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Post by caressa on Dec 1, 2004 22:36:09 GMT -5
In order to work the steps we need a close working relationship with our indiviidual NA sponsors. Besides offer help and guidance on addiction issues in our personal lives, sponsors share their experience, hope and faith as they help guide us through the Twelve Steps of Narcotics Anonymous.
Working the steps also requires regular attendance at a weekly NA step meeting. This is an "I can't, we can" recovery program and we can lear a lot by listening to other recovering addicts share their experience working the Twelve Steps.
What follows are some suggestions for working the steps based on the experience of other recovering addicts. For most of us, working the steps involves writing on each one, sharing what we've written with our sponsor, and living each step to the best of our ability.
Keep in mind there are no right or wrong answers to be look up in the back of a textbook or teacher's guide. These are suggestions to help us understand how to work the Twleve Steps of Narcotics Anonymous.
I have also take this same format and substituted the words Cocaine Anonymous in place of Narcotics Anonymous. It is a good guideline to use, not matter what your drug of choice was (People, places and/or things).
Our ideas about the steps change as we work them. In living the steps, we seek progress, not perfection.
1) What is the dictionary definition of "powerless"?
2) How was myl ife powerless during active drug addiction?
3) How was I powerless over my drug use?
4) How did powerlessness extend into other areas like work, finances, relationships, family, etc.
5) What are three good examples of how my life was unmanageable?
6) How does powerlessness apply in those areas?
7) What are reservations and how are they dangerous to my recovery?
8) How is my life unmangeable in my recovery (physically, emotionally, and spiritually)?
9) What are the symptoms of my addiction?
10) What are the benefits of accepting my powerlessness over my addiction?
11) What are the benefits of surrendering the management of my life to Narcotics Anonymous?
12) Is willpower enough to stop using drugs? Explain.
13) How is surrender another word for victory in the NA program.
14) How do I try to control situations to prevent feeling powerless?
15) How is addiction a progressive and incurable disease?
16) How is being self-centered in conflict with spiritual growth?
17) How have denial, substitution, rationalization, justification, distrust of others, guilt, embarrassment, dereliction, isolation, and loss of control been a part of my life?
18) What does being responsible for my recovery mean?
19) Is drug use a symptom of my addiction? Are drugs the prime problem, or does the problem lie within me in the form of physical, mental and spiritual disease that makes me crave drugs? Explain.
20) What does the "we" mean? Define fellowship.
21) What does "I can't ever ge my life together" mean?
This was given to me prior to the new Twelve Step Working Book guide and I think there was just the one page. This isn't a very comprehensive and complete list by any means, but certainly a place to start. We do what we need to do for our own recovery. Everything is a suggestion, but much is a 'must' if you don't want to go back out and use. #1 being "Don't Pick Up!" What you have to do after that, is your decision.
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Post by caressa on Jun 1, 2005 7:03:38 GMT -5
This is a good guideline for finding the root of the problem whether your powerlessness is over people, places and things. Perhaps by checking this you can identify the part of your life that you need to surrender, and use the Steps to find a solution.
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Post by caressa on Jun 6, 2005 22:34:17 GMT -5
Step One
"We admitted we were powerless over alcohol--that our lives had become unmanageable."
Who cares to admit complete defeat? Practically no one, of course. Every
natural instinct cries out against the idea of personal powerlessness. It is truly awful to admit that, glass in hand, we have warped our minds into such an obsession for destructive drinking that only an act of Providence can remove it from us.
No other kind of bankruptcy is like this one. Alcohol, now become the
rapacious creditor, bleeds us of all self-sufficiency and all will to resist its demands. Once this stark fact is accepted, our bankruptcy as going human concerns is complete.
But upon entering A.A. we soon take quite another view of this absolute
humiliation. We perceive that only through utter defeat are we able to take our first steps toward liberation and strength. Our admissions of personal powerlessness finally turn out to be firm bedrock upon which happy and purposeful lives may be built.
