Great thread, good luck in the main.

A lot of this stuff hits home for me because I just lost a close friend to oxy.

I couldn't agree more with the idea that for someone to get clean they have to truly want to be clean themselves. My friend that passed would say he wanted to stop, had a lot of opportunities to check into rehab and get help, but never went through with it.

For anyone saying that drugs help them perform better, or giving some other benefits of using drugs, I would encourage them to take a serious look at that statement. Possibly even ask trust worthy friends or family to give an honest assessment of what effect drugs have on your behavior. For the most part, heavy addiction and drug abuse is not recognized by the abuser until long after it becomes a serious problem.

Yes, balance, no danger. Of course I wasn't trying to glamorize weed, as such. I don't smoke either, and for good reason.

Maybe I should've mentioned instead something like going to a yoga class in the morning, having some Thai curry and iced green tea; followed by a four-handed two hour massage carried out by two lovely and skilled masseuses. Followed by two more hours of extra massage with one of the girls, because it is just so good, culminating in her grinding her silk panties on my face while she sucks me off. Then watch some TV or read a book.

Good clean fun and completely drug-free.

I'm sorry for your lose, fortunately i havnt had to deal with that yet, but did lose a friend to suicide this summer. Drug overdoses are so sad especially when you really can't help the person and they don't get that second chance at life.

Always grateful for the person I've become from having to deal with this disease on a day to day basis.

Enjoyed your post, once again sorry for your loss.

Great thread, Greg. You had an awesome series and I'm rooting for you to take down the ME.

My brother has been using heroin for about a year and a half, but he won't admit it, even though we find needles and he has all of the symptoms of heroin addiction. I barely see him because he wakes up in the afternoon every day and leaves the house right away to go hang out with his friends and do who knows what and comes back in the early hours of the morning. I'm really worried about him. Does anyone know how I can help him?

not to derail the thread but Pizza, what gif is that in your avatar?

Ezekiel Kemboi at the London Olympics. He is dancing after winning the 3,000m steeplechase.

love to see you doing so well greg. always knew you had the toughness and that $200 turning stone ft 5 years ago was just the beginning

pizza, i've never had to deal with a situation like that, but i think confronting him without judgement and showing him you are concerned about his well being would have a positive effect on the situation. if nothing else you'll have a better grasp of what's going on and have shown love to a brother who's in a tough spot. best of luck.

Thank you very much for the advice. I try to reach out to him and show him that I love him and am concerned but I don't think he understands the effect that the situation has on me. Last time I saw him I told him that he's my older brother and I look up to him and seeing him like this terrifies me because whenever I say goodbye to him I'm scared that it's the last time I'll ever see him. He just said "Ok." He's right at the age where he needs to choose which path to go down on in life(21), and i'm really hoping that he'll realize that no good can come from what he's doing.

^^ watch some episodes of Intervention and set up a plan with your family to try and reach out to him.

i agree with this, think you should talk to your family and his closest clean friends that are willing to set something up to save him. gl man

I cringed. All drugs are -EV long term. There is so much more to life than money. I was on a similar path as Greggy. I was using everything, and it's tough to get off. I cut out a few months ago and then went through PAWS, so I hopped on Lyrica then got hooked on that. I just cut everything out last week and now I'm letting my brain heal. It can be frustrating because my brain can feel "hollow" at times, and I feel dizzy a lot, but that just means my brain needs rest after using pills to pump out the dopamine before.

Exercise, meditation, routine, proper nutrition are all essential for recovery. Another thing is don't beat yourself up when you're recovering, accept that you're in a low key state and don't push too hard, otherwise you'll get frustrated and go back down the slippery slope.

And as for other addicts and how to help them...You can't...Or I should say you cannot help anyone who doesn't want to help themselves. The only thing you can do is be a beacon of good energy, let them know that you're there to help when they're ready, and don't enable them by giving them money, doing favors, etc.

I deal with addicts everyday and it's difficult, but if you don't draw your boundaries you will go down with them. If someone is not willing to improve you must let them hit rock bottom.

