Wednesday 28 October 2015

Me and my Monkey

Addiction. Such a loaded subject, innit? I mean, there are all sorts of addictions if you think about it. Robert Palmer had a hit song back in the day called 'Addicted to Love' and I can't help wondering if that's where the biggest bullshit addiction ever started. Sex addiction. "Oh, I'm sorry I'm a man whore who can't keep my dick in my pants but it's not my fault honey, I'm a sex addict. Please help me get through the 12 step program and I promise I'll never stray again..." Pfffttt... Michael Douglas was the first infamous sex addict and after that there were sex addicts popping up all over the place. I wonder if there was a live-in rehab they could go to? Must've been a shitload of shagging in closets going on there, you know - what with all those sex addicts in one place. What a crock. Anyway, enough about ho's with the perfect excuse.


I have always had an incredibly addictive personality, which is part of the reason I've never tried cocaine. I'm afraid I'll like it and end up spending all my shoe money on blow. I've met a lot of poeiermeide in my lifetime who use it to lose weight and give them personality but it really isn't for me. Sure, I'll lose weight but the pay-off won't be worth it because I would hate to start acting like those irritating eejits who think they're über-cool when they've had a snort or two. So thanks but no thanks, I prefer my ever expanding ass to stay the way it is... Ever expanding until I won't be able to fit through my office door to go down to the basement to whip all those poor bastards I have chained up in there and working for me for free, according to my stalkertroll. Which reminds me, I best tell Precious to go and dust the cobwebs off them again and chuck some dry bread in there - it's been a while. As for personality? I reckon I'm too old to change who I am and fortunately I stopped giving a crap about impressing people the day I waved goodbye to my 20's.


I've never been into hard drugs or even tried any but marijuana and I used to be very good friends. The first time I had a joint I thought I'd found the answer to the meaning of why and not a day went by that I didn't have my morning puff before I went to school but at least it made things interesting and more bearable for me. I know the kappie kommando would have me tarred and feathered for this but I honestly don't think weed is addictive or a gateway drug. If it was I wouldn't have stopped the very day I found out I was pregnant and my son wasn't born with fused toes, a learning disability or an extra head. I didn't touch it for years and I think that my built-in mommy paranoia had kicked in so hard that when I eventually tried a toke it wasn't fun at all so I never bothered with it again. Maybe it's because back in my day all we could get our hands on were matchboxes filled with Majad and if you ever managed to score Durban Poison or Swazi Heads you were a hero. This new shit grown in pods or whatever they're called is far too much for me and I think the ridge I had on my forehead for a week from hitting my head on the edge of the toilet seat is proof enough of that. Bottom line is if you choose to sit on your ass getting stoned day in and day out it's a decision you make and that doesn't make you an addict, it makes you a lazy shit.


When I was a teenager the only thing that was readily available was weed but nowadays there are far worse drugs doing the rounds thanks to the bane of society, drug dealers who should be strung up in public by their nutsacks and left to rot. The problem is that drugs are fun. If they weren't nobody would ever become a drug addict but people don't look down that road and have a good think about the consequences when they make the decision to try something. I've seen friends slowly lose everything they've built for themselves until they've got nothing left, not even a home to call their own. I've driven a friend who was a heroin addict to rehab 6 hours away, watching him eat methadone like smarties and crying all the way there. I've seen families destroyed and people lose their lives and unfortunately the truth is that drug addiction usually ends in tragedy. I'm happy to say that my buddy is finally clean after many stints in rehab and I am also completely unapologetic about the fact that I don't allow people who are on hard drugs in my house and anyone who takes issue with that can quite frankly go and fuck themselves.


