Dark & Light

Pulled from Chapter 3 of ‘The Beast Within’…

I’m glad we’ve decided to stop and grab some food. Funeral aside, just haven’t been right lately, and I’m not ready to go home yet. Window’s down and the cool breeze feels good across my face, even at one hundred miles an hour.

Mel turns, her face scrunched. “Can you turn down the radio, baby?”

Shinedown’s “Sound of Madness” is playing. Love this stuff.

“Hey! Baby, you okay? You listening to me?”

The book on pain, if he wrote it, I’ve memorized it. I’m a headbanger from way back. Can’t make a mistake once and be done with it, hell no, not me. Gotta keep banging my head on the wall … over and over and over! There must be others who can relate. Bang your head once, it doesn’t take long for the pain to fade. You forget a bit about how much it hurt. You think, “Maybe it’ll be okay now—didn’t leave a mark last time.” That voice in your head tells you, “Try it again, you’ll be fine, listen to me.” So, BANG! You do it again. This time it leaves a mark, maybe even a scar. With enough time that voice comes back, “I’m stiiill heeere, try it again, you’ll be okay, trust me.” So, SLAM! This time it leaves nothing … it starts taking. First it takes a piece of your mind, then a piece of your soul … that’s the sound of madness.

Feeling strange lately, like I’m not alone in my own body. And the voices, yes, the voices! They started by entering my dreams, familiar yet terrifying. My waking hours are no better now. I’m hearing something on occasion. Garbled noise? Words barely within reach? Can’t help but feel I brought this all on myself. Must be my Catholic upbringing, default to guilt. Not even sure what—

“Babe!” Wow, snapped back to reality, and Bully is cranking.

I have a real problem with people that prey on the weak. Tearing other humans down just to make themselves feel powerful. Dominating them mentally and physically. I get enraged when I focus on that…

From the author’s bag of wisdom…

Fatefully, I’m a hard headed SOB, beyond stubborn to the end. The moniker “headbanger” seems an appropriate fit for me. This was the inspiration in naming the series “The Headbanger Chronicles”, found only here at Wayward Redemption.

For my family and friends that have stumbled across this…STOP. I’m afraid you won’t be able to handle reality. Go back to Facebook and pretend life is simple. If you want to know what tens of thousands of us face daily, keep reading. Before I started this project, I was in a good place. Now that I’ve finished this piece, I’m in a very good place. Don’t ask me about the interim.

How does suicide become a viable option? To the uninitiated, this seems like an absurd question. For people going about their life in a bubble, this can be a horrifying thought. Wish I still lived in a bubble. For someone who has never experienced ‘the darkness,’ this thought creates a gag-reflex. Suicide is incomprehensible to the average human. Many of us are not average anymore. This is my story.

Start with a crushing emotional event. The thought of taking your own life trickles through your brain. The gag-reflex kicks in and self-preservation drives the horrifying thought away. But it’s a deep, cutting, emotional pain that persists. It’s like the back of a shampoo bottle—wash, rinse, repeat. For days, weeks, even months, the thought is kicked away like an easy save for a goalie. The shooter is cunning, wily, and experienced. Eventually, it finds an opening and it’s in the net. The thought of suicide is no longer horrifying and repulsive. Your brain has worn down the defense. It’s now an accepted part of your thought process, with muscle memory winning again. You make it through this event and life gets better. Unfortunately, the seed has been planted and a default mechanism set. When an event such as this happens, in the middle of decades of substance abuse, it is impossible to deal with emotionally on a healthy level. A deadly trap has been inadvertently set. Enter opiates….

I spent years partying and carrying on. No substance, including alcohol, had ever brought me to my knees. Even considered myself a professional drug taker. None of this prepared me for Hydrocodone, OxyContin, and Morphine. At first, the buzz was amazing, and Vicodin was everywhere. I’ve seen guys pass their prescription down the bar. Throw back a vike or two, pound the liquor, and do a few rails. You see, I loved layering it up. One drug at a time was never enough. One of anything was never enough. It wasn’t unusual for me to have 3,4, or even 5 different drugs in my system at once. High was never high enough. (Alcohol is a drug. A strong drug. Quit lying to yourself.)

After a short time, I could tell these pills were different than the others. There was always a quiet voice, gently stroking my brain. Dark and alluring, I’ll never forget the whispers. I am the one. You need me. My voice of reason told me, even implored, that this was a dangerous path. Deep inside I knew trouble was ahead. My arrogance wouldn’t allow this thought to be considered. My pleasure center was all aflutter, never letting up.

Fast forward two months…

It’s 2am. I’m lying in bed, and my head is screaming like a jet engine. I see visions of blasting through the sky and feel it in my body. My heart is pumping at such a high rate, I expect it to erupt like a volcano. I’m sure this is a stroke, heart-attack, and aneurism all in one. How did I get here? Death is half a heartbeat away and I’m praying to God to finish the deal. I beg him to end my life now.

Prior to this, me and God had a falling out. I would scream at Him, tell Him He was nothing in my life. I called out God with venom. I would drop 30 GD’s in a row and scream “fuck you!” Anger ruled my brain and He had heard enough.
I worked out obsessively and was a rock from head to toe. At 47 years of age, I had the body every man dreams about. And then it happened. I leaned over to grab my gym bag, something in my back popped, and excruciating pain ruled. The addict in me smiled, knowing I would get painkillers from my doctor. Pretty sure God had a shit-eating grin right about then. Time to take Daniel full circle.

