Greg: All right. What’s up, everyone? Greg here. Project Unbroken. Today, I’m going to be talking about what heroin feels like and also what it’s like to be a heroin addict. We skimmed this topic before, but, in today’s video, I want to dive deep. I want you to get a perfect understanding of what heroin feels like and also what it’s like to be a heroin addict because I want you to completely understand how dangerous and ugly this drug is. This is about education and helping people get away from this drug or get away from any thoughts of ever trying this drug, anything along those lines. I’m going to dig deep here.
Contents
How Heroin Feels
Greg: Now, there’s really a couple different aspects to heroin, and, with how it feels, there’s both a physical and a mental side to it. Also, the addiction as a whole, there are stages that you go through, so I want to talk about both of those things. Let’s talk first about how it feels.
Greg: What many people don’t understand is the high starts before you even use. The high started for me when I made the phone call, and depending on what stage I was at on how I felt exactly, but usually the high begins when I start dialing the number, and I’m waiting, and it’s ringing, and it’s ringing, and they pick up. “Yes.” That’s where the high begins. “Yes. He answered.” Then, it’s usually the way I asked my main dealer was, “You good?” I was hoping he said yeah. “Yeah.” “Yes.” That’s the next high. He has it. “All right. Well, where can we meet? What time? Hopefully so. I’m hoping soon.” He says, “Well, okay. Well, I can meet you 11:00. It’s 10 now, meet you in an hour.” Bam. There’s the first high.
The Stages Of The Heroin High
Greg: That’s pretty disgusting. Right? I mean you get your first high really just from the phone call. There’s so much desire for the drug, there’s so much pull that the high begins before you even use at just at the phone call.
Greg: The next stage is really the drive, like the waiting and the drive there, and that’s excitement. It’s adrenaline. You know that you’re getting ready to go do something illegal and a little bit of danger there, which I personally like danger, and it really excited me. I don’t know if I’m weird in that aspect, but the danger part actually excited me. Again, it was almost like an adrenaline rush but also, of course, knowing that I’m going to get high was a high on its own.
Greg: Then, the next stage, and I know all of you addicts, even whether it’s heroin or any other drug, can relate to this, especially with heroin and opiates, especially when you’re withdrawing, the next phase is the wait. We have all- All addicts have waited for a drug dealer. You pull up. We always beat the dealer there. We’re always first. The dealer pretty much never beats us to the location that we’re exchanging. Right? You get there, and it’s constant. “Is he this car? Is he this car?” That’s the next part of the high, waiting to see the car, waiting to see that car. Usually, you know their car, and you’re just waiting to see it turn that corner.
Greg: Of course, the next part of the high is when you see the car. It’s like, “Oo.” You start getting really excited. Again, embarrassing. I don’t know if embarrassing’s the right word, but it’s crazy that the drug can have that much hold on you that you get so much of a high before you even use it.
Greg: Then, of course, there’s the initial contact where you do the exchange. Again, for me, that was- Many people don’t like that, but, for me, it was like danger. It was like I was taking a risk. For some reason, I get a little bit of a high off of that itself and a little bit of adrenaline, and I know there’s people out there that are similar. After that, that’s the initial feeling, and you have it, and you each drive away, and there’s a little bit of excitement there because you didn’t get caught, and you now have what you want, and you’re getting ready to get high.
The Ritual
Greg: The next phase of the addiction is the ritual, and most addicts have a ritual. I know, for me, I never shot heroin; I just sniffed it, and, side note, that was something that I helped justify using heroin for. It was, “Well, I’m not shooting it. That was my justification for a while.” Anyways, my ritual was I would get the bags, and I would be driving back to where I was. I wouldn’t even wait, of course, until I got there. I know many addicts are like, “I’d do it right there where I got it. I don’t even leave the area,” but I usually like to leave just in case anyone saw the exchange.
Greg: On the drive home would usually be when I started up. If you don’t know what a heroin bag looks like, it’s about this thick. They came in blue bags. For me, they were about this long, and they fold up into a square like this big. You open it up, and I would flick it just to get the powder all level, and I would put one or two depending on how much I got or how I was feeling or what I was doing that day, usually one or two on a book that I kept in my car or a flat surface. I’d get out a card; chop it. Take out a bill, and sniff it. That was my ritual, and I always did the same thing: flick, pulled it out, always had a card on me, and that was my ritual.
The Actual Heroin Fix
Greg: From there, you’ve used, and then the second part of the high begins or the actual fix or the actual high, I guess you could call it. Surprisingly, many people don’t talk about the high beforehand. The pull is so strong that the process is a high. You get high in the process just mentally, just stuff flowing in your brain, knowing it’s about to happen. The whole process, it’s crazy. It’s unbelievable how powerful that drug is and what it does to you even before you ever use it.
