Tag: 988

Relapse Fantasy


Content note: This piece includes discussion or imagery tied to sex, substance use, and erotic imagery. It may be activating for readers with addiction histories around sex, substances, or stigma. Please take care while reading.

I picked up some art today from Magpie’s First Friday exhibition. February’s theme was The Dark Side of Love. I had submitted a piece titled “Nothing Bad Happened.”

For March, the theme is HOOKED: An Exploration of Addiction.

As someone in recovery from chemsex addiction, I hesitated to submit something. The shadow does not disappear just because behavior changes. It shows up in memory, in intimacy, in fantasy.

Addiction has been described as a thinking disease. My instinct is to outrun the thoughts or distract myself. My therapist tells me to sit with them instead.

Relapse Fantasy came from doing exactly that.

Relapse does not start with using. It starts in imagination. In a flicker of memory. In a sensory echo. Rather than pushing those thoughts away, I photographed them.

These images are not about returning to old behavior. They are about recognizing the moment before it begins. They are about interrupting the cycle in real time.

My work may not sell. That isn’t the measure. For me, creating it is part of staying accountable. I am in recovery, and this work is part of how I maintain it.

“I am being called to take care of myself in a new way.” ~ AB

Relapse Fantasy

Pleasure Industry
Just This Once
This Fits in My Hand
I Am the Drug
Tunnel Vision

Exhibition Statement

Artist Statement – Relapse Fantasy

Relapse doesn’t begin with action. It begins with a story I tell myself.

Chemsex addiction fuses sex and stimulant use in a way that rewires the brain’s reward and attachment systems. Dopamine begins to feel like intimacy. Intensity begins to feel like connection. The brain remembers that pairing long after behavior changes, and it can make the fantasy sound almost reasonable.

Relapse Fantasy explores that negotiation with the brain — the moment when pleasure tilts toward compulsion, when “just a taste” sounds logical, when repetition disguises itself as ritual and obsession passes for desire.

I’ve stood inside that logic.

I’m not documenting use. I’m documenting the sales pitch.

As someone navigating recovery in real time, I make this work to externalize the thought before it becomes behavior. The fantasy isn’t neutral. It’s persuasive. Naming it is how I interrupt it.

Chemsex is not only an individual struggle. It reflects how quickly intimacy and intensity become entangled in queer culture in ways we rarely name out loud.

If this work resonates uncomfortably, that’s okay. Discomfort can be information.

If this work resonates with your own experience, I encourage you to seek support. You do not have to navigate it alone. If you are struggling with addiction, support is available at 988 (https://988lifeline.org/) or local recovery services (Indianapolis resources).

Keep tellin’ the story,

Professor Peacock

Note: These are my thoughts and my story. I used AI to make helpful edits to my ramblings and online journaling, including some organization to be more blog-friendly. Images are photographed and manipulated by me.

Why 988 hotline matters


December 21 will always hold special significance for me.

As much as I try not to think about it, every year it creeps up on me. Some years, it has taken me to dark places. Some years, I’ve been able to see the growth.

This is one of those years where I’ve gained a new perspective on the night of December 21, 2009.

I’ve shared my story before. December 21, 2009 is the day I entered long-term recovery.

A lot’s happenened since then!

What’s changed?

This year, a new federal hotline service went into effect in Indiana. It’s called 988, as a phone call or a text.

“…Every person in every community nationwide can dial “988” to reach trained crisis counselors who can help in a mental health, substance use or suicide crisis.

988 is the first step in reimagining our crisis response, but there’s more work to do to ensure everyone receives the help they need — and deserve — in a crisis.” ~ NAMI

National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), 988: Reimagining Crisis Response

988 vs 911

With the new service, I reimagined by own crisis situation back in 2009. What if I had been able to call 988 instead of 911?

Chances are they wouldn’t have sent the police, because I had called in an overdose and failed suicide attempt. What I needed was help. What I got was help – and an arrest 90 days later, just as I was just finishing my extended treatment at Fairbanks. With that arrest, my 19-year corporate career ended in me being fired. I lost my house. I was awarded and lost a plea bargain that could have reduced the charges to a misdemeanor. But early recovery was difficult messy and I failed a required drug test. Until recently, I had two felony charges on my record stemming back to that phone call.

I don’t sit in this awareness and wallow in self-pity. I’m glad with where my life is today. I’ve since been able to expunge my felony arrest record, which means I don’t have any more barriers to getting housing or employment. I can’t travel to Canada though – or at least I don’t think I can based on what I’ve read.

In general and thankfully, I’ve been able to land on my feet. I am self-employed, thriving as an artist and photographer, and have stable housing & transportation.

Even though I’ve suffered great losses and pain, I’m grateful to be thriving in my 50’s as an artist.

But it does demonstrate why this new 988 matters. How many lives can be salvaged, not torn apart by piling legal consequences on top of someone in crisis?

That could have been me…

It’s like the joke about what happens when you play a country & western song backwards?

You get your spouse back, your job back, you stop drinking.

Quite literally, I could have gotten the help to stop my using WITHOUT an arrest. In the long term of recovery, that would have been pretty useful.

Call or Text 988 if in crisis

So next time you or someone you know is in crisis, consider calling or texting 988 instead of involving the police via 911.

More about 988: NAMI’s Committment

NAMI is committed to advancing efforts to reimagine crisis response in our country. We believe that every person in crisis, and their families, should receive a humane response that treats them with dignity and connects them to appropriate and timely care. NAMI is calling for a standard of care for crisis services in every community that includes — 24/7 call centers that answer 988 calls locally, mobile crisis teams and crisis stabilization programs — that end the revolving door of ER visits, arrests, incarceration and homelessness.

NAMI Website

Keep tellin’ the story,
Thanks for listening

Professor Peacock III

Why does 988 matter?
Why does 988 matter? Reflections on 13 years in long-term recovery.