For people who have been here before it may be apparent that the most conspicuous new item just now is this page itself. This website is a one person operation and as I lead a reasonably busy life with family, study, work and all those millions of other things that crop up continuously, it gets neglected for long periods. Changes to the website don't come all that frequently and when a new page was added I would just pop a note on the home page.

The home page was getting awfully long though. I have remedied this by splitting it up into four pages (yes, 4! I told you it was too long!) If you entered by way of the new home page you will have seen that it is but a shadow of its former self, giving only a short introductory paragraph and a choice of entry points. These entry points lead to: an introductory page and this, the 'What's New' page. The intro page has a short description of the site and a couple of the most popular pages, designed to give people who haven't visited before an overview of the site. The fourth page is site contents, a list of all the pages currently on this site with a short description.

When new pages are added to this site from now on, they will be announced here as well as added to the site contents page.

Those who have been to this site before will also notice that there has been a change of decor. Drop me a line either by e-mail or in the guestbook and tell me what you think of the changes.

I also plan to use this page to just write. I have created three pages that contain autobiographical material and I will be putting more here. Perhaps also some comment and opinion on issues or current events.

I have had a few e-mails asking how some events described in my latest autobiographical page turned out. On the page I described my deteriorating relationship with my methadone prescriber and said that I was transferring to another prescriber. This has worked out very VERY well. My new doctor is very new to methadone prescribing and drug treatment. In fact, I participated in his training for the methadone prescribing permit in mid 1998. I suppose because he's so new he hasn't been burnt or let down by his methadone patients yet and can look at us through fresh eyes as individuals. He has given the patients in his care more take-aways than they have ever had before - (for those unfamiliar with this story Victorian regulations permit only one take away dose per week, so no matter how many years you have been clean you have to turn up for dosing at least 6 times per week. To get more than this the doctor must send an application to the Drugs and Poisons Dept. - apparently they are very tight with their approvals). Last week I asked him to put in a request for me to pick up twice a week. The good news is - the GREAT news is - the application was successful. I used to have to attend for dosing five times per week, now I only have to go there twice a week - which in the larger scheme of things is still a ridiculous infringement on my liberty and mobility, but under the circumstances a great improvement and a triumph.

Another situation that I wrote about was also connected to take away dosing. I am currently studying full-time for a Diploma of Visual Arts and part of the curriculum was a field trip for a week last August (1998). Because we were going to be camping in a remote area I needed seven take away doses in one go, which, apparently, is unheard of. In the end they were granted and I did get to go on the trip, but I was forced to disclose my medical history to the staff of the college so that the teacher in charge of the trip could take responsibility for the medication and supervise my dosing. So a small triumph for my right to travel, but a big loss for my right to maintain my medical privacy.

Anyway the school year is well over and a new one is soon to begin in March. My marks last year were very good and I hope to do even better this year.

A couple of fantastic things have happened around this website over the past month (it's mid January as I'm writing this). There has been a spate of people writing in to say that they have used the information on this site to help them detox and to stay clean. 'Ronny' has left several messages in the guestbook over the past few months and we have followed him through the ups and downs of trying to break a habit with limited success. But his last entry is very encouraging (see guestbook). Another correspondent said he has been clean for seven weeks, and also passed information from this site onto a friend who has since been clean for two and a half weeks. Thank you very much to those people for writing in and letting me know that I am making a difference. Just the feeling from knowing that I have, in whatever small way, helped someone to improve their life - to take control - was the BEST Christmas present.

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New Pages

• Is Methadone Maintenance a Form of Treatment or is it Legal Opiate Dependence?
  
  
  
  This is a personal account of Nick Stafford's experiences as a methadone patient, with some interesting observations thrown in to make us question the bigger picture.

• More than Methadone
  
  is a review of a methadone clinic in Sydney which provides its clients with other life-improving services. A positive example of a clinic centred around the client's needs.
  
  It was an article in CEIDA's (Centre for Education and Information on Drugs and Alcohol) Connexions magazine. They have given me permission to reproduce it on this site.

• Heroin Maintenance
  
  A page I have been intending to write for a very long time. It replaces two pages, 'Canberra Heroin Trial' and 'Swiss Heroin Trial' neither of which had any information on, only links. I have tried to summarise the arguments against heroin maintenance and refute them. I'm sure I'm going to get plenty of feedback on this one! Counter arguments, new arguments, additions and any other comments are welcome. If I get enough of quality to make it worthwhile I'll arrange some sort of discussion forum.

• Copyright and Disclaimer Information
  
  I did have a brief statement at the bottom of each page to cover copyright and disclaimer stuff, but I have had so many people writing and asking for details that I thought I would save a lot of people some time and effort by detailing what can and can't be done with stuff on this site. If you have any doubts about whether you are using information, pictures, excerpts, quotes, copies, etc. from this site legally, check this page. If you are still unsure then e-mail me.

• The Wardrobe
  
  A semi-autobiographical short story.

• Methadone Cartoon - "Just Wait Here"
  
  Not, strictly speaking a new item, but a new rendering of it. For those who don't know of it - I drew up a cartoon for my local drug-and-alcohol/health service to help tell the children of methadone patients what the hell they were doing waiting around in a mysterious clinic while their parents picked up 'medicine' every day. As a result of feedback on the cartoon I was asked by the people I drew it for to make a couple of small changes. So this is the second draft. Also I got a lot of complaints about the large file size and the quality of the text. Obviously I had squashed the files so much that the image was suffering and so really could not do much to help the people who thought there was too much of it. So I made some changes to how it is presented. The details of the change are on the Cartoon's intro page.

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Feedback Comments Suggestions

I welcome feedback. I will also consider putting other people's writings on these pages, especially autobiographies. Please contact me if you think you can contribute to this site. I am interested in YOUR story. You may want to ask questions. I will try to answer any questions, but please keep in mind that I am not a doctor or counsellor and have no qualifications in either of those fields. E-mail me egad-dict@geocities.com.

I make an effort to answer all e-mail, but it may take a few days to a couple of weeks since I don't get on the Internet every day.

The guestbook has been split into five because it was getting so big. I can no longer give personal replies to guestbook entries because it's just too much, so if you have a question or want an answer, e-mail. Feel free to browse the guestbook , there are some beautiful, hopeful, inspiring messages in there. And you can add your own comments in the guestbook.

Email:egad-dict@geocities.com | Sign the Guestbook

Copyright information and disclaimer.