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Before relapsing or using meth again, consider this...


Loraura Consider the following before using meth
I've adapted the following text from an OA pamphlet, and replaced references to food and eating compulsively to drugs and using. I find it very helpful when I'm feeling overwhelmed with thoughts of relapsing maybe it will be helpful to someone else, too.

"If you are confronted with the urge to use, consider the following points BEFORE you take that first hit:

1.Cultivate continued acceptance of the fact that your choice is between unhappy using and doing without just one small hit.

2. Cultivate humble gratitude that you were fortunate enough to find out what was wrong with you before it was too late.

3. Accept as natural that for a period of time (and it can be a long one) you may recurringly experience:
   a. The conscious nagging and craving to use.
   b. The sudden overwhelming impulse just to take one bump.
   c. The craving, not for drugs as such, but for the soothing glow and comfort just a hit or two once gave you.

As disturbing as these feelings are, they do not have to be acted upon.

4. Remember, each time you face a situation without using will make it easier for you the next time.

5. Develop and rehearse a daily plan of thinking and acting by which you will live that day without using, regardless of what may upset you or how hard the old urge to use may hit you.

6. Don't for a split second allow yourself to think "Isn't is a pity or a mean injustice that I can't use like so-called normal people?"

7. Don't allow yourself to either think or talk about any real or imagined pleasure you once got from using.

8. Don't permit yourself to think a bump or two would make some bad situation better or, at least, easier to live with. Substitute the thought, "One hit will make it worse -- one bump may eventually mean a binge."

9. Minimize your situation. Consider the courage of others who have overcome or accepted great adversity in their lives. Think gratefully how fortunate you are to have a disease that can be arrested, one day at a time, simply by not taking that first hit.

10.Cultivate enjoyment of sobriety:
  a. How good is it to be free of guilt, remorse and self-condemnation.
  b. How good it is to be free of fear of the consequences of a run just ended, or a coming run you have never before been able to prevent.
  c. How good it is to be free of the fear of what people have been thinking and whispering about you, free of their mingled pity and contempt.
  d. How good it is to be free of fear of yourself.

11. Catalog and recatalog the positive enjoyment of sobriety such as:
   a. The simple ability to wake up glad you are alive, glad you stayed sober yesterday, and glad you have the privilege of being sober today.
   b. The ability to face whatever life may dish out with peace of mind, self-respect and the full possession of all your faculties.

12. Cultivate a helpful association of ideas:
   a. Associate that first hit with all the misery, shame and remorse you have ever known.
   b. Associate that first hit with the destruction of your newfound happiness and the loss of your self-respect and peace of mind.

13. Cultivate Gratitude:
   a. Gratitude that so much can be yours for so small a price.
   b. Gratitude that you can trade just one hit for all the happiness sobriety gives you.
   c. Gratitude that you stopped using in time.
   d. Gratitude that you are only a victim of an illness called addiction, that you aren't a weak-willed glutton or a person of doubtful reasoning power.
   e. Gratitude that, as others before you have discovered, in time you will not want or miss the drugs.

14. Seek out ways to help other addicts, and remember, the first way to help others is to practice sobriety yourself.

15. Don't forget that when the heart is heavy and resistance is low, and the mind is troubled and confused, there is much comfort in a true and understanding friend standing by."
danimal
55
Re: Consider the following before using meth
TY Loraura! Excellent advice, and a fine example of preventing relapse by *not* "turning it over" or "faking it", but instead by taking the bull by the horns and using a cognitive "self talk" approach and *REFUSE-ing TO USE*, or to even think about it.
Euphoric recall IS thee enemy and it must be combated in the ways you have kindly set forth here.
The using thoughts and euphoric recall DO eventually give up and leave us alone, I'm living proof with 30+ *CRAVING FREE* months behind me. TG

My Mother is quite emphatic about gratitude, service and friendship as expressed in # 13, 14 & 15 in your list of relapse prevention skills...and my Mother DOES know best!

These 15 skills are IMO what the "cravers" truly need to *apply* in order to, once and for all, silence that monkey mind and it's incessant nagging for dope.

When using is no longer an option...for ANY "reason"
it's no longer an option.

See also:

Meth Relapse Topics

Can I smoke meth one more time or will I be back at day one of hell?


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