We know that little good can come to any alcoholic who joins A.A. unless he has first accepted his devastating weakness and all its consequences. Until he so humbles himself, his sobriety--if any--will be precarious. Of real happiness he will find none at all. Proved beyond doubt by an immense experience, this is one of the facts of A.A. life. The principle that we shall find no enduring strength until we first admit complete defeat is the main taproot from which our whole Society has sprung and flowered.
When first challenged to admit defeat, most of us revolted. We had approached A.A. expecting to be taught self-confidence. Then we had been told that so far as alcohol is concerned, self-confidence was no good whatever; in fact, it was a total liability. Our sponsors declared that we were the victims of a mental obsession so subtly powerful that no amount of human willpower could break it.
There was, they said, no such thing as the personal conquest of this compulsion by the unaided will. Relentlessly deepening our dilemma, our sponsors pointed out our increasing sensitivity to alcohol--an allergy, they called it. The tyrant alcohol wielded a double-edged sword over us: first we were smitten by an insane urge that condemned us to go on drinking, and then by an allergy of the body that insured we would ultimately destroy ourselves in the process. Few indeed were those who, so assailed, had ever won through in single-handed combat. It was a statistical fact that alcoholics almost never recovered on their own resources. And this had been true, apparently, ever since man had
first crushed grapes.
In A.A.'s pioneering time, none but the most desperate cases could swallow and digest this unpalatable truth. Even these "last-gaspers" often had difficulty in realizing how hopeless they actually were. But a few did, and when these laid hold of A.A. principles with all the fervor with which the drowning seize life preservers, they almost invariably got well. That is why the first edition of the book "Alcoholics Anonymous," published when our membership was small, dealt with low-bottom cases only. Many less desperate alcoholics tried A.A., but did not succeed because they could not make the admission of hopelessness.
It is a tremendous satisfaction to record that in the following years this changed. Alcoholics who still had their health, their families, their jobs, and even two cars in the garage, began to recognize their alcoholism. As this trend grew, they were joined by young people who were scarcely more than potential alcoholics. They were spared that last ten or fifteen years of literal hell the rest of us had gone through. Since Step One requires an admission that our lives have become unmanageable, how could people such as these take this Step?
It was obviously necessary to raise the bottom the rest of us had hit to the point where it would hit them. By going back in our own drinking histories, we could show that years before we realized it we were out of control, that our drinking even then was no mere habit, that it was indeed the beginning of a fatal progression. To the doubters we could say, "Perhaps you're not an alcoholic after all. Why don't you try some more controlled drinking, bearing in mind meanwhile what we have told you about alcoholism?" This attitude brought immediate and practical results. It was then discovered that when one alcoholic had planted in the mind of another the true nature of his malady, that person could never be the same again. Following every spree, he would say to himself, "Maybe those A.A.'s were right..." After a few such experiences, often years before the onset of extreme difficulties, he would return to us convinced. He had hit bottom as truly as any of us. John Barleycorn himself had become our best advocate.
Why all this insistence that every A.A. must hit bottom first? The answer is that few people will sincerely try to practice the A.A. program unless they have hit bottom. For practicing A.A.'s remaining eleven Steps means the adoption of attitudes and actions that almost no alcoholic who is still drinking can dream of taking. Who wishes to be rigorously honest and tolerant?
Who wants to confess his faults to another and make restitution for harm done? Who cares anything about a Higher Power, let alone meditation and prayer? Who wants to sacrifice time and energy in trying to carry A.A.'s message to the next sufferer? No, the average alcoholic, self-centered in the extreme, doesn't care for this prospect--unless he has to do these things in order to stay alive himself.
Under the lash of alcoholism, we are driven to A.A., and there we discover the fatal nature of our situation. Then, and only then, do we become as open-minded to conviction and as willing to listen as the dying can be. We stand ready to do anything which will lift the merciless obsession from us.