I went to my doctor, a surgeon, and a pain specialist within 12 days. My doc gave me a scrip for 10 mg Vicodin. I played the surgeon and the specialist like a Stradivarius. Two more scrips, (Norco’s and Percocet) and I was celebrating.
I now had 200 painkillers right in front of me. Drooling like a fool I started popping them like candy. In fact, I used to fill a Pez dispenser with my pills. The vikes and percs fit perfectly, and I would proudly carry it in my pocket. When I pulled it out I would laugh at the irony. (Not sure if that’s the proper use of this word but it sure seemed fucking ironic to me.)
That 2 am night was the first of many. I had taken 15 painkillers that day, but it gets worse. My late-night prayers asking for a quick death fell on deaf ears.

The inadvertent deadly trap…

Addiction rules your life. There is nothing else but feeding the crave, lest you pay the ultimate price—withdrawal. I didn’t worry about taking less, just making sure I could find more. The self-realization of addiction is constant. Guilt destroys you from the inside out. We know we’re fucked, but the thought is driven out of our head. The demon of addiction has taken us over. I knew what was happening, but was unable to stop. Picture a giant pile of shit that was not worthy of living on this planet. I was convinced this was me. I am not worthy of life or any happiness. Self-loathing had set in and the wick was lit. I felt less than human. This is where the pain starts. The pain you want to stop. It must end, but God hasn’t answered the prayers for a quick death. Your body and mind ache in tandem. It feels like you’re being burned alive, but from within. The pain is debilitating and unending. Every cell in your body is under attack. Muscle memory has been patiently waiting for the right moment, and now it’s arrived. This time the thought doesn’t trickle in. It slams you right in the head.

I should kill myself.

Your self-preservation defense was worn down a while back. It starts making sense now. I’m being destroyed by inner pain and I can do something about it. Negative thoughts shred what’s left of your soul. I turned my anger inward to make it stop. Nothing worked. Your inner demon now has the upper hand, and its voice can’t be ignored. You’ve told yourself thousands of times…I hate myself and I don’t deserve to live. This pain has to stop.
I need to kill myself, but how?

***This is the first in a multi-part series I will be posting on my website. I will continue ‘my story’ in the coming weeks and months.

Life is best lived in balance. Writing has given me the opportunity to reach out and almost touch it. Our world must stay on an even keel, never tipping too far in any one direction. Emotions run the gamut. What’s love without hate, happiness without sadness? If there wasn’t one, would the other exist? The same can be said for good and evil. I believe in God; therefore, Lucifer exists too. Balance.

I lived in darkness, walked with the demons, and still fight them to this day. I thirst for the Light and drink from its well. Don’t be confused. This isn’t about religion. It’s about being honest and finding the Truth within oneself. We are all looking for the same thing. We all have our own path to follow. No one is right and no one is wrong. Balance.

In this section, the stories will reflect this. I’m going to write about the dark side of life. When we hear ‘dark and evil’, it’s fairly understood what that will entail. I’m also going to write about the lighter side. This will include humor, sarcasm, music, friends, and family. You have a friend here that wants to Lighten your mood and soul. I look forward to working together to reach our ‘Truth’. People helping each other. Balance.

Welcome to the Dark and Light of it All.

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I remember when I was 19, living with three of my high-bastard friends. My one buddy comes home with a jar of 500 5mg valium. He says, “the cool thing about this shit is you can’t OD on it.”

Well, well, well, we’re gonna test that theory. And he would know, after all, because his mom’s a nurse. Hell, that makes him almost an expert.

Over the course of 4 hours I took 24 of those little yellow pills. I was gulping them down, laughing, 3 and 4 at a time. About the 6-hour mark I stopped moving. I vaguely remember conversation, hearing “man, I hope he’s not dead,” followed by a lot of laughter. At some point, I remember looking down. I was floating about 6 feet above everyone. At the time, I didn’t comprehend what was happening. I just thought, “How cool, I’m having an out of body experience.”

Looking back, I know I was floating away to death. My breathing had stopped. Well, shit, I had ingested 120 mgs of valium. I was going to off to meet…God perhaps? Addiction’s a bitch, a bitch that comes after you in an unrelenting manner. It plays dirty. It knows you. It knows what it wants and does anything to get it.

A person can overdose on aspirin let alone valium. But the voice of addiction tells you, insists in fact, that it’s ok. TAKE IT. GET HIGH. TAKE CARE OF ME AND I WILL TAKE CARE OF YOU. Lies and bullshit, but the pull is excruciating. Fate must have interjected on my behalf that day. 12 hours after I started this assault on myself, my eyes popped open. I heard someone say, “Wow, you’re alive!? We thought you were dead.” Great friends, eh? Problem was, they were all too high to do anything about it. I lurched my body out of the chair and ended up on all fours. I crawled down the hallway and into my room. Made it to my bed, which was a mattress on the floor, and flopped out. I didn’t budge for another 24 hours. My girlfriend had to hold her compact mirror under my nose to make sure I was breathing. When I finally woke up I went looking for a joint. Addiction is a BADASS! Addiction is a motherf-