Day 12 - "Overdose"

Tuesday, 5 December 2006 - Day 12 - "Overdose"

Looking back at my heroin use, I realize only now how many times I actually stared death in the face with my pinpointed pupils. The devil was sitting there laughing at me, tempting me with heroin. For some reason he was quite fond of me, I think. He tried a few times to get me and almost succeeded five or six times.

Overdosing on anything is not a pleasant experience. There are a few factors that can cause an overdose: Bad quality product from the dealer, mixing different drugs and taking too high of a dose - I experienced all of them. The worst was the night I stopped breathing. Heroin lowers your breathing considerably and if it goes too low for too long it is fatal. Luckily I had my friends looking after me that night. I can’t remember most of what happened and I’m not sure what they did to help me – but I’m glad they did it.

Besides overdosing those times I got a bad batch from the dealer once or twice. He even game me cocaine once and I injected that without knowing what it really was. Believe me… not a good thing to do!

Besides the fact that I was obviously taking heroin which is addictive and destructive I never really knew what they were mixing the stuff with. I heard a story once of a person that owed the dealer too much money and never paid. The dealer sold him cement one day. I’m not sure how that story ended – but the moral is that you just never know what you are getting or what they mixed it with.

Apart from the overdosing which is potentially fatal it is probably your veins, heart and liver that suffers the most during heroin use. Heroin makes the veins collapse. You start off by injecting in the arm and as you slowly do the permanent damage to your disappearing veins you have to start looking for other veins.

I might have stopped using heroin but irreparable damage has already been done to my body. I still have to go for blood tests to see if I ever got anything from needles. I have to check up on my heart and my liver and I have to drink medicine to prevent blood clots. It is obvious that getting clean is just the beginning of the fight…