(away from keyboard: accepting the return to rehab)
usually my absence from social media means one very clear thing: I’ve relapsed and lost my phone. When i start fucking up it’s a matter of time before everything in my pockets has vanished
I have friends with the discipline and self control to just take a break, or quit the social apps with no real hiccup. that is not me, i am almost compulsively drawn to obnoxious oversaturation of my instagram story. It’s almost embarrassing what my daily social media screen time adds up to…i don't even want to say.
its about 7 hours total screen time on a given day… judge me as you will. i do everything the same way i do drugs: to excess.
i will be quiet for the next month, if not silent but not for the usual reason. i will be entering inpatient substance abuse treatment. i may still have a phone (likely not while I’m in rehab) and my nintendo switch but trust me, the soul rot is plenty motivation to get back on the clean side of things again.
i may not have lost all my possessions but it’s a matter of time before everything is lost down the drain pipe, i know.
it’s a blessing for people in my usual sphere because i never have the resolve to shut the fuck up, digitally. it just happened to come together with a more frequent writing practice i've developed over the past few weeks, but i’m not going to stay out of treatment to blog about clearly needing to be in treatment.’
so a quiet month for everyone that's been inundated with my incessant content, opinions and the same 7 dinosaur jr. songs on their feed. you’re welcome… i’m sure my mania and speed use have been tiring on everyone…take a month, you’ve earned it.
and i’ll be back in very familiar territory, trying to learn from the things ive been hearing over the last 10 years of frequenting rehab facilities. I’m not ecstatic about it but i am also refusing to be negative about it. yes, its not as nice as total freedom to listen to whatever, do whatever, smoke whenever… fuck, at least its facing me in the direction i need to be headed in. i doubt i can stop the bleeding of my latest relapse without professional help, anyway, so ill have another stay like i always did when i was sort of tired of the pain and also sort of staying out of the bostonian winters.
by the numbers ive been to rehab almost a billion times over the past 10 years. by the numbers i managed to stay sober about five out of those ten years.
A man like me (addict, alcoholic) can really only have one setting: totally sober. i cannot responsibly use mind or mood altering substances without my whole situation eroding quickly. i have not known this my whole life but i can say i grasped it starting in 2014.
if we are looking for good reason a person with this knowledge would decide to try to safely drink/ use drugs again i can be of no help. i am generally a logical person with critical thinking abilities. There just tends to be a glaring mental fucking blind spot when we talk about booze and drugs, the memories of bad ideas gone predictably badly just cant be accessed.
i know of onlookers in my own family who are baffled by this inability to think it all through. i would just ask: what man would burn his life to the ground because it seemed like a sweet party? it’s hard to explain the unexplainable to people, and they get frustrated, i cant blame them. it isn't like someone held a gun to my head and forced me into the liquor store, why would i make such a disastrous choice?
if drug use is a symptom of the larger holistic sickness: mentally, being sober is like having a gun to your head on the way to the jim beam store. it feels like that, i’m in it for relief not to have some social party life. it’s absolutely trying to escape the existential dread and pain of sober existence.
it still defies any sense of logic.
i thought i could think my way through being prescribed low dose Adderall last month…i was wrong, i ended up going straight to the crystal meth pipe after inhaling a 30 day prescription of america’s favorite child amphetamine blend. you would have thought a smart fella like myself could have predicted this kind of outcome…nope. nope, haha fooled by addictive thoughts again!
back to rehab, do not pass go, do not collect 200$.
i accept that i need a lil help to stay straight, its fine. This recent fuck up is very unique in that i didn't become homeless and penniless (yet). usually im sleeping outside by day one, phone/wallet/ glasses gone. it helps i still have somewhat of a life to look ahead to, but i know it wouldn't be that way if i continued the self medication regimen i've been on since august…only a matter of time until I'm living out of a trash bag, i do not want that for myself again.
i've packed a notebook so that i don't fall back into the writers block rust i was in, and maybe ill share some of my analog blog when i return.
just, save my seat, i'll be back. i'll be back, better. i am excited about it.
i do now have a patreon, but its probably a good idea to wait for me to come home before subscribing (to maximize subscription value): https://www.patreon.com/evr0ck1
you can also have a nice strong cup of coffee lined up for my release date: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/Evr0ck17/posts . i have the feeling I’ll be needing it.
