More, Now, Again Quotes

“For all of my life I have needed more.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I can see that I imagine all kinds of rejection that never happens. I can see that I beg and plead for love that is freely offered because I somehow believe that if I don't ask for it, everyone will forget about me: I will be a little kid sent off to sleep-away camp whose parents forget to meet her at the bus when she comes back in August. Or else I think people are nice to me only to be nice to me, that they feel sorry for me because I am such a loser- as if anyone could possibly be that generous.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I’ve been looking for a feeling like that everywhere I go. I’ve been waiting for someone to see all the good in me at every truck stop and intersection along the way. I’ve been waiting all my life for the moment to arrive when I can just stop. Stop looking”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I need to start thinking more like an engineer and less like a scientist: I need to think about what works, not about why.

The problem was me. I was it.

That's what I believed. I believed I was the everything.

The largeness of my disaster dragged others- frankly, everyone- down with me. I was certain that entire rooms of people became vertiginously joyous when I was high and having fun, and that anyone who got near me when I was morose and coming down would have to feel my pain as potently as I did. Whether I was high or low, the intensity was so great and the world became so small- no larger than the size of me and my mood of the moment- that it was hard to imagine that anything else was going on. It was hard to believe that there were things happening in the world that were not about me.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Banned! My eyes light up, I think I see stars. Anything that has been banned by anyone must be something I’d like.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“It's being a grown up, which I never figured out how to do, scrubbing the tub, and remembering to eat and shampoo my hair. It's the basics: I can write a whole book, but I cannot handle the basics.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again

“The desire to be seen as superior and singular- and, conversely, but similarly, inferior and individual, is a big topic...They have a term for the syndrome- it is called terminal uniqueness...we all refuse to be part of the crowd, to walk in the middle of the road in the safety of others. We all think were special. But the problem is, as I point out to Dr. Singer all the time, I actually am special.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Even if I remember the first time perfectly, I don't remember the beginning at all. I mean: the beginning of addiction. It's hard to say when it becomes a problem; it sneaks up on you like a sun shower.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“When she walks in that first Monday, of course I am awake - I am always up these days - I decide to lay it down. “Look”, I say, “I snort Ritalin. That’s what I do. I snort it all day long. I crush up the pills and inhale them like cocaine. I’m up to about forty a day. I can’t stop. I am planning to get help, to check into rehab or something like that, as soon as this book is finished. In the meantime, I can’t stop, and I am not going to.” She looks at me impassively. “I don’t care what you think about it. So you have a choice. I can sit here and do it in front of you, or I can keep running into the bathroom so you don’t have to see. Either way, it’s going to happen, so it’s just about how bad it’s going to make you feel to watch.”
She doesn’t seem to know what to say. She stares. I think she is going to cry. I think she wants to give me a hug, maybe, but there is an invisible cage, a delicate netting of glass, an ice sculpture surrounding me that no one can walk through. I’m cold. I’ve frozen into someone who just can’t be touched. I dare you to try.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“And then I think of the Velvet Underground's doleful song "Jesus," from their third and least renowned or appreciated album. It is my favorite. "Jesus / Help me find my proper place / Help me in my weakness / 'Cause I'm falling out of grace." The only words in the song, repeated repeatedly, composed by Lou Reed, a Jew. You see, in the hour of darkness, it is easier to turn to the Son of God than to God Himself, for some reason. I'm not sure why.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Time passes slowly, or too fast, or it makes no difference.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again

“If you already know what your response will be before you've heard what the other person has said, you are not listening.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“When you do drugs, you count like a chemist: The numbers are wild, the formulas are easy. Then, when you try to get clean, you start to count like a pharmacist: How many hours between doses? How much or how little do you need to maintain? Then, when you finally give it up completely, you count like Noah in his dinky, seafaring ark full of pairs of every animal in God's creation: You count days. You wait for the rain to stop, for the sky to clear, for life to ever seem normal again. And then eventually it does. Then you start to count how many cups of black coffee you need just to get through every day, how many cigarettes you smoke. You know the address of every Starbucks in a mile radius, which is easy because there so many, and you know the names of every restaurant where they allow you to smoke, which is easy because they are so few.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“A deeply true, wholly aching account of the dangerous way we live now--LOVE JUNKIE is great fun to read, and finally fully redemptive. Rachel Resnick brings a light, delightful touch to a hard subject, and creates a great, relatable, readable memoir.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Sometimes someone will be standing in front of me, and already I feel him walking away. It's only a matter of time, so what's the point?”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I don't much like my life, but for some dumb reason, I want to be alive, because sooner or later, I figure it will work out.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Most people will say, We had no idea she was on drugs. And it’s not because they’re stupid. It’s because the changes are subtle, the universe is parallel, you speak a little too quickly, your voice is more shrieky, you seem not to be paying attention, you stare too long and too hard at the wall or some detail in the Persian rug. Most people can’t tell that’s a problem. Most people have their own problems.
 
