, loneliness, anxiety, anger, boredom again, general pent-upness, frustration that I'm not as successful as David Bowie, I almost succumbed to this honey-trap...it was Manuka.

Ah, the honey of sweet, sweet crack being drawn into my submissive, hoping lungs...and a woman (he never said she was his girlfriend)...and ah, woman, living emblem of all lost pleasures, current lusts, libido-drenched pleasure-facilitator for the damaged man, whose life's gone off the tracks he stared down in youth, when life was mostly ahead of him.
  'I've been good for a while now,' I thought, 'maybe I can manage it now, and X-Man is usually prompt, perhaps a day out of life is just what I want, need, deserve...'

And that is all I have to say today.

AFTERMATH: A Crackhouse Romance

 

Hi, thanks for popping by.  You may know by now that the first 22 episodes of this blog (Jan to April 2013) are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict'.  You can buy this on amazon, as a kindle, if you would like to.  If you do, or have, please do post a review there, because all feedback is appreciated.  So, here is today's little contribution, memories of a couple I knew when I was in the thick of my inglorious decade of addiction...

Before we begin, here is a song for you, written by me under my guise of Benjamin Lo-Fi, and posted on youtube...would be great if you'd give it a listen...

My song, 'Get Out Of My Room'

A CRACKHOUSE ROMANCE

Rob sat on the sofa, Carol in the armchair.  The dog, stinking, scuttled in, a skeleton in a tight fur suit.  'Ah, Mungo, you're a menace,' Carol decrees.  The crossword is done, so there's no way to speed up time, to bring Killer that bit quicker.  Rob notes a note.  'Is it the 24th?'  Carol looks at phone.  'Yeah...'  'Then we've got three days to get the bike out,' he says, showing the note.  'I know...'  'We're not going to be able to do it, are we?'  'Alan might want juice on Tuesday...'  The buzzer goes.  'It's Killer,' says Rob, in a mock-Mexican accent, rising like a stickman from the sofa.  Clutching notes, goes into the hall.  Carol, in armchair, reaches forth, places pillow of ash on pipe, hopes Killer has both, crack for starters, and main, heroin dessert.  Her anticipation, the cerebral equivalent of a salivating cat when the treats are rattling.  And Rob, one of the harem, gyrates in old jeans, looks for work, coughs up on Thursday, keeps the patchwork of the week almost intact.  'Would Alan want juice?  If so, how many mils?'  Peaks, troughs, and the peaks are getting thinner and shorter, the troughs longer and deeper.  But she knows there's love in the midst of this, in the mist.

And that is the end of this small crackhouse romance.

AFTERMATH: One Day When I Didn't Score

Hello, thanks for coming by.

You maybe know, the first 22 instalments of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (from Jan to April 2013).  You can buy this as a kindle on amazon, if you do that kind of thing, and it would be great if you could review it...there are 3 good reviews so far, and all are appreciated.  Now here is today's lesson...

Here is a link to a song of mine on youtube.  Just click here to hear Masochist's Anonymous

ONE DAY WHEN I DIDN'T SCORE

It was a rare, drear day.  Woke at 6.44, and began the countdown in my mind to about 9, when I could viably ring cohorts from Hepatitis Court, a tenement-block where once I'd scored.  They were, at the time, the only other users I knew, a couple, with two kids of about five, who hadn't been taken into care yet.

I managed to drop off for an hour or so, truncating my wait, and then, at 8.45, I dressed, and left.  Past the garage, the shops, the bus-stop, and then right down the ramp into Hepatitis Court car-park...up the steps to stairwell one, and through to number 3, Spike and Suzie.  One would surely be in, and would ring Killer, the probable nearest candidate to bring the wares.

But I knocked, there in the dinge, little light upon me, filtering through the fire-door, but all I heard was silence, and then a shuffle, a voice, a child's voice, 'Hello?'

'Hello,' I said.

'I can't open the door,' it said.

'Are your mummy and daddy in?' I asked.

'They're not here,' it said, footsteps fading away.

After a moment, I turned, and left, through the fire-door into stairwell one, downstairs, and out onto the street.  I had an eye out to find someone, or be found by them, but somehow, more by chance than judgment, I wandered home.