To be honest I don't understand the emotional and interpersonal aspects of such situations well at all... but my approach tends to be like reverse psychology (which is real in this case) such that drugs are not glamorous or cool. And they are also very dangerous. That takes them out of the "chic" or "hip" category squarely into the "wtf" and "lame" category and stop-doing-this-****-NOW category.

The Apa-Morphine cure mentioned by Burroughs in Naked Lunch is interesting, but I have no idea about the science of it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apomorp...iate_addiction

Reading Burrough's letters and commentary after Naked Lunch was for me very enlightening about the problems of opiate addiction, a ton of things that I did not know about it.

Hey Greg. I don't have anything to add to the thread except to say I think it's awesome of you to do this and pretty brave, since you could have just tried to shut that part of your past out of your head and forget about it.

Going over dark times is not the easy route imo, so, bravo. Good luck.

hey thanks oldjude, i remember playing against you a little on ftp. If i didn't love poker so much i would be a drug counselor and its nice to have this thread for people to vent/discuss issues. I would never want to forget who i am, a drug addict. The moment i start to think that I'm not is a scary thought and can lead to things turning for the worse very quickly. This disease has made me so much more humble and positive about poker and life in general.

Just want to thank Anthony Gregg, Evan Jarvis, and most of all Christian Harder for really helping me stay focused this year. Having the right people in your corner is huge.

one love

First of all, I want to say it was very strong and brave for you to share this publically with everyone, respect that.

My story is similar to kleinstein's, my very good friend also passed from oxy. The difference was this happened when we were only 15, young teens. It was only his second time doing it, the first was the weekend before. We went to a party the first time and he had told me how he tried oxy and how he felt "amazing" after doing it. I told him that if he ever did something so stupid again I would kick his ass. Sure enough the next weekend we went to another party and he did it again. That was the last time I saw my very best friend alive, some one who was like my brother. Immediately after doing it, he went to a room and just passed out on a bed, he never woke up again. It was by far the worst thing I have ever been through, I still think of him to this day. only 15 years old and he was taken away from us, I always wonder where he would be today if he was still alive? He had all the potential in the world.

Anyways, whether it's oxy or any other drug, they are all extremely -EV. The short term high or pleasure you get is not worth any of the negative outcomes. The negatives that come from drugs far outweigh any of the positives ( if there is any) that come from any drug. Too many people do them and aren't aware of the series consequences they can face. Hopefully I save some one from my story, and they think twice before doing anything like that.

Also, really rooting for you in the main bro, take it down!

thanks for sharing kevin, i couldn't imagine losing my best friend at that age from something like that. It really puts things into perspective as to how dangerous opiates truly are. Hope people can benefit from your post and be more careful about the decisions they make in life. Im very blessed to not have overdossed and be here today and i live everyday on a free roll now. Once again, thanks for sharing your story, I'm sorry for your loss.

Nasty story. There was a great (by great I mean scary and intriguing) documentary about OxyContin which followed addicts around the one stop pain relief shops in Florida I think. I love watching drug documentaries something about it intrigues me and saddens me. I am astounded that those pain shops are allowed to operate, in the uk we only have rogue pharmacists and there aren't that many of them, havea friend currently hooked on cocaine, opiates and booze and it's just sad to watch.

Two of my friends in college were addicted to opiates specifically oxycotin. They would get so spaced out from it. Don't know how anyone could grind on it.

i lost a lot of money grinding on it, surprised that people could actually win being so doped up

First off congrats on your sobriety and Main Event run. You seem like an awesome player/person and hard working and you deserve all the success and run good you have! I will be rooting for you in October. While we have different views on drugs, it doesn't make me less of a fan of you as a player.

There is still a huge social stigma to oxycodone use and a lot of pills/any drug use other than weed and its kind of annoying. I've seen and done and been around pretty much everything over the past 5 or so years and don't have many regrets. You can have a very addictive personality and still be smart enough/careful enough to moderate your use and enjoy some of the most euphoric highs ever without ending up in rehab. Just like you can drink without being an alcoholic, or smoke weed without being a pothead stoner loser. Only one of those drugs will get you looks if you were to do it on a break of a poker tournament though.

Granted, with the more hardcore stuff, you'll see less % of people being able to control it and I've seen all the worst out of addicts. Still, I hate how most of these stories paint the picture of drug use to be just this despondent black hole of misery. If the highs associated with some of the drugs weren't ****ing amazing, addicts wouldn't go through such great lengths to get high.