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Post by caressa on Jan 11, 2006 22:12:32 GMT -5
Change is the characteristic of all growth. From drinking to sobriety, from dishonesty to honesty, from conflict to serenity, from childish dependence to adult responsibility - all this and infinitely more represent change for the better. Only God is unchanging; only He has all the truth there is. Do I accept the belief that lack of power was my dilemma? Have I found a power by which I can live - a Power greater than myself? Today I Pray I pray that The Program will be, for me, an outline for change - for changing me. These days of transition from active addiction to sobriety, from powerlessness to power through God, may be rocky, as change can be. May my restlessness be stilled by the unchanging nature of God, in whom I place my trust. Only He is whole and perfect and predictable. Today I Will Remember I can count on my Higher Power. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The book, "A Day at a Time: Daily Reflections for Recovering People," by Anonymous, copyright 1989 www.Open-Mind.org/Books/Spirit.htm* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * |
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Post by caressa on Jan 16, 2007 18:54:57 GMT -5
Step One: We admitted we were powerless over
alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.
"We know that little good can come to any alcoholic
who joins A.A. unless he has first accepted his
devastating weakness and all its consequences. Until
he so humbles himself, his sobriety – if any – will
be precarious. Of real happiness he will find none at
all. Proved beyond doubt by an immense experience, this
is one of the facts of A.A. life. The principle that we
shall find no enduring strength until we first admit
complete defeat is the main taproot from which our whole
Society has sprung and flowered."
© 1952, AAWS, Inc.; Printed 2005;
Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, pgs. 21-22
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Post by stickmonkey on Apr 2, 2007 15:07:17 GMT -5
i still have another na first step a guy from india gave me
i will post it in the na section later
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Post by caressa on Feb 4, 2009 3:39:32 GMT -5
Step One wouldn't work for me until I could find full acceptance of my powerlessness. It wasn't until I put in the word control, that I could see it at work. All my life I had tried to control people, places and things, only to be hurt, time and again and control was an illusion. I could not change anyone else, all I could do was change me. I had to decide if I wanted to make that change and if my dis-ease was in need of changing. I had to get honest with me. I had to quit pointing the finger at others, I had to quit looking at every one else and take stock of me and where I was going and where I had come from.
I could see unmanageability to a certain extent, but didn't really look at the robbing peter to pay paul, the changing jobs, the changing relationships, the changing apartments, the changing friends, and the list went on and on.
I really hadn't done that much with my life. I had no sense of who I was because I had lived it through other people. I found my identity in others and had no concept of self. Every time I picked up, I had given a piece of me away and their was this big empty void and a sense of loss. Where had I gone? If it wasn't the alcoholic or the alcohol directing my life, who was?
Every morning, I have to do Step One. Today I am a recovering alcoholic/addict, who has a disease that took me to people, places and things outside of myself to make me happy and to cope with life, and it was hard to believe who I had become and needed to change and take responsibility for the direction of my life.
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Post by SunnyGirl on Feb 4, 2009 16:53:36 GMT -5
Powerless! What a concept! When I found 12-step recovery
I was out of control, mentally, physically and spiritually….
Step-1, was a Godsend…. I knew beyond all doubt that my
life and my family were out of control, I knew I had no power!
I heard somewhere, when I try to control another person
I am giving them all the power. If they do what I think they
should do I’m happy, but if they don’t I am angry or frustrated.
In other words, they hold all the cards and have the power to
control my feelings.
It didn’t take long, for me to begin trying to take my power back.
I let go of trying to control my addicted loved ones and put my
focus back on me. I have a hard enough time making myself mind
Me. It was one of the most freeing moments of my life. I no longer
felt the need to push them to be what I wanted or give me what they
didn't have…..
I’ve worked step-1 many times on my journey to recovery. But I
have finally learned it’s an ongoing process, letting go of control
that I never had.
Peace on the journey, SunnyGirl
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Post by caressa on Feb 4, 2009 22:25:29 GMT -5
Well said my friend. I agree with you. When I was in my denial, I was blinded by the blanket I chose to pull over my head that prevented me from being honest. I didn't want to wear a label that I had put on my dad and my ex-husband. I always knew I was an addict, "Some is good, more is better," had been my motto for years. An alcoholic, no never! I had lots of excuses and I just didn't want to acknowledge that when I pointed a finger at each of them, that I had three coming back at me.