And that is my reminiscence for the day...

AFTERMATH: It's Hard Being Wise When You're Bored

Above is a song...

Hello, as you might know, the first 22 episodes of this blog are the text of the ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (from Jan to April 2013), which you can also buy on amazon, if you have three pounds to spare.  From then on, the blog is the frequent emissions of the servile blogger, who aims to please you daily, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  And here is today's attempt to please you...the above is an old song, but you might like it, if you believe in the link between love and garbage...

IT'S HARD BEING WISE WHEN YOU'RE BORED

Addiction's a social-life in itself.  You don't need a diary.  You can just be assured that every day, and any ensuing days, will be related somehow to drugs.  It may be a using day, or it may be a day after a using day, or a day before a using day, or a day where you just hide in bed, and wait for something to drop into your bank-account, counting down the hours and days with Time Team and Hitler documentaries chuntering away in the corner.  Odds on, even if you haven't used for a week or so, this is probably because you're broke, and so who needs a diary just to write in it 'remember to stay in'.

But today is a bank-holiday, which, in case you're reading this somewhere other than the UK, is a kind of extra Sunday, nailed on to the end of the week as a treat for those whose lives are impaled on the stake of the working week...or something like that.  Yes, just when you've got through a weekend, there's another day of semi-blankness to consider, confronting you with extra helpings of Time Team, and family-friendly films all through the day, messing with the schedule you'd got used to punctuating your day with.  Everything is set adrift, and all you can find, if you're lucky, is Jason and the Argonauts, toppling that giant, and slaying those skeletons and the like.

It can be as paralysing as any snake-venom, a bank-holiday, once its got its fangs into you.  You might rise with noble intent, hopes to write this letter, that poem, win that game of scrabble, ring that friend, write that song, do that exercise...and then, come four o'clock, with only a few Jaffa Cakes consumed, your mind strays towards that 'spare' £80 in the overdraft, which is already spoken for...but what the hey?  You stray a little further, picturing, as if in a cinematic dream sequence, your good self wandering down the road to the cashpoint, getting out forty, pottering along to your friends round the corner from the pawnshop.  Yes, ok, you're going to use, but at least you're also doing it because you want some company, some human contact, some stimulation, interaction...is that so bad?  Is it wrong to want a pick-me-up, the personal touch, a little pepper on your pasta?

Who wouldn't want when their life was so wanting?

It's so hard holding on with fingernails chipped and flimsy, rainwashed rockface...oops, I've gone again...

And that, as I splash down into ravenous rapids, is all I have to say today...

AFTERMATH: Autumn Eventually

Hello, as you may know, the first 22 episodes of this blog (Jan to April 2013), are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict', which you can buy on amazon if you want to.  From then on, it's the daily emissions of your faithful blogger, Benjamin of Turnham Green, edutaining you with words, some addiction-related, some not, music, and pictures, like a child's scrapbook, with no overseer.  And here is today's emission...

AUTUMN EVENTUALLY

Today, I am dreaming of mutilating Richard Curtis, author of films such as Love Actually, Two Weddings, Notting Hill, and the recent one, About Time.  The idea that a character in a film can time-travel to any middle-class setting in history, is a remarkably original idea, and I commend him for it.  As for mutilating Curtis, I think I'd probably do it, go back, do it again, and perhaps do this up to ten times.

I also have a film coming out this season, entitled Autumn Eventually.  In it, I, the protagonist, am seen initially kicking my way down a leafy mews somewhere in the Kensington neighbourhood, dressed in Doctor Martens, naturally, some kind of bookish jacket, the sort a librarian with attitude might wear, and probably bootcut jeans from ebay.

Later, I stop off at a coffee-shop, ask for a latte, and sit down, noticing as I do the woman with ringlets and a book, sipping a tall tea at the table in the window.  The book is probably by Hermann Hesse, or some such, and I comment on it unobtrusively.  She smiles, and tells me what she likes about it, and how she loves his use of water-related imagery.  I concur, and buy her a teacake.

