The All-Encompassing Effects of Addiction

So before I start answering this question, I actually had to look up the difference between 'effect' and 'affect'. For those of you who don't know, like I did, effect is commonly used as a noun, to show impact and or the result of something. Affect is commonly a verb and is used to show influence over something. You can affect something, and observe the effect of the affect. "You can't affect the creepy poem by reading it, but you can enjoy the effect of a talking bird." Just a little tid-bit of information for your day.

"How has my disease affected me physically? Mentally? Spiritually? Emotionally?" ~ NA Step Working Guide p. 2

Physically

So over my years of drug use and abuse, I've affected my life physically in more ways then one. I've done many different types of drugs from hallucinogens like 25i-Nbome, to mood altering substances like MDMA. Pretty much every common drug except PCP, crack, and heroin. Each substance affected my body in different ways.

I think the main effect of my drug use was my drastic weight loss. When I went to jail in 2015, I weighted 118 pounds, with clothes on. So let's say 115 pounds for the sake of the clothes right? Now I'm 6' tall, so for me to weight 115 pounds is ridiculously unhealthy.

While I was on Meth, which was my drug of choice for 2 years, I would barely eat anything at all. When I did eat, it was difficult to chew because of the sore muscles in my jaw from clenching my teeth all the time. I now have numerous cavities, broken teeth, and a weird sense of taste.

When I was doing hallucinogens I would consistently masturbate for hours and hours to the point that I would develop sores. I also was making choices on bad sexual partners and contracted an STD a couple of times. Thank goodness that they were treatable STD's. It was a sad sad time.

Mentally

I personally believe that my mental health has taken the most abuse. Whenever I was withdrawing off of Meth, I was going into Acute Drug-Withdrawal Schizophrenic Episodes that would produce auditory and visual hallucinations. I was already having these hallucinations while on drugs, but not as bad as when I was withdrawing.

I was extremely depressed throughout my entire life, and my parents divorce was a catalyst to my major depressive disorder. The major influence however was due to the massive amounts of Dopamine and Serotonin releasing drugs I was doing such as MDMA, MDMC, and other Ecstasy like substances. On numerous occasions I would lock myself in my bathroom because I was so depressed that I wanted to die. At the same time I didn't want to die, so my instinct was to isolate myself and remove the outside world for a while to hopefully just be able to refocus and no want to kill myself anymore. It was a weird sense of mental state.

Mentally now, I suffer from numerous diagnosed conditions such as Major Depressive Disorder, Insomnia, Borderline Personality Disorder, Panic Disorders, Agoraphobia, Suicidal Tendencies, and mild HPPD from doing too many hallucinogens. What is HPPD?

To put it simply, I really fucked up my mental health by doing drugs. However at the time I really didn't care because I was in such a foggy mental state and had lost any and all perception of reality.

Spiritually

This one is easy to answer. I legit had nothing spiritual about me. I never believed that anything was higher then me, or that anything had any power over me and my future. I was my own boss, and I though that I had full control over my own self-will and could just do whatever I wanted without any consequence. It was a difficult thing to accept in recovery that there is something higher then myself. I definitely was spiritually bankrupt as the program says.

I wanted nothing to do with God, and I felt as though all my life that God (whatever that might be) at the time had let me down. My life was never improving and my life was consistently going downhill. I asked myself frequently, "If there is a God, then why would he allow my life to go downhill? Doesn't he care about me?", not realizing that I wasn't doing anything to improve my life even though I thought I was. This all comes back to my distorted sense of reality.

I realize now that I've been watched over all my life by my higher power and kept safe. Situations where my life was in danger, or could have ended badly didn't. Not by my own doing, because trust me I was adding fuel to the fire by being in high and making impulse decisions. It's only by the grace of my higher power that I made it through these situations.

Emotionally

Emotionally I was unavailable. I wasn't really able to show any emotions because I had worked so hard to turn them off. During my life I felt as though emotions were a sign of weakness and not something that was going to get me anywhere in life.

This made my relationships with others non-existent, or extremely stale. I wasn't able to invest any emotions into my relationship with a significant other, and thats honestly probably why I was able to cheat on numerous girlfriends without thinking for a second of their feelings.

When I turned off these emotions, I also turned off the ability to recognize emotions and how my actions affected those around me. I couldn't ever show empathy, and drugs like MDMA gave me a false sense of empathy. It wasn't reality in the least bit because as soon as the drugs wore off, so did the 'empathy'.

Summary

I was bankrupt in every sense of the meaning. Financially, Spiritually, Mentally, Physically, and Emotionally. I didn't have a sense of reality at all what-so-ever. Nothing made sense in my life, whether it was my actions or even my own thoughts.

I was chasing after a dream, a reality that wasn't there. It effected those around me and most importantly it effected me. I was barely a human being. Looking back and thinking about everything that I've ever done while on drugs, I feel my stomach doing flips. It makes me physically sick to know how much pain and suffering I've caused. Logic was no where to be found, and insanity was running rampant.

So, to answer the question simply. It effected all aspects of my life negatively. Every second of every day of every week of every year with no hope of ever getting better. There's a saying in NA, "My worst day sober is better then my best day using." Boy is that ever true.

I might have a shitty day today, tomorrow, or even the rest of the year could suck. It's still better then my best day using, and I'm able to identify my character defects and flaws and with the strength and guidance of my higher power I'm able to improve myself as a human being.