It was so much easier to play the blame game and it kept me sick for a very long time.
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Post by caressa on Feb 11, 2009 1:39:51 GMT -5
My powerlessness has been made very apparent to me the last few days. My son has been into the crack and been drinking. He gave my phone number to a new girlfriend. She walked into a bar and saw him with another girl and she has been phoning here and although I asked her to stop she didn't. My son when he came by called her and they started a shouting match and I had to call him on his behaviour and told him it wasn't acceptable. She called nine times in one day. There is nothing much worse than a drunken message, putting down your son who you know is no innocent, but you really don't want to hear it. I left a message on her machine last night and said no more calls or I would report her. Today it was quiet. I am powerless over his disease. I am empowered to set boundaries and walk my talk and do what is right for me, when I surrender and ask for help. I accept where he is at, I can't change him, I can't cure him, and as much as he doesn't agree with me, I didn't cause it. I think this disease is not so much hereditary as being products of our envirionment. Who and where I hang out, has an influence on my behaviour and if I can't beat them, I too often joined them. Not just in the drugs and alcohol, but in the behaviours and acting out of the disease. Yelling at my ex-husband like a banshee and putting him down for his drunken behaviour didn't make for a good relationship. So often the abused, becomes the abuser. I know I did.
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Post by SunnyGirl on Feb 11, 2009 13:35:36 GMT -5
They may inherit the gene, but their choice to act
on an addiction is their own...
It just plain hurts to watch someone you love
act out in this way. It's the insanity of the disease!
You take care of ((((Caressa)))))
Sending prayers your way.... SunnyGirl
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Post by caressa on Feb 12, 2009 14:54:20 GMT -5
It was really hard to admit that Ms. Independent needed help and couldn't help herself. It was difficult to acknowledge that I too had a problem and I couldn't continue to point the finger at my dad and my husband. The reality was, you can't match them drink for drink, drink when they passed out, and be sober. The alcohol changed my thinking and it was like night and day from the 'lady' I was raise up to be to the 'shady lady' who walked through the doors looking for help. It was an act of Providence that allowed me to walk by the girl's door and hear her say, "I don't want to be like her down the hall," and know she was talking about me.
I was bankrupt mentally, emotionally, spiritually and physically. There were many people who told me that if they had drank like I did, they would still be drinking. How many times have you heard, "I have spilt more than you ever drank?" It wasn't how much I drank or how often I drank, it was about what it did to me when I did drink.
My whole life was ruled by the thought of using people, places and things to make me feel better. Always looking for something outside of myself to make me feel better. People were relationships (marriage, boyfriends, work, the Legion committees, the volunteer committees, etc.). Places were my bed, the bars (The Riverside and The Bayview - every place generally has one), the Legion, and work. Things were food, shopping, pills, alcohol, computer, reading, and anything that I could hide in and not face reality and life on life's terms. Give me a hug, I don't feel good. Hold me and I will feel better. Give me another one, I am still feeling sad. And the list goes on, and on, and on.... Every time I picked up something, I gave a piece of me away. There wasn't much 'me' left when I came into recovery. When I gave up the addictions and the obsessions, there was a big void and I had to find a way to fill it.
To be continued...
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Post by caressa on Feb 14, 2009 0:27:16 GMT -5
So many people look at humility and compare it to this humiliation we feel as a result of our using days. It has been my experiencee that no one can be truly helped, especially long term, if they aren't willing to be in recovery for themselves. Many have come for others, have been ordered by the courts, to get family off their back, to regain their health so they can go back and use again. When I got here, there was just no where else to go. As a friend of mine says, "It was the last house on the block." I like many tired institutions (treatment center, hospital, marriage, etc.) and nothing else worked. I tried substituting other things when something stopped working, only to be needing more and then both and looking for something else. It is only when I surrender, and ask for help, that I can start rebuilding my life. Through working the Steps, I find the God of my understanding, who is the Bedrock of my life.
