How do you plan on dealing with your social anxiety now? Are you considering therapy or self-improvement classes or something?
How much were you drinking per day? I’ve not read through this thread entirely, so if this has already been discussed, forgive me, but are you a functioning alcoholic?
Where most of the other patients “frequent flyers”?
Were you allowed to go there and detox from one thing while still taking another?
What do you mean by the nicoteine stuff being like cigarettes in prison - what is there to barter for in detox? Presumably not drugs so…?
I’m not sure. In some weird way I wish I were back there now. It was kind of fun to be in the zoo surrounded by other fuck-ups. It was kind of liberating to be able to tell someone, “Dude, if you didn’t have a problem you wouldn’t be *here *with *us *right now,” and have 5 people chuckle and back you up.
But I think it’s mostly that I miss the people that I met there. There was a camaraderie that develops. We all got there feeling like crap so everyone feeling a little better looks out for everyone just getting in. For example, right when I got to the ward they did vitals, gave me 50mg of librium and I went to lay down for about an hour and a half. I couldn’t sleep because my heart was still beating out of my chest so I went to the common room. When they saw the condition I was in they went and told the nurse, who did more vitals. My BP and HR were still sky high so they gave me another 50mg and 30 minutes later I started to feel better. And even after that, we all (the voluntaries at least) looked out for each other. That’s where I think meetings could be helpful.
As I said, they gave me a script for an SSRI, I think outpatient rehab will involve some counseling, but if not I’ll find one specifically for that.
I was, but in the middle of a long post. I was up to about 12-18 per night and functioning at work. My boss was shocked when I told him that that was the reason I had called in sick 3 days in a row (it had gone up to the high 20’s-30 Father’s day weekend and the following few days).
There were about 4 of us there for the first time. Some had been there just the week before. Several knew all the staff by name the second they walked in the door, and the staff would say, “Back again?” The highest number of stints I heard was about 17.
Not sure what that means. But, if this answers the question, I was there for alcohol. The only thing I needed was librium (a benzodiazepine), but when new people came in and I’d get anxious I could ask the NP for hydrochlorothiazide (anti-anxiety), and when I couldn’t sleep I could ask for trazodone (a hypnotic/anti-anxiety).
Yes, there were drugs on the ward. My roommate ODd by taking something someone had smuggled in. I was thinking more like ice cream, control of the TV to watch a Yankee game, dibs on the shower in the morning, stuff like that.
-
What was it that made you decide to check into treatment when you did, as opposed to the week before or six months before? Was drinking seriously interfering with your life, job, school, etc., and you faced a dark moment (e.g. almost flunked out, almost got fired, got fired, got dumped by significant other) that directly led to the decision, or did you just have an “aha” moment where you can’t really explain why you made the decision* then and there*? Did you come to a realization that you were headed toward being arrested (e.g. for DUI, drunk in public, assault, etc.) and court-ordered rehab, and so you decided to do it voluntarily to protect your reputation? In a sense, what was different about your life when you made the decision versus a month earlier? What was different a month earlier that made you not go to rehab?
-
Looking back at your drinking, do you see a point (approximate is fine, like senior year of undergrad) where your drinking became problematic? E.g. can you say that you drank casually and un-problematically until some life event, or some general life period?
-
Do you think that you could ever return to casual drinking, or do you feel that avoiding all alcohol is the best?
-
Do you think it’s possible for some people to use alcohol responsibly over their life, or do you think that any use leads down a slippery slope into addiction?
-
Does having a history of alcohol abuse or alcohol treatment count against you in terms of returning to school or getting a license in a policy sense? That is, if you are sober enough to actually return to class and succeed, is that enough, or do you need a formal alcohol abuse evaluation before you would be allowed back? If so, what needs to happen for you to succeed? Is it mostly a matter of proving that you have resolved your drinking problem? After graduation, do you have to be formally evaluated by the board of medicine and be adjudicated clean or else be denied a license?
-
You said that you would need to start med school over. Is this because your credits were cancelled, voided, or because your credits have expired, or is it because you don’t feel you actually remember enough of the material to complete the rest of the classes that build on your previous coursework or actually function as a doctor?
-
I know someone who took some classes on becoming an addictions counselor (outpatient talking therapist, not MD) and they told me that addictions counselors were about half former addicts who cleaned themselves up and decided to help others do the same and the other half was composed of people who saw drug counseling as a decent and lucrative career. Do you have any interest in specializing in addictions medicine or detox or anything of that nature?
Did they tell you why they took away your deodorant? Seems silly to take that, unless it can get you high or kill you in some way I cannot envision.