When she leaves, her perfume, a non-animal-tested fairtrade fragrance from a festival, lingers in the air at my table, almost making my muffin taste slightly medicated.  I smile a goodbye, not wishing to seem too keen.  She thanks me for the teacake, and parts the scene.

Then, because I'm depressed at another too-fleeting encounter with a woman, I ring up my crack-dealer, who meets me outside and slips two-and-one into my waiting fist and shimmies away.  I return to my table, and order another latte, pretending I work in publishing, and am reading a manuscript from a possible author I'm going to represent.  Then, when it comes, I ask if I may use the gents'.  The polite waitress says 'of course', and lets me know it's just behind the counter, down the steps.

I pop to the loo, and, because I thought to bring my pipe out, I lay me a chunk of white on the gauze, and light up very nicely thank you.  I sit there on the loo, wanking for a minute, cursing the woman for leaving, and not obeying my desires, not knowing my desires, and acting in exact accordance with them.  Then, when the high subsides, I have another, but the gauze burns, and I choke badly.  Then the fire-alarm goes off, and I panic.  So I try to load up another pipe, thinking to dash...but then I remember I have to pay...I'm shaky, and I begin to sweat, and I can't load mi pipe.

I shove everything in my pocket, resentfully and flustered.  I go back into the eating-area, and offer to pay at the counter, but we all have to go outside.  I follow the herd, about eight of us, and two staff.  The chef comes out saying there's smoke in the toilet, and they all know it's me.  I'm sweating even more now, and can't think of what to say to appease them all.  I apologise profusely, and say I did light up a cigarette in there, and start crawling and fawning like a fuckwit.  There's not much sympathy, and the chef points out that there's a no smoking sign in the very toilet I was using.  I go even gaucher, and start swivelling about like some tweed-elbowed English teacher in a tizzy.

Then the lady with the book returns, a little astonished to see us assembled so.  She's forgotten her notepad, and indeed, it's there, open on the table she was sitting at.  The words on it read, 'I recognise the man who's just come in, but I'm not sure where from...'

I then realise I recognise her.  I once shared a twenty with her in a bin-chute near Acton Central.  She asks me if I'd like to go and discuss Hesse's use of the semicolon in another café.  I say I would, and press a tenner into the clutches of the calming waitress, which she accepts.  The alarm stops, and we wander down the mews in slanting golden sun, warm, yet with a winter-crispness creeping in.

'I'm sure I know you,' she says as we meander towards the alternative tea-room.  'What's your name?'

  'Acton, I say, Acton Green.'
  'Oh,' she says, with turtle-eyelids, 'don't think I know an Acton.'
  'There aren't many of us around,' I say, and we enter the tea-room.
  We sit down, order, and I pop to the toilet.

And that is all I have to tell you today.

AFTERMATH: Money Days

Hello, as you may know, the first 22 episodes of this blog are the text of my ebook, 'How To Become A Crack Addict' (Jan to April 2013), which you can buy on amazon if you wish.  If you do, or have, I would really appreciate a review - there are two good ones already, and all are welcome.  From then on, the blog is the almost-daily reflections of yours truly, Benjamin of Turnham Green.  So here are today's profound reflections...

MONEY DAYS

Well, today has been a money day, which has been hard.  I had no plans, and I've heard that if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.  The morning was hard, because I'd hardly slept, so, after a few cups of tea, and a bit of youtubing, I lay on my beanbag (one of the lovely things I've bought for my little cabin since putting the crack down), and listened to England vs Australia playing cricket, and it was quite a nice experience, even though Australia were doing quite well.  I then buried myself in finishing off the first song I've written in a while (with my new keyboard, another gift of recovery).  I got money today, so I often felt like appeasing the boredom by going out and using, if only for the company.  But, luckily, I managed to complete the song, and although it's a bit rusty, I'm glad I've got it done, and put it on youtube with a little video filmed with my webcam (another reward of recovery).  And it's above, if you fancy a listen.  It's called Autumn Blues.  Turns out there are about two hundred songs called Autumn Blues on youtube, so it needs all the support it can get.  I hope you quite like it.  There are other songs by me on there too, under the name of Benjamin Lo-Fi.  I shall write more tomorrow.

Thanks for dropping by.

And that is all I have to say today.