Many, like my son know they are alcoholic, but don't care. I never realized I was. It was a blanket of denial that I wrapped myself in and let the world pass me by. I was existing, not living and it was stop the world I want to get off because I had no strength and courage to go on. It was only through the love of the people and the fellowship of the programs that I was able to lift myself up and have hope. Just maybe I can do this. Just maybe I am worthy and deserve recovery. Just maybe I can find what they have. My way didn't work and I have been trying for 8 years so I will try it there way. I stayed in an abusive marriage because of low self-worth and feeling like I had to have someone in my life in order to be someone. I didn't know it was okay to be me.
Admitting I had a problem started the process that lead to change.
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Post by caressa on Feb 15, 2009 20:17:50 GMT -5
I had never heard of AA except in reference to a guy who was a member of the Legion and I remember someone saying, "He is on the wagaon and is going to AA." Didn't have a clue as to what they were talking about. A friend of mine was a bartender at the Legion and she told me I don't drink I am going to AA." It was her words that made me open to it only to find that she never went and she had just said that keep everyone off her back and pressing beer onto her. This friend would be drunk on two beers and would still be walking around after 20 beers just as obnoxious as she was on 20. With me, most people were hard pressed to know I had been drinking and it was a case of whether I had over 20 or not. I didn't have much use for people who couldn't 'hold' theire booze. They should leave it for me to drink if they can't handle it. So I was challenging for me to admit I was an alcoholic to begin with. Wasn't sure what AA could offer me, I just knew I couldn't go back to where I came from. Where I was from was living with an alcoholic father and husband and I laid a lot of the 'blame' for my disease on them. I always knew I was an addict, some is good, more is better and I had used people, places and things all my life to escape my reality, to make me feel better and to bring me up to a level of sanity and out of depression so I could cope with life. When I first started drinking it took eight rum and coke to bring up to a level where I could have 'fun' and relax and let go and just be. Over the years as my disease progressed, it always took more.
I heard that normal people don't have that burning in their arm when their arm is swabbed for an injection. I was told that only an alcoholic can make vodka smell. I heard a gentleman share his story and said, "He was allergic to alcohol, he always broke out in spots like Toronto, Montreal, Edmonton, Buffalo.... For many years I compared instead of identifying and stayed sick. I was sober but still had the stinking thinking without the drinking.
I made up my mind that I needed to quit at the age of 41. It took me another 8 years trying to quit my way to find the doors of recovery. It took another years in recovery to take Step One totally and come to a complete acceptance and able to take it 100%. I was always leaving the gate open so I could drink again. Self justification and rationalization, drove me insane along with my friends although they never admitted it.
I didn't like beer so I can't be an alcoholic. I don't drink my booze straight, I can't be an alcoholic. I don't like gin, vodka, scotch, I can't be an alcoholic. I didn't drink before noon. I didn't wake up until almost noon. What part of morning didn't I drink? I didn't go to bed until at least 1 - 4 a.m. in the morning. I always said, "My husband was in the Legion every day at 12 noon. He's a real alcoholic." Guess who was with him? Who had the attitude, "You had better not have one more drink than I have or 'God' help your soul! Where did you get that beer? Why didn't you get me one? It wasn't until I could get really honest with myself that I could look at what I did, not look at what I didn't do.
To be continued...
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Post by caressa on Feb 19, 2009 20:53:00 GMT -5
I love reading the stories about the history of AA. In comparison to what they had to go through, driving miles for meetings, with no guidelines to follow, no place to go for help except to the Insane Asylums. It is my understanding that they were heavily medicated, which probably lead to other problems and a pill addiction. I co-sponsored a young fellow and he was in his early twenties and he was diagnosed as a chronic alcoholic. They always took him to the hospital and medicated him because they didn't think he could live detoxing on his own. This didn't work long-term and unfortunately, he kept going in and out of the program.
