new sobriety date

last week, after i crashed, i ate 20 vicodin and a bottle of codeine cough syrup in 4 days.

when i got to the er, in addition to my bleeding knee, i was coughing like i always do after racing CX. coughing like i had been for 10 days. pred, amoxy, nyquil, all did nothing for me.

as i sat waiting on the hospital gurney, my mom showed up. i demanded some of her pain meds. she claimed not to have any. then dominic showed up and i heard her whispering to him about me wanting pain meds.

then the nurse came over with a little cup and said, "here are some vicodin, they will help with the cough too."

dominic was furiously texting with my father-in-law (i love my pops) and my mom was yelling "HOLD ON, SHE'S IN RECOVERY!" and i was grabbing at the cup and saying "it's FINE, i NEED them".

i swallowed them without water.

half hour later the pills were kicking in, goddamn what a tease.

the nurse came in and started numbing my knee up. that's when i had to bite down hard on a water bottle to keep from screaming. she stuck me several times with lidocaine before my knee was numb. then i watched as she sewed me up.

the other nurse came back in and i asked for a script of codeine cough syrup, because as promised, the vicodin had relieved my cough. i was sent home with an rx of naprosyn (strong advil) and an rx of phenergan/codeine cough syrup.

the chemicals in my brain just react. it's like an allergy. the destructive behaviors began all over again.

-manipulation
-anger
-loss of control
-lying

we went to walmart for the scripts. i threw out the naprosyn and grabbed that 150ML bottle of cough syrup like it was a stack of 100 dollar bills.

i got loaded.

i woke up early monday morning, after the numbing meds had worn off, screaming out in pain. at 8am, when my dr's office opened, i called them and told them what happened. it took all day for my dr to call back, but once she did, i easily manipulated her into a few days worth of vicodin (10 pills).

they were gone the next day.
so i went to a meeting.
all i could think about was getting more pain pills.

so i called her for more on wed, and she agreed to give me 10 more.

thur morning i texted my sponsor:
i have to start my clean time over

she took me to a meeting that night.

today i have 6 days sober.

OCCUPY: I've come to a conclusion.

Life just gets harder as you age.

I look back to decades past, and think "wow, shit was easy back then."

In my 20's, I was in a drug induced haze. I don't even remember who was in office, let alone vote for them. I remember making stencils that read "Eat Quayle Drink Bush" and spray painting that shit on my leather jacket. Yet, at the time, I really didn't give a shit about the government, I just knew that all politicians were crooks and that Government was the enemy.

Yet, I stood in line for welfare and food stamps in SF and sold them for dope. Hypocritical maybe?

I was declared indigent by the courts in 96', as I stood in front of a judge for crimes I committed. The state paid my way through drug treatment and drug court. I got food stamps and welfare as I lived in a halfway house, until I could stand on my own two feet and get a fucking job.

In my 30's, I decided I wanted to live like a "normal" person. I went to trade school, got a real job, with a BIG CORPORATE company, and I had health insurance that actually paid the bills when I went to the doctor. I was riddled with anger throughout the 7 years I spent at that job. I fucking hated it. Yet, I loved the benefits and the vacation days and the fact that I could have a credit card and a buy a house, in MY name.

Then the insurance premiums went up.
And up and up and up.
I changed jobs.
I had worse insurance.

I noticed bills from the doctor's office. I was paying more and more for insurance that didn't cover anything.

Then I lost that job and haven't paid a dime for insurance since.
Fuck it.

I sat in bankruptcy court this summer and watched people declare a Chapter 7, couples with 300K houses, Lexus cars, boob jobs, and motorcycles. Then they called the LoPresti's up to the stand. The judge announced our debt, our home worth 22K, our cars worth under 4K...

And now here I am, 41 years old, and back to where I started when I was 20.

No credit.
No insurance.
Struggling with addiction on a day to day basis.
Working for 7 bucks an hour in a coffee shop with a bunch of 20 year olds.

My eyes are wide open today. I watch the news. I see them talk shit. It's the same fucking shit that went on when I was 20, it's just a different decade.

















I may be part of the 99%, but this Occupy shit just isn't a priority for me and marching downtown in front of the banks certainly isn't going to change MY life.

