Any lengths.

Since yesterday’s romance, I have been talking to anyone who will listen. I phoned my sponsor after I spoke with my daughter, I told my roommates, I told M and others at the recovery home, I shared about it from the podium tonight. I was of service again to the woman who is renewing her vow of sobriety. I lead tonight’s meeting as the secretary, and secured speakers through the end of June. I attended a planning meeting for a fundraiser for AALA and offered my services without hesitation or self imposed restrictions. And I received and accepted warmth, love, hugs, and kisses at the meeting’s end. (Even from the person I’ve been avoiding who happened to show up tonight for the first time in months…Providence?)

The advice I received is as varied as our backgrounds and stories. What rang louder than anything for me was the chat I had with JBM, the woman that relapsed after a significant number of years of sobriety. I really picked her brain today (and it was her infinite wisdom that I share tonight so she “arranged” for my lottery ticket to be pulled…yeah, we do that sometimes when schtuff like this happens in our fellowship). I was most shaken by the fact that I could not sufficiently conjure up “the consequences” of taking that drink. What she said was…”Honey, if none of those things could stop you then, what makes you think they’d stop you now?” That made sense. She brought me back to what I was feeling on my last drunk (which was actually anticlimactic) and the hamster wheel I was on to kill those feelings. That was painful.

I don’t usually re-read my journal entries but I did this afternoon. The ones from the first days sober, and the ones from the first few days living in the recovery home. (I was sober 23 days when I moved in there, not that it matters. The feelings were the same.) I can’t even believe I am the same person. I’m not actually. The packaging is the same, but everything else has changed.

Even today, when I think back on yesterday’s seduction, I can’t believe that was me. My brain. Without mental defense against the first drink. There are moments when I am shaken, but for the most part, I feel like an objective observer. OO. It already feels like eons ago. I don’t know whether that’s a good thing or not.

Someone asked me this evening if it was the interruption by the phone or the person calling that stopped me. Would it have made a difference if it were my son, my baby girl, a friend, a bill collector, etc.? I honestly don’t know. I never want to be close enough again to find out. I’m assured by long-timers that it still happens even with 15+ years. With that in mind, I will pick brains, work the steps, listen, pray and meditate, go to meetings, work with other alcoholics, be of service, pick up the phone, and stand on my head if I have to. Any lengths.

Thank you for paying me a 12 Step call.