Consequences

[knothead]

I've been through rehab after rehab, for various & sundry reasons. Sometimes to try to save a a job, sometimes to save a relationship, and sometimes to simply "get my sh*t together."

I have been in and out "these rooms" of recovery for over 15 years.

At the very first, I had almost zero desire towards getting clean. I just wanted to figure out a way to continue using W/O the negative consequences.

However, after "butting" my proverbial head into the stone wall after so long, I discovered that it had little or nothing to do with my own personal ability to control usage of any particular drug. I had a disease, which I choose to call "an addictive personality."

Though I had had heard it time after time in rehabs, it didn't trully strike home until one time at an NA speaker's meeting. Somehow, that particular night, I was actually listening (with my heart & ears both), and I identified with nearly everything that was said. Somehow, I suppose, it was just the right time & place (God does for me what I can't do for myself).

Even though it's been 15+ years since my first acquaintence with a 12-step program, I feel as though I am a "newbie." I beleive with all my heart & soul this is a new direction for me this time. I have a sponsor this time (whom I know I can trust & confide in).

I have earnestly met & talked with people that have had more than a few 24 hours clean time back-to-back. They seem so at ease with themselves, and have a sense of humor that comedy clubs would die for. I want what they have.

Look, I don't expect miracles. However, to me, at this point in my life, it would be a miracle to just be able to smile again W/O any mind-altering chemicals.

I know there is a long row to hoe ahead of me. I must be willing to do the things I have been taught. To practice them in everyday life.

To live life on LIFES' OWN TERMS. Which is a pregnant dog sometimes.

But it can't be any worse than the pregnant dog of using: trying to hide the nuts, lying to everyone to coverup, losing jobs, losing stuff like credit & real property, stealing for the money to buy the nuts, etc. ad finitum. After awhile, it becomes evident that you are a sleeper to your own addictions (when I say "you," I mean myself).

Can anyone else relate???

[~graced~]

Wow....do I know this one!
Been there done that...wanted what they had and I mean in the worst way! I couldn't seemingly 'get it' until I was ready and willing to do the deal. Even if I didn't understand what it was that they were asking me to do, I did it anyway. Intellect didn't apply in my first few years of being clean and sober, my problem was I wanted it to. What I failed to recognize was that addictive personality--my whole thinking was backasswards and it simply wasn't 'reliable' or 'credible'.

You've got a great start going, Knothead. You've aligned yourself with a sponsor you can trust and hear--that was pretty essential to me finding something different. Mine was an old fart who lived the deal and truly had a sense of peace with the world around him. Not a whole lot riled him--and I tested that theory...LOL Pretty wise man. But like you, I couldn't quite see it working for me, I couldn't trust that I was eligible for the miracle.

I guess I'd say to you what was said to me in early recovery--expect miracles.....LOOK for the miracles. While I didn't have a whole lot to smile about when I came here I found the laughter infectious, the sense of common welfare overwhelming and the relationships just plain refreshing (if not a bit daunting). I didn't think it would happen for me. I stuck around, got willing to do what was suggested even though it made no sense to me, and continued to do things even if I didn't 'want' to. Wanting to wasn't required....doing it was.

You aren't disqualified for the miracles--you're eligible as well. Heck, they were happening around me and I simply couldn't see them through the fog my brain was in. How could I expect to see when I was blind to truth? Running, hiding, lying and conning for years will get you to that place--and the throes of addiction go pretty deep.

A day at a time, Knothead....you've got a good start going. And it can happen for you. I'd go to wager it already is happening....isn't it a miracle that you've even made it to this spot...that you're here? G-d must have a plan for your life to have gotten you this far.

*hugs*
Stick around!! WE truly can do what you/I weren't able to do all by our little lonesomes.

[lala]

boy oh boy can i relate with what you shared thank you so much for this post i too have been in and out of these rooms for 15+ yrs always trying to find myself and always enduring those consequences. for me i always had that lurking notion that drugs would do for me what it always had done for me before the most time i ever established clean was one whole yr and even during that yr i had those notions and it led me back to using one more time but now i can honestly say that i have NO lurking notions and im almost six months clean i never had it nor knew it could be this good the relationship i have with my higher power and in these rooms will be with me one day at a time...........lala

[knothead]

Thanks for sharing ~graced~ and Lala.

Miracles??? No doubt. It is a miracle that I'm even alive right now to type this, literally. I very nearly OD'd my way over to the next realm on a couple of occasions. "Coming to" on a hospital bed the next day, being told by a doctor that they thought they had lost me the night before in the ER ain't exactly all that much fun (especially with family members there, looking at me as if I had lost my mind or something - and sometimes weeping over my sorry arse). I've had suicidal thoughts before, but I never would've chosen this as the best way to check out of here, if ya'll know what I mean.

I thought getting back into this program wouldn't all that difficult, as far the steps are concerned. I figured I could just waltz right in and pick up where I left off on step four. After talkling one-to-one with my sponsor, I realize that I haven't even completed the first step yet. At least not to the point of acceptance. Heck, admitting something is fairly easy compared with wholly ACCEPTING it. And that was & is the sticking point for my sponsor. I still have some latent reservations.

It isn't that I don't understand the disease concept. On a purely an intellectual level, I understand it as much as almost anyone, I'd dare say. But that it really applies to moi, is a difficult thing to swallow. Because I tend to want to think that I am somehow unique. That I can lick this thing if only . . . I could get {people, places, and things} ordered to my liking.

On the surface, I *KNOW* I have the disease of addiction. And that, for me, "one is too many, and a thousand is never enough." But something deep-down inside keeps telling me that I simply haven't tried or found that one drug that I can control yet. Logically, it makes no sense whatsoever, seeing all of crap the disease has created in my life (not to mention the lives of those that are closest to me).

It is a paradox. Life seems like a paradox at times for this "junkie-trying-like-hell-to-stay-clean-and-sober."

But, just for today, thank God, I am. And that is good enough for now.

[stickmonkey]

i hate it when dope feinds think they get fixed and stop coming
please addicts keep coming back

[majestyjo]

This must have been a time my computer was down or when I was asked to leave the site. I don't remember reading this. Some good thoughts here. For the most part, did it wore the t-shirt.

I often think of it as a dis-ease, uncomfortable within myself and looking for something outside of myself to make me feel better. Not knowing that I could go within, connect to a God of my understanding, and learn to live a new way of life, free from addiction. A spiritual defense against that first drug, no matter what shape or size it came in.