Is Cocaine really addicting? Can't I just use it on weekends?

Question

I’ve been a recreational cocaine user for the last year or so. Doing it only on weekends and I honestly never have much trouble keeping it away from the work week. I understand that it is a very addictive drug but I think I have it under control and as long as I ensure that it never creeps into the working week I think I’ll be OK. I don’t think that I have a drug problem and I have never really had an addictive personality but I have noticed over the last month or so that things just aren’t as fun without coke. Maybe that sounds like an obvious statement, but what I mean is that I have always been able to party on the weekends and then still have a good time during the week with my touch football team and going out to movies with my GF etc. Lately though, these activities all seem kind of gray and boring and I feel like I am just going through the motions during the week just to get to the weekend. Is the way I am feeling likely because of my cocaine habit or is unrelated? I don’t really want to give up my weekend fun but if it’s starting to affect my everyday life then maybe I’ll have to consider making some changes.

William Anderson · Accepted Answer

You need to stop now, if you can, before you slide downhill so far that you lose everything important to you. Every cocaine addict I have ever worked with in hospitals, rehabs or jail talked just like you at one point in their addiction and decided they could keep it under control, with catastrophic consequences.

You are talking about using a drug every weekend that can easily land you in jail or the morgue on any given weekend as if it was mother's milk. You are saying that life without it is gray and you only go through the motions during the week to get to the weekend and cocaine. This is what cocaine addicts say. You are a cocaine addict.

But there is hope. You can get back to a healthy life. The slide towards losing your job, your friends, your love and your life is not inevitable. You do not have to self-destruct. However, you will have to give up the idea that you can use cocaine "recreationally". That is a lie. To save yourself, you will need to decide that life without cocaine is better than losing everything else. And you will need to give up the idea that you can control this all by yourself.

You can either go to an addiction counselor, addiction program or 12-Step group now, or you can wait until life forces you to encounter them in jail or the hospital after you crash and have lost something important. I hope you choose to do it now, while it sounds like most of your life is still intact.

My heart goes out to you and I wish you the very healthiest and happiest future possible. Unlike a lot of those I have worked with, it is not too late to save yourself.

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