Greg: Once you use it, the initial feeling, it’s like an itch getting scratched. That’s a good way of putting it. You have an itch on your back. You can’t reach it, and you get someone to scratch your back. It’s like, “Ah.” The itch is scratched. Or, if you crack your back, if you’ve ever been to a chiropractor, you get a really good neck crack at the chiropractor, they do an adjustment, it’s like, “Oh my gosh.” You feel the big pain that they hit it, and it cracks, and it’s fixed. It’s almost like that feeling at first, especially if you’re in withdrawal, especially. That’s just intensified because then you go from feeling totally horrible to feeling good, and it happens pretty quick.
Greg: I know, for those that shoot, it happens even quicker, pretty much instantaneously. Stiffing, if I remember correctly, it took like, I don’t know, a minute or so, 30 seconds, a minute. Even like the high probably takes longer, but I think even like initially like, as soon as you sniff it, you feel better just because you know that it’s about to kick in. I could even say sniffing, although the high like may not be technically kick in right away, it kind of does because you know it’s coming any second. It kicks in pretty quick.
The Drip
Greg: Next is the drip. Again, I sniffed heroin, so the drip for me was a very distinct taste. What’s weird, again, is it doesn’t even taste that good, but I loved the taste. I think the reason for that is because I associated that drip with a great feeling. Every time I tasted this specific taste or this drip going down my nostril down the back of my throat and into my system, it made me feel great. I think, subconsciously, even though it doesn’t necessarily taste that good, my body fooled or tricked me or my mind tricked me into loving it, and I loved that drip.
Greg: Then, of course, it finally kicks in whether it’s a couple seconds or a couple minutes, whatever the case is, and how you feel from there really depends on how much you use. There’s different stages and different levels to what you feel. If you’re sniffing it, you’re just doing one bag, and you’ve been doing it for a little while, usually, it almost makes you feel normal. You’ll feel a little high. You’ll get a little happier, maybe a little bit of drowsy. It’ll make you feel normal.
Greg: Early in your addiction, it may make you feel a little drowsy, a little better, because you build a tolerance over time, but it’s not like the super like the nodding out usually, like the one bag, unless you’re just starting. That’s with the greater use. Like I would compare it more to, for me, like pills.
Greg: If you’ve ever done a Percocet, like you ever got a pain, and, Percocet, it … more social, like, lower amounts, you can be more social. You don’t feel as much body pain. You still feel the euphoria, but you’re more likely on low doses to act normal and look normal and get away with it, but you still feel good, and you can still get a little body high depending on where you’re at in your addiction and, of course, how strong it is.
Greg: But, then, as you go to the higher doses, if you do a couple of bags or a few bags, you can get to a stage where- what’s called a nodding out. You’ve seen people that are … where they’re almost drooling, and like it’s obvious. Everyone’s seen someone nodding out. What that feels like, the more extreme how heroin feels like, is it’s almost like, at that nodding out stage, where you’re pretty messed up, it’s almost like I would say like a dream. It’s kind of like a dream, but you’re more there.
Greg: If you ever had a really good dream, and you’re like enjoying it, but then you wake up, and you’re like, “Oh, man. What did I dream about?” it’s almost like a dream you can control, and it’s a really good dream, and your body feels really good, and it’s a lot of euphoria. You’re very happy. Nothing else matters. Nothing else really matters when you’re that high. You’re just concentrating at almost like controlling your dream, I would say, like you’re almost floating. But, again, you’re more there. If you had a dream like where you’re flying and it’s really fun, it’s hard to remember. Right? But, in your addiction or when you’re that high on heroin, it’s almost like a dream that you can completely feel, and you’re there. That’s the best way I can describe it.
Greg: But you’re not really dreaming. Like I’ve never really dreamed. It’s just more like I’m there, but I’m not, and it’s like I’m floating. That’s the best way I can explain it, like extreme body high, feel very good, kind of there but not. Close to dreaming but more controllable.
It’s Not What It Seems…
Greg: It sounds really enticing. Right? But the problem is what goes up must come down. The more you go up, the harder you’re going to come down. What I mean by that is, the more you use heroin and the more you do it and the higher doses you get, the harder it is to get off and the harder the fall is going to be, the harder the comedown is going to be. Not worth it. Although it sounds really good, you’re getting a short-term benefit, an hour or two, and it’s really a false sense of feeling because it’s not real. I mean you feel it, of course, but it’s not permanent. You got to do the drug and pretty much bet on ruining the rest of your life if you want to keep feeling like that. It’s not worth it.
What Heroin Addiction Is Like…
Greg: As a whole, like being a heroin addict as a whole- Hopefully that helps you understand what heroin feels like. Although, yeah, it feels very good, it has complete control over you. Nothing else matters, which, again, leads me into the addiction as a whole and why you don’t want to try heroin. You don’t even want to do it. It’s not worth it even a little bit.
