Leaving Frome was emotional. My partner and dog I will miss for a few weeks. The workshop, my home of daylight hours sad to say goodbye to Mag and Lisa who have been so supportive and understanding over the years. Driving began well till getting lost as rain fell heavy. Finally arriving I couldn't see much of the site so parked at the top car park. Today it's clearly a valley and cliffs to the sides, overgrown quarry, jackdaws playing on the rock faces. Several caravans and trailers. Trees behind over a green valley. Somerset is a week or two ahead but spring will be opening each day as recovery begins. I'm hoping for a swift clean out but expect to suffer for a while. Money, short and I suppose some way to get by must be sorted before I'm proper sick. I have everything I need so feel positive. Quite easily one of the hardest choices I have made. But the last two days in frome I could feel the window closing as a part of me was u consiously thinking of returning to pattern. Having been on one drug or another for a very long time, though two years of subutex maintenance was as clean as ive known left me happy but sometimes bored. Twelve years of drug treatment, psychologists, key workers, psychiatrists and their various pills never helped. Jumping now in to the unknown is the most responsible act. My biggest disappointment was the talk from a chemist I'd grown to know, like and respect described my actions as "running away" yet in truth, for the first time I am facing up to things. I was offered the option to wait for Turning Point to amass six hopeful candidates. Once found we would spend six weeks with a day in each meeting to talk about rehab. After this the panel, chaired by a drug worker, just graduated and very inexperienced, one who I refused to have as key worker, one I made cry and run to her boss when I said talking to her was like talking to a child. One who I have seen play silly games with clients, desperate people, damaging their lives. After the wait then the six weeks assessment, she would decide if I could be appropriate fo rehab. The chemist described this as trust issues. However, another two months in frome would quite possibly see me dead. And if I got through that period, then be told I want ready for rehab, and I don't think it beyond the childlike worker to be childishly petulant, refuse me a place, that would have ruined me. I would have quite possibly, in rebalious habit, said 'fuck it' and escalated my drug use in protest. Not that these self destructive protests affect anyone but myself, but risking my life under those circumstances would be idiotic. So if that chemist is reading this I hope that you can see I have not taken the easy option, I may have trust issues but in this case well founded. Added to the twelve years that the drug services have failed make any difference, only heald me to a prescription that admittedly, initially was saving my life, but rolled on to a trap and the prevention of any progress. Last year, the good key workers were offered their old jobs at half their old pay. They all found alternative jobs after this insult. They were replaced by inexperienced graduates. My first, a young girl, so un knowledgable, so dangerous she has put three people I alone know back on to drugs. People who were doing well. I refused to risk my recovery and life with her and asked to change worker. This is the right of any patient there. Fortunately, I was given a new worker who though just starting, has all the signs of being excellent at the position. Being a drug keywoeker requires some very delicate skills. An understanding of fragile, invariably mentally I'll people. Small things. Leaving voice messages on mobiles for example. Most haven't the money to listen to voice messages. A text would work. An addict is plagued with calls from dealers, other addicts, debt collectors, hence frequently they wisely turn their phones off. So, this workers voice messages, arranged appointments, never heard, result in a client going to collect their prescription but finding it cancelled by the child drug worker. They may have to ferry their children to school, go to work or any normal human chore. But they will be ill. So, rather than let employers, children down their only option is to score. That one score, even if they manage to regain their script, that one bag can end years of work achieving stability and a period that can be weeks, months or years before they are able to find a way off gear. This type of small mistake can lead to a death. And I strongly believe, before Vicky is recognised as the hazard she is, there will be a death, perhaps more. She told me she was once an addict. Looking at her skin, her teeth, her eyes, her hair, she has never been what I would call an addict. Yet her belief that she has meens she takes decisions based on how she would have reacted during what must have been little more than a breif binge to me or any serious drug user. A little knowledge can be far worse than none.
No comments:
Post a Comment