So if you were having DT from not drinking for 14 hours before going to detox, how did you normally go to work?
Mostly answered in post 10, but to further elaborate. After going to the bar on Father’s Day I missed work Monday, then I missed work on Tuesday, and most of the day Wednesday. When I finally made it in I spoke to my boss who was unusually understanding and offered me a week off to go somewhere. I made it in on Thursday but couldn’t handle a pipette at all really. I spoke to a friend who said that if he was offering the week, just go. So I went.
The first big event was three years ago when the girl I was dating dumped me with almost no warning and I realized I hated med-school. The second was when I got into an argument with a bouncer about some guys using the word “faggot”. It was the first time I stood up for myself and realized that trying to keep people from knowing I also like guys was eating me alive and I had to start letting people know. But it wasn’t something I wanted to do while living at home.
Of course I think I can, all addicts do. Hopefully that won’t be a bridge I think about crossing for a few years.
Of course it’s possible. My mom’s one of them. She drinks maybe a glass of wine a month.
It’s definitely not a positive for going back, I’m not aware they would necessarily have access to that info. However, I think being upfront and honest about the fact that I recognized the problem, how it was affecting my life, my performance in school and sought professional help would be a mild positive as opposed to trying to come up with an irrational explanation for the past few years. There are some legal aspects when it comes to licensing that I don’t feel qualified to answer, QtM would probably know better. I think it also may vary by state/hospital. Some may require random testing, antabuse, opioid blockers for opiate addicts. Not entirely sure.
Nope, it’s just because once you leave you have to start over. Med-school is a different animal than college to the point that it’s damn near impossible to even transfer schools while in school.
Not in the least. You have to deal with too many assholes (mostly drug induced assholishness) that I don’t have the patience for and the good people who are there to get help fail too often and it would cripple me emotionally.
Do you expect to relapse, deep down?
The only thing I could think of is somehow molding pills or baggies into the stick
For starters, once I decided to go to detox, I lost all self control and was drinking as soon as I woke up/came to. Almost like a last hurrah. That was from Thursday night till Monday night, pretty much non-stop with a few hours of sleep a night.
Secondly, Monday’s always sucked because I went from drinking insane amounts on Friday night and Saturday down to about 15 Sunday. By 2pm on Monday’s my heart would be racing, my hands slightly shaky, and if I stopped doing things I’d start getting very anxious (this odd feeling like my brain was going to kill me). At 6/7pm I’d be out the door to the bar down the block to get rid of the brew shakes. By Tuesday, the best I can figure, my brain realized it wasn’t going to be getting the same high dose of alcohol and started producing some amount of GABA again. I still would get some shakes and hot flashes on a daily basis though, just not terribly noticeable to anyone else.
Were the AA, NA and CA meetings just with patients from the facility or were they meetings with outsiders as well?
Not as long as I’m on SSRIs. That could be years. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. As I mentioned, I’ve been reading about the Sinclair Method of attenuating the cravings to drink by using an opioid receptor blocker.
Two people would come in to run the meeting. It was only the detox patients there. We had no contact with the rehab patients, for good reason: many of the detox patients were still being medicated to the point of being/acting high.
With the opiate blocker, is there a risk of someone trying to drink more than usual to get the desired effect?
Congratulations on quitting drinking.
Do you think you will gain another addiction to “take place” of drinking?
Another question that would be better answered by a full MD not a 1/2MD, but as I understand it, it reduces the craving to drink and the desire to over drink if one slips, but I suppose it could be possible.
That’s my biggest fear. I have never used any drugs other than alcohol and marijuana that weren’t prescribed (and usually decline pain meds when offered a script), but I could get my hands on just about anything I want. I do still want to do mushrooms and acid (not at the same time) at least once, and possibly molly, but that’s more of a life experience, open the window to my mind kind of thing.
Interesting thread. I just had to respond to this:
NOBODY could have been the son he wanted. I’d bet good money that it’s nothing to do with who you were or weren’t and everything to do with the fact that you were an easy target. In other words, that idea is a lie he planted in your head so he could make himself feel big by making you feel small. A real father wants the child he has got.
Good luck with all this.
You may want to see meetings in the outside world. I would not have gotten anything from just listening to fellow detox patients. It was listening to people who had gotten and stayed sober that made a difference for me.
Well said.
I could only imagine what kind of mind fuck that would be like coming from the person who is suppose to love you. Luckily I never had to go through that, I grew up without father and I think if my father was like that I would rather grow up without one. Way to freakn’ poisonous. If he’s still like this Crawlspace, stay away far away.