I've had some amazing times on drugs and had some terrible things happen on drugs. You should be glad you have money. The terrible path that most people go down is prescribed adderall aka speed....weed to calm down/go to bed....find percocets after that to go down after uppers/coke use with alcohol....get addicted to oxys....run out of money cuz oxys cost so much and tolerance goes up....and find heroin is much more cheaper than oxys to curb withdrawals/get that warm opiate high....and once you hit heroin...well...heroin is no turning back I've seen terrible stuff and I'm glad I never got into shooting that **** up just because I was never a fan of needles and would creep me out just watching others do it. Poker stopped you from having to go down the H path.

Seen that exact path happen to an old friend and my ex gf...really regret not doing more to stop my ex gf from getting into heroin

Even with all the terrible stuff that it can lead to, wouldn't take back the good times for anything. I've been completely sober for many months mainly due to being broke, and the only way I could ever rationalize doing drugs was to hustle myself. And I just basically use them to self-medicate depression/bipolar...and because I abused them so heavily when I was young and had money (AND ONLINE POKER IN USA!!) its impossible for me to get too deep into them again. My brain/dopamine receptors are just ****ed for life.

I still loved the process, the ritual, the routine, the ups, the downs, the lifestyle. Theres more to drugs than just the misery and I'd never want to be completely sober forever but if thats where you find happiness and peace with yourself then I'm very happy for you. I think I found more of a rush from going into bad neighborhoods than the drug itself sometimes. Addiction and drug use is very weird and complex.

I have one question for you that I'm not sure you can answer. How do you have sex again after having consistent sex while abusing oxys? As I'm sure you know, its nearly impossible to bust a nut while on oxys so that was actually one of the big plusses of the drug. If you weren't that great at sex you could pound away for hours and make girls go crazy. Myself/friends found that if you ever tried sober sex it was like the opposite effect....in that you'd basically become a premature ejaculator. Over time, did this effect subside for you? Or when were you using did your sex drive go down so much that you never had sex. (Common side effect of opiate use, I've known people who got hormone replacement)

Wicked post mate, really liked how you worded it, hope you know what's going on in your life now

Wow greg, your such a huge inspiration to me. Having just kicked a very extreme roxy addiction, I've turned to poker again and am working full time now. I dont have much to say other then I understand how horrible that paticular addiction can be. It just about cost me everything. I can still hardly believe that I beat it to be honest. It sucks because just before my addiction took a turn for the worst, I finally had built a bankroll to take a shot at playing for a living. About 50k spent on drugs later I'm starting all over again, but atleast feeling much better about life being sober. I've always thought that if I ever reached greatness in poker, I'd tell my story to try to get some awareness out there. Opiates in America are crazy right now. Thanks for your post. It deffinetly makes me feel posotive about things. I'll be rooting for you in the ME. GL

Wow, that so freakin' cool and glamorous. I bet Heath Ledger really went for that. He was probably like "Oh WOW man, I was just ****ing for 3 hours because I can't feel my dick (or my face, or my ass, or my feet). WOW that is bloody awesome." Then they just pack him in a hefty garbage bag and wheel him out in front of the paparazzis, and all of his troubles are over. AND he's a Hollywood legend forever. What could be better; living the dream. I bet he had a really spooky dealer named Flukey, too, who lived in the ghetto, and there were teen age hookers with hot pants and thongs on walking around outside Flukey's apartment when he went to go score there. So awesome.

Yeah, I guess you're right, I guess we shouldn't sue the drug companies for instigating a massively expensive and violent "war on drugs" while they manufacture a zillion oxys a year and make them easily available to everybody.

From Wikipedia:

There are a couple of things I will say about this type of perspective. First of all, it will be almost impossible to effectively argue about something like this being "wrong". That being said, I think it is human nature to rationalize away conflicts. I have heard a lot of people saying that drugs are great and they would not give them up, etc. but I wonder how much of that is rationalizing something that they cannot, or are unwilling to change.

I think there are a lot of negatives to drugs that drug-advocates simply do not address. There are also many positives to life without drugs that are not addressed either.