I notice that there isn't a lot of activity here, but I've found that even just venting helps sometimes.  

I have an extensive psychiatric history: childhood sexual abuse/incest led to depression, self-mutilation, suicide attempts, ptsd, and finding myself as an adult in risky and unhealthy situations, naturally leading to other instances of sexual assaults as an adult, including an...episode? Incident? With the man who abused me as a kid, at which point I spiraled emotionally, in and out of inpatient, outpatient, residential places, therapists, psychiatrists and the seemingly unending list of drugs to try in an attempt to get my depression and ptsd under control. This time last year I was on 11 different psychotropics. Today I'm on: Celexa, Welbutrin, Adderall, Ativan, Haldol, Prazocin and Ambien.

Three months ago I had a beautiful baby girl and, in part because of my psychiatric instability, in part because of the family dynamics and the abuser, in part because I have shitty self-esteem and think I'd be a terrible mother, I placed her for adoption. The strangest thing happened: my depression and ptsd got significantly better after I gave birth, but I'm grieving the loss of my baby girl. The adoption is open and I have contact and get updates, but honestly, seeing pictures of her all the time just upsets me and makes me overwhelmingly sad. I realized a couple months ago that this new emotional crisis had pushed away emotional rollercoaster that trauma had had me on prior to giving birth. 

Now, my best friend is an addict. I love her dearly, she's an amazing person, but she's battled addictions with several substances since I met her over a decade ago: pain pills, then heroin, then bath salts, then cocaine and now crystal meth. I've never been remotely tempted to join her on that journey, having watched her struggle and lose and gain and lose everything important to her over and over. Last week I finally sat her down and asked her to teach me how to smoke meth. I have no idea why; possibly because I need a crisis that's less painful/actually relieves the agony of missing my daughter,  at least postpones it. I know it's not a solution. I have absolutely no doubt that combining meth with my current medication cocktail is reckless and dangerous, and yet, I have made a conscious decision to get high at least once a day every day for over a week. I don't love meth. It tastes absolutely disgusting, but it puts me put of my misery, if only for a few hours, and it appeals to me because it's so dangerous and toxic. It's, I think, my way of punishing myself for all of the mistakes in my life and all of the blame I put on myself and all of the shame and anger and digust and downright contempt I have for myself. I know that a lot of shit wasn't my fault, but some of it was, and some of it could have been prevented, and all of it makes me feel just so unbelievably...bad. Wrong. And it's those feelings I'm trying to escape, however temporarily. I'm torn between wanting that punishment and simultaneous escape and not wanting this to become a full blown addiction that I can't control. Meth is a harsh mistress; everything I know about it tells me that I could cross that line at any given time and not be able to turn back. Part of me hopes it will kill me. That part is not small.

If anybody out there has any thoughts or suggestions, I'm open to hearing them.