City Crisis and Crisis City are two different video games that both exist.
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iâve since finally gotten around to trying that place and itâs now one of my favorite places.
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Seven weeks sober (alcohol). I felt the need to say that to someone outside of my house. After struggling for 20 years, I started of Fluoxetine which flicked a switch in my head. I hit my 40th birthday a week ago and celebrated it sober and happy.
I do feel the need to apologise to all of the game developers and retro game sellers on eBay since I am no longer making questionable purchasing decisions at the end of the night.
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big congrats, and hereâs to many happy days in your future
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Good for you man, thatâs fucking awesome.
Unsolicited advice and musings about addiction (not necessarily especially directed personally at Chopemon, just got me thinkin) from myself as someone who works in addictions and tries to learn about them, but hasnât had a serious one below (cw substance use and not just alcohol):
Summary
Some people really can quit cold turkey. My grandfather, after a moment where he hit total rock bottom, resolved to never drink again, and as far as I know he never drank a drop after that. I at least certainly never saw him drink or be drunk while he was still alive.
At the same time, falling off the wagon is probably a more common story. Thatâs the reality of it but that also means itâs also pretty common for people to get back up on it, itâs just a question of how long it takes you to get back up on the wagon and how long you can stay on it for never time. Seven weeks is a long time, even if you were drinking a few times a week, even more impressive if you were drinking every day, though, so⊠who knows? If you can do 7 weeks you can do 8⊠if you can do 2 months you can do 3⊠if you can do 4 months you can do a year⊠and so on.
I think the true secret to developing an optimally healthy relationship to things we have developed an addiction to (not just substances) is to figure out how much or how little we can have and still be happy. A lifetime of exercising sheer strength of will to commit 100% to abstinence is where some people find the strength to do it. At the same time, donât feel shame or regret or anxiety about feeling temptation or even as we said falling off the wagon either. The vast majority of stories about recovery are not linear nor can they be summarized in a few sentences.
But letâs be realâas much as substance use can cause pain and grief and struggle, it is almost a certainty that people use substances for reasons which were actually not bad, or even good. A missing aspect to so many conversations about substance use is that the use of the substance has some if not several positive aspects. Like, no one is gonna get addicted to Anus Rash Pills (the pills which cause your anus to develop a painful itchy rash and have no pleasant effects otherwise). A relief from pain, a method for managing difficult emotions and stress, cultural and social rituals⊠even just, simply, a way to have fun and feel good. It doesnât mean that all of the negative consequences donât exist of course, itâs just that, weâre not really understanding the full picture of substance use and addiction if we refuse to consider substances are fun and make people feel good, these are normal things to be drawn towards, and not everyone is so fortunate as to have the sort of life where you can trigger a surge of serotonin, dopamine, endorphins, and/or oxytocin by just going for a walk.
It actually sickens me that things like methadone (clinically prescribed alternatives to opioids) purposefully do not have a euphoric effect, and I might be mixing this up with something else, but the point of some of those drugs is to inhibit the euphoria inducing effects of real opioids. For one, this is why some people overdose despite being on an opioid substitution drugâlots of people do chip while on methadone, as in, supplement methadone with other substances because they donât get relief from methadone, and then they end up overdosing because they donât fully understand the full ramifications of the action of the opioid substitutes. But even beyond that it is so dehumanizing. It results in the position of hard and regressive clinical treatment for addiction essentially being that drug users donât deserve feeling good or relief. They deserve life support and a baseline of pain relief for functionality and nothing more, as if an unending, austere struggle is their punishment for the decadence of, idk, getting addicted to heroin because it was the only thing available to them that gave them peace from PTSD flashbacks or chronic pain.
Like, yeah ofc you can become physically dependent on a certain chemical (like alcohol), but in some cases it would probably be less accurate to say that someone is addicted to a specific substance or set of substances, and more like theyâre addicted to an intense happiness or a deep sense of calm or a profound sense of belonging and connection, or a relief from pain, and those feelings just happen to be at least semi-reliably triggered by certain substances. What does it mean to âcureâ someone of an addiction, then?
