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.

Oh The Humanity!

I was provided with the opportunity to be of service today for a woman whom I’ve known for my entire sobriety. We aren’t close, but we have mutual friends and share a history with the recovery home in which I once resided. She needed help. I needed to be of service. Simple. The language of the heart binds us.

She finds herself in the position of, what I’d like to consider, renewing her vow of sobriety, after maintaining her sobriety a significant amount of time. SIGNIFICANT. The how and why of it isn’t important for me to discuss here. After all, it is not my story to tell. But it did give me pause to think about some of the basic principles I hold so dearly.

Over the course of the past 2+ years I have witnessed the fragility of sobriety and life. I have seen individuals who relapse time and again, others disappear from sight for a prolonged period only to return unrecognizable, some try rehab after rehab, yet others never make it back. Relapses have happened after as little as 2 days clean, others after 34 years. Relapses have lasted hours, or months, a couple have seemed like years. In some cases, relapse has meant another chance or it has meant the end of a life. Some relapses did not surprise me. Others have shaken me to my very core.

There are quite the varieties of opinions voiced when such events occur. They range from not even a blip on the radar to outright repugnance and ridicule. What I can’t forget is “No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles we have set down are guides to progress. We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection.” This gives me a chance to be human.

I don’t believe that relapse has to be a part of recovery. I do believe that we all have a right to be sober. What works for some, may not work for others. Recovery is a very personal thing, between oneself and their concept of God. “Our book is meant to be suggestive only. We realize we know only a little. God will constantly disclose more to you and to us.” This gives me an opportunity to learn.

So when I hear opinions that are belittling to another’s path in sobriety, be it relapse or rehab, I remember the words of Herbert Spencer. “There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance—that principle is contempt prior to investigation.” This offers me hope.

Time goes on. Faces change. No two people are exactly alike. I get so frustrated when I hear (read) some of the opinions sent from the moral high ground. We're all in search of the same thing. We each have our own path. No one is right and no one is wrong. Does it matter how we get there? What matters is that we never stop learning.

Thank you for paying me a 12 Step call.

Conflicting messages.

My mind is a blank. My mind is racing.
I am an outsider. I belong.
I don’t want to be here. I’m glad I came.
I have nothing I want to share. Yes I do, please pull my number.
Please don’t come and hug me. Hey, come over here, I missed you and need a hug.

Yes, I went to my regular Wednesday meeting and THAT is what the committee in my brain was doing--the entire time. I can’t turn it off. I can only accept it as the crossed wires in this alcoholic’s brain. The wires that are designed to cause enough conflict to lull me into believing I’m different; unique. The same wires that turn “wah wah wah…wah wah” into a powerful message.

I went to the meeting, not for me, but for the newcomers in the room. (Magnanimous of me, wasn’t it?) What I didn’t count on was that a friend would stand up and identify as a newcomer after almost 2 years of sobriety. His relapse was all of one night, and he came back the very next day. I had felt him pulling away over the course of several months. This isn’t an isolated incident. It’s happened before with others. I either have radar about these things, or give off some kind of vibe. They say the mental relapse begins long before the physical one. Maybe living a lie most of my adult life, in one form or another, has given me a sixth sense. In any event, I felt a plethora of emotions when he identified and will no doubt process this with my sponsor tomorrow.

But what it boils down to for me (at least tonight) is this: I went. It doesn’t matter for whom. And that is only one of four crucial things I must do if I’m going to stay sober.

Don’t drink no matter what.
Keep my side of the street clean.
Help another alcoholic.
Trust that God is on the job.

By showing up, even when I didn’t feel like it, even when I’m in a very dark place emotionally, even when all I want to do is to isolate, I stayed sober another day. Does that mean I helped another alcoholic? I hope so. Cuz today…it’s all I could manage.

Thank you for paying me a 12 Step call.

What have I got to lose?

Some days I just really get so emotionally worn out. Take today for example.

I wasn’t able to make it to my usual support group at 6 because I couldn’t pee. (Yeah, there’s a story there, just not today.) I did the responsible thing and notified the facilitator that I would be coming to the 7 PM meeting instead. Rushing through downtown LA traffic to actually make good on that was harrowing enough without the committee working overtime in my brain over the pee thing. (Seriously, this is an issue which requires more time to explain than I have now.) I received a text message in transit that was upsetting. Potential bad news for a loved one. Sigh. “This is the last place I want to be” was my mantra as I walked to the meeting room. Ever feel like that?

WELL…person after person described in detail how hopeless they felt. So hopeless that using again seemed like a viable option. The monologue in my head was going something like this: "OMG! This is taking forever. Can we not move it along so we can just get out of here?" (Sound familiar?) At some point I stopped being self-obsessed and started actually listening. And to remember what it felt like to be there. To feel that desperation. To not be able to see a way out. To just say “screw it” and have a drink. It’s overwhelming.

When it came my time to share and the words started flowing, my gratitude over how much my life has changed in the past 2+ years hit me solidly. Things may not be the way I planned at this stage of my life, but they are far better than when I got here. And I never have to go back to living like that ever again.

I think one of the reasons I don’t drink is that I never want to have to stand up as a newcomer again. To admit I lost the time I accumulated in front of friends and loved ones would really suck. But what I need to remember, is, that the only way to lose is to end up in a body bag. So, I’ll keep coming back. Just one more time.

Thank you for paying me a 12 Step call.