Now, go ride your fuckin' bike or something.

Busted up and Broke down.

I lined up with 34 women at Gun Club CX yesterday. That was just Cat 4's women! This race and CX in general has completely exploded in the Ohio Valley. We had 70 juniors racing yesterday alone. A total of 406 racers at Gun Club yesterday, and in 2003, there were 37 racers TOTAL. And this isn't even a UCI race!

















I crashed before my first lap was over. The entire race report is on DC.

I had no idea how bad I had crashed until this morning, at 1am, when the numbing medicine had worn off and pain was shooting out of my knee like lightening bolts.













I had to scramble to find someone to cover my shifts the next couple days at the coffee shop. Luckily I was able to - it's hard when the majority of my co-workers go to school full time, or work other jobs.

It looks like I will be resting up for the next couple of weeks.

Epiphone

I've been sick the last week or so, and I've been off the bike a lot. This gives me time to think a lot, which can be bad. I tend to get stuck in my head and start to obsess on little things.

For instance, last weekend's CX race.

I had been sick for several days before the race but decided to reg' at that last minute on Friday. I woke up Sunday feeling crappy, mostly from lack of sleep due to working at Sidewinder the night before, closing the coffee shop and getting home late. I was still excited to race on that gorgeous Raleigh and see what I could do.

The race was SHIT. I have never felt so bad during a race in my life. Coughing, hacking, lack of breath, I felt like I was going to fucking DIE. I coughed all the way through the 2nd half of the race and was mortified that I raced so shitty.

I wrote up a race report on DrunkCyclist.com and received a lot of good feedback. Then I got a nasty comment:

Peter H, Raleigh Says:
October 3rd, 2011 at 2:46 pm

This sponsorship is really working out for us! A last place rider result and bike photo with puke! Wow, way to go!

But the REAL Raleigh people left this comment:

KJT Says:
October 3rd, 2011 at 3:30 pm

Actually, Peter H (who is NOT associated with Raleigh)… we (the real Raleigh clowns) are quite pleased with the sponsorship. In fact, our marketing guy had this to say about the puke photo:
“You’re supposed to do that during the race. Not only does it get rid of some weight…it also ads a layer of moisture in your mouth when no one is offering handups!”
Judi is riding bikes – that’s all we care about. That she’s riding a Raleigh is just icing on the cake. That she’s racing… well that’s just gravy on top of the icing on the cake. Which could bring us back around to puking. Circle of life, pal. Oh, and don’t be such a dick.

That shit stung, especially when I tracked the IP address and found out it was a local Cincinnati hater.

This local bike racing scene tears me up sometimes. In fact, it tears me up so bad that I am contemplating not even renewing my USAC license in 2012. Just giving it up - the racing - not the bikes.

See, I love bikes. Yet I find that racing them takes my love out of riding them. Does that make sense? I've bitched about the team elitism, it reminds me of high school, where I never belonged either. I go to the bikes races, see a few friendly faces, am snubbed by many, and a lot of times, I go home thinking "well that sucked".

A few girls I have managed to make friends with, and we have dinners out and talk on the phone and sometimes they even cheer for me when they can't race. It's cool.

Then there is DrunkCyclist. A blog that is read by cyclists around the world. Today a package arrived in the mail. Ergon gloves, 6 pairs of socks, Arizona Hot Sauce, a tool cage thingie that fits under a bottle cage, and stickers galore.

The other package that came today was from Raleigh. Some socks to race in. How fucking rad is that?













And the 3rd package that came today was from Beth, a sweet girl, who I met at Interbike and who reads this blog and DrunkCyclist. She has become a friend over the last year, a fellow jewish girl who likes to ride bikes. She sent me a boatload of stickers and patches and all kinds of cool PDX bike stuff. So fucking thoughtful of her.













I am fortunate to be shown a lot of love by a lot of people. It is pretty awesome.

The race thing, well, I am not so sure I belong there anymore. I'd like to do some serious riding on my Voodoo - Mohican 100k and The Whiskey 50m in AZ - but all the rest of the races just don't seem fun anymore.

I've met so many other people this past year who just like to ride bikes, and I think that's just what I am gonna do in 2012.

Ride my fucking bikes.