I must admit my curiosity got the better of me a few years ago, so when my son was away on a trip to Holland I decided it would be the perfect time to see what the fuss was all about and we planned a night of Ketamine with a doctor friend of ours. I reckoned that taking it under a doctor's supervision would be one way to make sure it went ok but thank fuck I chickened out. You see, a few months later I was diagnosed with a brain tumour and after having long talks with my neurosurgeon - to the point of confessing even the things I thought of doing in the interest of full disclosure seeing as the man would be slicing into my brain - he told me that because of where the tumour was situated I would have died if I had taken any drugs. That would have been one helluva buzz kill for everyone else, especially considering the fact that since Ketamine knocks you out my body would probably have been decaying by the time everyone else came round.


Just to clarify, I'm not sitting here on my high horse going on about something I know nothing about. Granted, I don't know a damn thing about being a crack whore or a poeiermeid but I am an addict. After my brain surgery I became hopelessly addicted to codeine and morphine based pain killers - or the 'crack of the suburbs' as a friend referred to it once. The thing with prescription pain killers is that they suck you in slowly. So slowly that by the time you realise you can't function without them you're already fucked. Nobody chooses to go down that particular road, it's not a decision you make, like deciding to smoke your first crack pipe. When you start taking them it's because you're in so much pain that you're not even human - you're a sniveling snotball of misery who's only coherent thought is wanting the pain to stop and you will take anything your doctor gives you. I hadn't felt pain until I had bleeding on the brain and a fat hole sawed out of my scull. I'm sure there must be worse pain but trust me when I tell you that the pain scale doesn't exist when you're hemorrhaging blood out of your nose and you feel like you're bleeding out of your ears and eyeballs too and there is a mini midget in your brain taking great big bites out of your grey matter. Having a lekker old nom. When you honestly feel like you would rather die than endure another second of hell on earth. By the time I got home from hospital I was still on morphine based injections and the strongest codeine tabs on the market. I wasn't allowed to drive for almost a year which suited me just fine but being housebound didn't help much either. My days passed in a hazy bubble, measured out in the hours between when I could take my pills and when some kind soul would bring me a cuppa. Hence the song below which was my anthem.


After almost 2 years of this I slowly started gaining the realisation that I was losing myself and the day I started panicking because I only had 27 tabs left I had a moment of clarity and decided that enough was enough. By then I'd become an expert on what pills could go with what booze, I mean really, only rock stars get to drown in their own vomit. Anyone else is just kinda pathetic wannabe shit. I had a bit of a dilemma though, I really didn't want to go to rehab because there ain't no Betty Ford Clinic around these parts I'm afraid. At least there you have a minuscule chance of running into the Johnny Depp's and Benicio del Torro's of this world but in South Africa? All I could envision was Frikkie from the Vrystaat with dirty fingernails and an all day Klippies and Coke habit. Clearly a no brainer for me then that I decided to go cold turkey. I won't lie, it was HELL! Weeks of wanting to rip my own skin off my body but I did it and I'm superfuckingproud of myself for it, even more so when a friend told me about all the codeine addicts he met in rehab. I suppose part of the reason I did it was because all the pills were screwing up my liver and I need that for drinking. I still have that bloody monkey on my back and I always will. There have been nights I've turned this house upside down looking for something I may have stashed away for a rainy day and the worst was when I came across some leftover vials from my morphine based injections. I felt so desperate in that moment that I almost broke a vial to drink the contents but I took a beat and realised how very fucking idiotic and pathetic that would be. I may be a stubborn bitch and very opinionated but I have never been a victim and I'm certainly not pathetic. If I take codeine again it will be a choice and then I am no better than anyone who ever decided to smoke a crack pipe or chase the dragon with heroin.

Yes, I smoke like a chimney and drink like a fish - a girl's gotta have some vices. Besides, we all have to die someday and I may as well do what I enjoy on my journey to the grave. I'll be one pissed off ghost if I die while jogging or some such shit. Who knows. maybe if I reach the ripe old age of 80 I may decide to try everything. It could be kinda interesting to see what an 80 year old crack whore looks like seeing as they never live nearly that long, so technically I will be doing it for science. For now though I think I will stick to beerwinevodkarum as a friend of mine has so aptly named our valium in a bottle...


Live well, love much, laugh often and always remember to dance!
GeeGee xx


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