Alcoholics

Alcoholics, and probably all drug addicts are a helpless mixture of fraudulence and honesty. I definitely fall under this category.

All the lies told are conjured up instantly in the addict brain, it can come up with a massive web of thoughts leading to one lie to get what they want/need.

All the honesty is just that, pure sincerity. They honestly do love you, they honestly do intend to pay you back and finally they honestly do want to be free of addiction.

But the chemicals ultimately have hold.

Day 1

Looking back and reading back over my posts it almost seems inevitable that I’d crash and burn at some point. I feel somewhat like Jekyll and Hyde, at times I’m caring, generous, showing love for the other walkers on this planet, at other times I’m a complete asshole, stealing, robbing, causing general mayhem and breaking more hearts than I can count on my hands.

I arrived in Tenerife at about 10-11 AM local time, lit up a cigarette and breathed in the warm air, basked in the sun for a while and hailed a cab, told him to take me to civilisation in the best Spanglish I could conjour up. He was in disbelief that I had no hotel arrangements, but drove me through desert wasteland to ‘Los Cristianos’ for €25, The Christians? I loved the irony.

Another 4mg or so of Xanax in the car, we arrived. I asked him about long term accommodation, I was to look for Pensiones, or cheap/shitty rooms to you and me.

I wandered round, feeling a little beaten up as you do after a flight, a bag over one shoulder and my leather jacket in the other. I got wind from some bikers that there was some house nearby so that was the first stop. There were two pretty young English girls standing outside the nice looking apartment, they told me they were leaving today and that it was real cheap.. awesome! Then some old hag appears and tells me I can take the place for €30 but only for 1 night because… I didn’t understand the rest of her Spanglish.

I kept asking and walking, dripping sweat but still feeling pretty good about being in the warmth of the sun and escapism.

I tried a few of these places, all were full. As I hauled myself up 3 flights of stairs off the beach I comtemplated sleeping rough, at the top of those stairs was another place that would take me. It was something like €21 a night, I booked a week there and then and handed over the cash. Some heavy motherfucker asked for my passport to photocopy, I handed it over and within 2 minute’s I was given the keys to Room 7.

3 single beds, a bedside table, electrical sockets that looked fatally dangerous and two windows, both with bars across them.

It’d taken me about 4 hours to get from the airport to this place, I shut the door, I flopped down on one of the beds and felt totally at peace. I could finally unload my shit and cease worrying for a week! I think I fell asleep.

As soon as I woke I went out to see what the place had to offer, it was getting towards evening but the sun was still warm. I don’t know how I found this place, I never saw it again, but some restaurant was serving €1 pints of beer and decent priced food. I downed a couple of pills with the decently priced beer and waited for my meal, I felt fucking awesome, sitting there in 25C staring out at the sea sipping a cold beer.

I paid the cheque and toured the bars, clubs, got drunk and somehow found my way to the small steep staired apartment I was staying in. Finally managed to get the key in the door, pulled off my clothes and got into the middle bed. I hadn’t slept that well in literally 2 years.

The Beginning of the End

It’s difficult to believe this was a whole month ago.. time frames are still pretty hazy but I’ll do my best;

Friday – A couple of days until payday, completely fucked on Xanax and booze I decide to take an £850 pay day loan, as soon as that was approved dropped a call to a couple of dealers and within 30 minutes or so there was with 3g of cocaine. I tore open the first bag and mixed with 0.3ml of water and proceeded to inject shot after shot until my veins were so constricted and my head so wired that no more was possible.

Saturday – I’m still up at 10-11AM when there’s no way in hell anymore of that coke is getting in me, after one last shot I washed down a handful of Xanax bars, Valium etc with vodka and lie in bed, anxious has hell, and waited for sleep.

Woke up some point with my nerves on edge, numbed them with booze and tranquilisers. So much intoxication in fact that somewhere gone midnight I had the bright idea to go and rob a local pharmacy, I’m not sure if it was because I was afraid of running out of medication or just because I was fucked up and felt like breaking something.

Sunday went pretty much the same way as Saturday, I’m not sure if I even stopped drinking or popping benzos at any time between these two points and once again the idea to rob the pharmacy was back. This time I managed to get in. As soon as I did I saw the reflection of flashing blue lights, turned around and put my hands up. I was thrown in a van and booked into a cell, I guess I wasn’t going to work Monday…

I later found out that my house had been searched by police at 5:45 AM Monday morning.

I was stripped of my belongings and since I couldn’t get the elastic stuff out of my clothes was issued jail clothes that looked kinda like scrubs. I sat in the cell, laughed, cried, eventually fell asleep. It would take me a week to sober up from that binge.

My lawyer arrived at some point, along with a “responsible adult” since I was, I suppose, deemed unstable. We all went along to an interview room with two detectives, they showed me undeniably high resolution CCTV images. I told them that I had been on a bender and hadn’t even realised this happened on two occasions, I honestly thought until then that this all occurred on the same night. I also made it clear that despite whatever I said my memory was fucked, which it obviously was, and that this was totally out of character for me, I’m a well paid manager in the goddamn National Health Service! I was led to a different cell and eventually bailed and released at about noon.

I had just enough change in my pocket for a bus home. I phoned my boss and told him someone close to me died and I needed time to grieve.

Next comes a blackout period, I suppose I got totally shitfaced for the remainder of Monday.

My next memory was (I guess) Tuesday about 3:00AM, I had about £3000 at my disposal, I’d say that I put any thought into it but really I was on autopilot, I packed all my clothes into bag along with a bottle full of pills and took a cab to London Gatwick.

The only places open were some coffee shops and a currency converter. I went and got a coffee, necked 4mg Xanax and looked at the departures.

The first flight was leaving about 5 AM to Tenerife, headed to the money stall and withdrew/converted everything I had into €uros, stashed it in various places on my person.

5 AM finally came around and I boarded, the place was practically empty, I had a whole row to myself. I ordered probably 6 beers, continued to pop Xanax and admired the view from the plane and the spiked orange refractions of light from my beer.

I felt fantastic, elated. I felt free, work and everything had been getting me down. I might note at this point that it was a one way flight, I had no intention of returning.

“Life’s too short to not go for broke” – this line played over and over in my head from leaving the house at 3 AM to then.

Day 1 in Tenerife coming soon…

Tranquillity

With each cell in my body ridding itself of drugs another memory comes to mind..

They are mostly bad. Even the good ones are tainted.

They are irreparable, I’m riddled with guilt and all I want right now is some benzos or booze to numb these feelings.

That isn’t an option, if it was I’d probably (definitely) take it, the coward’s way out, while fully aware that these thoughts and feelings would come back worse than before as soon as it wore off.

That is the nature of addiction.

As much as I think I am in control I am not, the drugs are.

How long will it take for me to feel tranquillity again without tranquilisers?