Something about what Chopemon said, that starting on fluoxetine (which is, letâs b real, basically the acetaminophen of psychoactive medicine) was like flipping a switch, made me think of all that. Deliberately choosing to refuse to think of an addiction to substances like alcohol as a moral failing or a disease or a genetic predisposition in the individual, often reveals that that addiction was someone self medicating depression and/or anxiety and/or unresolved trauma and/or chronic pain, or shit, even just ennui or boredom or a lack of fulfillment in life (letâs not even get into the next layer of that where addictions can be thought of as socially/culturally/environmentally/economically generated). Antidepressants and/or anti-anxiety medication and/or other stuff like that are still âdrugsâ youâre âdependentâ on, but, theyâre far more controlled and targeted in how they can address symptoms, and itâs great when it can work out like that.
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This is the only part I disagree with.
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Gaagaagiins is correct that it wasnât a physical addiction for me, it was a way of escape from depression, anxiety, OCD and PTSD. I have had a lot of wonderfully enjoyable times with some drinks in me, but over the last ten years it became a habit to use it to escape.
I donât think I ever got to the point of abuse where I would be classed as an alcoholic, but I think I got close. I had tried antidepressants before (Sertraline) but they didnât agree with me at all. I had a very bad mental health incident earlier this year which pushed me to give a different type a try and as soon as I did, the craving for alcohol was gone. Iâm in therapy as well to work on my long term coping mechanisms if I ever come off my meds. I donât want to slide back into old patterns.
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I defer entirely to your expertise on this!
Perhaps what I meant more was that it was actually the Tylenol of psychoactive medicine for treatment of symptoms of depression. Prozac is practically a household name in the same way that Tylenol is, and as I understand it is probably still one of if not the first medication prescribed for treatment of symptoms of depression.
Perhaps you would agree with that more detailed explanation of what I meant, but again, I absolutely defer to your expertise.
I tend to think of Tylenol in two different ways:
- Tylenol is a ubiquitous and multi-function (pain and/or fever) thatâs been around a long time but is still very useful.
In this case, I would equate it more to something like Elavil in the psychoactive realm.
- Something that is surprisingly dangerous when taken inappropriately or with certain other common consumables.
In that case, itâs definitely MAO Inhibitors.
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On second thought, if we look at both criteria together, itâs probably Valium.
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What is the Tylenol of video games?
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CW substance use, addiction
First, more encouragement for Chopemon:
Summary
Youâre far, far from alone on that, so, that wasnât even an educated guess! Also, you should be proud of yourself for having that level of self awareness and also the courage to speak honestly about it.
Itâs fascinating how societally and culturally there is so much gray area, here. Even terms like âhigh functioning alcoholicâ really muddy the waters about what constitutes an addiction and what doesnât.
@Death_Strandicoot can probably give a more accurate accounting on this but I would bet that finding that the first antidepressant you try is what is going to work for you for the rest of your life is maybe only slightly more likely than winning the lottery. Iâll continue to speak out of my ass in a way that might irk @Death_Strandicoot but we really donât have an exceptionally clear picture on why these drugs do what they do, so trial and error is a very normal process for figuring out what antidepressant or whichever is going to help any particular individual.
Always fantastic to hear. The doctor who prescribed my partner fluoxetine as her very first antidepressant was quite frank about itâyou might be taking this for the rest of your life. Thereâs nothing wrong with that, but it also sounds like youâve got a great attitude in general that will be very conducive to longterm happiness and stability. Do what works, do extra on top of that, and keep an open mind on future change.
Best of luck to you in the future, and kudos to you again on taking such massive forward steps on your healing journey.
More musings on the social/cultural/economic aspects of addiction:
Summary
The gray area of what is considered an addiction and what isnât is part of what I was getting at when I pointed out there is a social/cultural/economic element to addiction that is rarely talked about.