It’s the people you are close to, the ones who love you, the ones who have seen your heart, who have touched your soul—to them, it is obvious that something is wrong or missing. Your heart and soul are missing. They feel it. It hurts them. It kills them.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I’m not so sure how well I’m doing, deep down. But this moment feels okay. And I think: I know what life is for. I don’t know how it will go, I don’t know anything at all, but it feels okay.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“This is how it is, how it always is with men: It feels good at first, it feels soft and solid, slipping into love, sliding into the sweet thing. But then it’s just like falling into a muck. Everything I learned at Silver Hill is gone. I am obsessed with Hank— Hank! My friend Hank! —the way I’ve been with everyone else before him. And I could say something, should say something, should make this stop before it gets any worse, but I’m not going to do that. I can’t. I am not good at walking before I have to run. I’m an idiot. I deserve to be a drug addict. I never learn.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again

“I remember thinking: I know what life is for. For once I know what life is for. I don’t have all the answers, don’t know what will happen next, but just at this moment I understand that my life matters, that there are good things ahead. I don’t know what they are, but maybe it will be all right. I felt peace. I understood that corny thing people say: I am at peace with myself. And I wanted to think of better words for it, wanted to think of a way to say it that was less trite, more apposite and writerly. And then I remembered: sometimes these simple words that everyone uses are just right, are just good.

God in heaven, if I got to that place, how did I lose it? It’s like I was hijacked, mugged, like someone just ran off with all of my stuff. Peace of mind is no better than four years of high school French: if you never have occasion to speak a foreign language ever again, you forget it; if you don’t live in Paris or Provence, sooner or later there’s nothing left but that certain je ne sais quoi and this is what tout le monde is saying and, when all else fails, Parlez-vous anglais? I forgot to remember that feeling, and now it’s gone.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“And it’s not just that you’re afraid of your bad feelings,” she says. “You’re afraid of good ones too. Because what if things go wrong? Instead of just enjoying, you worry. You just worry. You can’t keep an open mind and see what happens, and enjoy it as it goes, because you are just trying to manage all your emotions, good or bad.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“You’ve seen a lot of movies and read a lot of books, and you know how to write in a way that makes other people feel understood—if that makes sense. I mean that your understanding of yourself makes other people feel understood themselves—and that’s all very good. But where has it landed you?”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“And I have to act as if. That’s a big recovery term: act as if. Act as if you believe you will stay sober. Act as if you like meetings. Act as if you believe in God. Act as if you like getting on your knees and praying each morning and night. Act as if there is a lot of wisdom in the Big Book and the Twelve Steps. Act as if there is a point to making your bed each day, even if you are just going to get back into it that night. Act as if everyone around you is not an idiot, and treat others with respect. They like to say: “You can’t think your way into acting, but you can act your way into thinking.” The idea is that if you do what you are supposed to, your mind might catch up with your body. If I stop acting as if therapy is one big useless joke that I have been in for twenty years only to land in a mental institution at long last, if I act as if this time it’s for real and this time it will work, it just might. It just might.
And I have to count on those mights, all of them. They’re all I’ve got right now.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I have known no man of genius who had not to pay, in some affliction or defect either physical or spiritual, for what the gods had given him,” wrote Sir Max Beerbohm in No. 2. The Pines. This statement and others like it make those who are defective and afflicted feel better about themselves, which is good as far as it goes.
But too many people misapply it, and this bit of misinformation or disinformation drives me crazy. Just because you feel deeply and indiscriminately does not mean that your feelings are indications of anything other than your flat-out fucked-up life.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“You can always wake up feeling better; that’s always the hope with a depressive. But no one around me harbors that hope any longer. They are petrified. They are disgusted. At long last, my pain is a serious matter.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“Shit. I don’t want to hear one more person tell me how great I used to be, and how horrible I am now. I know they think that’s a compliment, I know they think they’re telling me something about my native character that I ought to be happy about, but it just breaks my heart. What’s wrong with me? Even when I was the person I used to be, I was not very happy. If anything, I am happier now, and everyone else is displeased. I can’t win.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I can’t stand people’s disapproving eyes. I hate the way they look disgusted. And they do, they always do.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I needed you all so badly, and it was never enough. Nothing you did was ever enough. So now I have found something that sates me. The burden is off of you.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“I don’t look well; my degeneration is obvious. For a while, only friends who know me would be able to tell that I just don’t look like myself any longer. But at this point, even strangers can see that I am pale, that my eyes are droopy and, at the same time, wide open and a bit astonished”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction

“really they can do whatever they want. I can’t fight back, I can’t run away, and if they decide they don’t feel like letting me use the phone, what am I going to do? I’m at their mercy.
I have never thought of this before, but I have never been at anyone’s mercy in my entire life. For all my complaints about my life, I am completely free.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, More, Now, Again: A Memoir of Addiction