Greg: As a whole, when you first start using, it’s fun. I’m going to be completely honest. It’s fun, a lot of fun. It’s exciting. I even remember, my first six months of use, I think I even told Matt, I was like, “I’m just going to do this forever.” Like I was still functioning, still at a job. Everything was still going pretty good, but the problem is it gradually becomes more of a burden. You start running out of money. More and more things start going wrong. You get more hooked. I mean you’re instantly hooked, but you just get dragged deeper and deeper. You need to do more and more heroin. Your life revolves around heroin more and more, and things start spinning out of control.
Greg: It was at that stage where I was like, “Well, at least I’m just sniffing.” I would still make excuses because, at that point, I knew I had a major problem, but I didn’t want to do the work to get out of it. I didn’t want to have to go through withdrawal. I didn’t want to have people know that I was using heroin, which would have to be done in order for me to get clean.
Greg: Again, as a whole, the addiction at first is exciting, fun. For me, it was about six months of that. Gradually, over the next six months, it started becoming more of a burden, more and more of a burden, and then eventually it just turns into a constant battle. I mean you’re constantly battling with addiction, and, like for a year or two at least, I went through the process of trying to quit and failing and trying to quit and failing, trying different things and failing. Well, I’ll just use for another day or two and then failing and then money.
Greg: “We’re running out of money now. Where am I going to get money?” People started finding out. “Well, I wonder if this person knows and that person knows.” Like just more and more things start piling up. Running out of money means withdrawing more, so I’m going through withdrawal more. I got to fight every day just the anxiety knowing that I need heroin to feel okay now. At this stage, at the later stages, as it eventually turns into a constant battle, now you need even more of it. You have less money. You’re more likely to start like losing your job and stuff, which less access to money. You start losing friends and people who do favors for you, so even less access. Dealers get caught. Just a lot of things happen, and things get worse and worse and worse, and it just becomes a constant battle.
That’s What The Heroin Addiction Progression Is Like
Greg: That’s really the progression of heroin and what a heroin addiction is like, what it’s like to be a heroin addict. There are stages where, first, it’s very fun. There’s a medium stage where, all right, it’s starting to not be as fun, but I still love getting high. Then, there’s the last stage, for me, which was, “Man. This is getting out of control. It’s a constant battle. How the fuck do I get out of this?” That’s where I ended my addiction.
Greg: I know that some people just keep going with it. Maybe they don’t know where to turn. Maybe they just don’t know what to do or they feel like they’ve tried everything, and this video’s also for those people. Our videos we do are also for those people who have gotten to that point, and they’re like, “Man. What the fuck do I do now? I’ve tried everything everyone else is telling me. What do I do now?” A lot of our approaches are really different. We didn’t go to rehab. We got on a maintenance drug. We took it very slow. We implemented diet and exercise, and it worked for us, and it seems to be working for other people. We started success stories where people are now reporting success coming off heroin, methadone, and Suboxone.
Greg: Hopefully, that helps you understand what heroin feels like, like what it truly feels like to be true, which hopefully isn’t too enticing to you because it’s really a false sense. Although it makes you feel very good in the moment, it really steals your soul. Like, heroin, it just steals everything from you. It steals your sense of worth. It steals your confidence. It steals everything. If you think it’s worth it to trade you to feel good for an hour or two here and there, you might want to rearrange your priorities. Don’t go trying heroin even if you think that’s worth it because I promise you it’s not. You get in that situation, and it won’t be worth it for very long.
Greg: Then, of course, the addiction, there’s stages to it, and it goes from fun to, “Eh. This is all right. Like I’m okay still,” to, “All right. This is getting out of control, so like I need to get the fuck out.” That was the last stage. “Man. I need to get the fuck out of here. I need to get out of this.” Then, of course, during that stage, it was a constant battle for me. During that like- I got fucking- “How do I get out of this shit?” It was a constant battle. I was at that constant battle phase where I just tried different things.
Greg: Eventually, I was able to overcome it. How I did was, of course, tried Suboxone many times. Then, I got on methadone eventually, and I had my full methadone taper store which I’ll post a link to below so you can finish the story off there if you like.
Greg: That’s how heroin feels. That’s what it’s like to be a heroin addict. Hopefully this was educational to you. Hopefully it sways you away from ever even thinking of using. If you are a loved one of someone who’s using, hopefully it helps you understand maybe where they are. A lot of heroin addicts are at that last stage where they’re like, “I need to get the fuck out of here,” but they just don’t know how to do it, or they’re scared of the withdrawal. They’re scared of the recovery.
Greg: Again, Greg here. Project Unbroken. That’s what heroin feels like. That’s what it’s like to be a heroin addict. Not very fun. All right? Make sure you like, comment, subscribe. I’ll see you all in the next video.