If someone is a daily user of, idk, cocaine, but they are wealthy enough to outsource and defer and mitigate all potential harms to themselves or others due to cocaine use (maybe excepting the long term health detriments of daily cocaine use), do they really have an addiction? For the hoi polloi, the boundaries of what tends to be perceived as a substance addiction and what is perceived to just be I suppose enthusiastic use of a substance tend to be when it becomes a risk to oneself or others (healthwise, but also legal, financial, etc), but freedom from a lot of those risks are definitely purchasable.
Donât let anyone forget that a bar is a supervised consumption site, subject to usually strictâbut constructiveâstate regulations and also state taxation. This is a good thing, we want the intoxicating substance they distribute to be created by producers who are under a lot of scrutiny to provide a safe, reliable, and effective product, so that users can consume it in a public place. These places tend to have a relatively healthy social environment, and even if there arenât other patrons around there are professionals who can intervene in the case you experience a dangerous overdose.
A lot of alcoholics, in this sense, are perceived as if not forced into this status of âaddictionâ to the substance, literally because they are poor, as in, they are too poor to be able to afford the markup in price that comes with consuming alcohol at the volume and level of quality of alcohol served in bars/pubs, and thus also cannot do so within the socially acceptable environment of a bar or pub.
Finally, I summarize an episode of a podcast I really love that I listened to recently:
Summary
For some bright news on the topic of alcohol addiction and radical approaches to support people addicted to alcohol, I heard about a beautiful sounding program from listening to one of my favourite podcasts, Crackdown. This episode was about, ironically, how even drinkers are criminalized, particularly those whose addictions are severe and who are on the margins of society.
Spoiler alert but it talks about a MAP, or, a Managed Alcohol Program, which was designed particularly to address severely addicted drinkers who were drinking non-beverage alcohol (e.g. mouthwash, rubbing alcohol, etc). I canât remember all of the details but a set daily quantity of beer and wine is available at an enormous discount (or free), partly because it is brewed by participants and volunteers. Apparently lots of participants quickly reduce how much they drink non-beverage alcohol and many people end up drinking exclusively there and many are even able to drastically reduce how much they drink. Some even get sober!
Sounds like a great example of both a safe supply, a supervised consumption site, and addiction management. Itâs always frustrating when scumfuck austerity motherfuckers talk about how they are sympathetic towards addicts but say that the focus needs to be on some vague concept of âtreatment.â Thatâs just an expectation of abstinence with extra steps and is completely unmoored from reality, especially in the face of programs like the one described above, since total sobriety is not sustainable or even possible for some of the most vulnerable addicts, and things like Managed Alcohol Programs demonstrate their efficacy AND efficiency all the time.
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Well, looks like in contrast to my happy posts about my bestieâs wedding, life is going to throw another curveball. Our Nookmis, my grandmother, is soon going to pass away.
But actually, itâs all good. Sheâs at peace and sheâs not suffering too much. She is of sound mind and this is her choice. Itâs all happening very suddenly, less than 6 months ago she was still living independently and even still driving, but also sheâs 93. Having lost a different grandparent in a much more drawn out and uncertain way, I can only be grateful to her for doing it like this. She doesnât even want a service⊠if only we could all go with that kind of grace.
Laugh everyday, even if (or perhaps especially) when you feel like crying, thatâs how you get to 93.
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The name of the Frog Fractions protagonist is Bartholomew Salience.
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A post was merged into an existing topic: Having a very normal morning on this very normal day.
Iâm trying to imagine it but I canât form a complete picture.
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had to look this dude up on wikipedia and
To avoid the difficulty of an Atlantic crossing, the Gödels took the Trans-Siberian Railway to the Pacific, sailed from Japan to San Francisco (which they reached on March 4, 1940), then crossed the US by train to Princeton.[26] It was during this trip, that Gödel was supposed to be carrying a secret letter from Viennese physicist Hans Thirring to Einstein [to alert Roosevelt of the possibility of Hitler making an atom-bomb]. It turned out, that Gödel never conveyed that letter to Einstein, although Gödel did meet. The reason was that Gödel was not convinced, Hitler could achieve this feat.[27]
was he just like nah, not going to worry about a hitler a-bomb
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he also famously starved to death, i think it was after his wife died, because he would only eat her cooking. extremely abnormal fellow.
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