I consider myself a low-bottom alcoholic even though I wasn't on the street, didn't drink rubbing alcohol, didn't shoot alcohol in my veins to get a faster high, didn't drink AquaValva and Listerine. My first drink was at 10, my first pill at 16, and started drinking legally at 21 and quit at 49. Drinking that long didn't leave me very high on the totem pole. I didn't think my life was unmanageable when I got rid of my ex-husbands, everything was their fault after all. Yet when I reached out, there was no husband, no father, no relationship in my life and I had to look at me. I was still having problems getting rent money. I had 3 jobs for 3 months in a year. There was something 'wrong' with them. I got fired from a job in Barrie, because I gave my boss attitude. At least I think that was the problem, we just didn't jive together although the other two men I worked for were very please with my work. In fact the day he fired me, my boss called me into his office and complimented me on a two page letter written in German. He left, then the Plant Manager came to speak to me and told me I had been let go, he didn't know why because he thought my work was excellent but he had been asked to give me my notice. The General Manager didn't have the guts to tell me himself. I think he took exception to my remark about typing my own letters (did collection on accounts) when he asked me if I had ever typed a letter before. The last job I had to leave in Orillia was because I had to have two operations in a year and they felt they couldn't give me the time off, which was only right. I was receptionisht and accounts receivable/payable accountant. I work in Midland and quit my Payroll/Personnel job when the long-time worker quit because of the chaos caused by switching from manual to computers. The computer was in a room the size of my bedroom. She refused to take the responsibility because they didn't do a manual back up on the first computer run. The manager was new and I quit too out of fear, because I sure didn't want the responsility and I didn't kow what I was doing on the computer. I went back to Georgian College to get my Grade 12. Came down to Hamilton several years alter and took Mohawk classes. I got Bells Palsey twice. The second time I got it I was receptionist at a Cake Decorating and Bridal Shop. My boss sent my seperation papers with a cake delivery boy and never even spoke to me. I was an embarrassment and didn't look good and would be off-putting to customers. I probably could have fought it but I didn't think it was worth it. Before this period in my life I had worked as an account receivable clerk, proofreader and inventory control clerk for five years in Hamilton and went up north to look after my alcoholic father and worked for five years as an assistant accountant in a job in Orillia. It was oh woe is me! Resentment and anger, and why does this always happen to me. The change came when I went home to take care of my father and became his drinking buddy. He would get up in the middle of the night and pour a drink, light a cigarette and fall asleep in his chair. It broke up my sleep and I didn't feel safe and yet stayed there from the time my son was 2 until he was 10. After we moved out (married the second time) at my father's request when we came home at 11 p.m. at night and told us to leave. We went and stayed with a friend until we could find an apartment. My father died two months later as a result of his disease. I had called him on the Monday to see if he would join us for Christmas. He said he would let me know. My husband went to his house because we hadn't heard from him. He arrived the same time as my dad's older brother. They found my father dead and he been dead for at least three days. It was 3 days before Christmas. My father didn't choose to get help for his disease. When his girlfriend was killed in a car accident, he gave up on life and chose to drink himself to death. He felt like he had no reason for living. He grieved her more than he did my mother who had died when I was 21. Just another reason to have a resentment although I loved his girlfriend dearly. After all, she told me I made the best stuffing she ever tasted when I invited her for Thanksgiving. My father passed out with his face in his dinner plate. I was embarrassed for him. I always seemed to take on other peoples feelings. I took everything personal. When my parent had a fight, it was my fault. Mind you many times I was told it was and I believed. I didn't know I didn't have the power. I didn't know I was powerless over people, places and things. I didn't know that when I surrendered and asked for help, that I would be empowered to help myself.
It is really good to see younger people coming into the program. People think that because they are young, they are high bottoms. With all the substance that are out there in today, their bottoms are anything but high. They often start out my drinking and pot, but when that stops working, they are looking for more. There is a lot more 'more' out there and it all brings you down fast.
At first, I stopped drinking because I couldn't drink safely. I can't drink today because I am diabetic. I don't drink today because I don't want to.
Continued....
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Post by caressa on Feb 23, 2009 1:56:24 GMT -5
When I looked back on my own journey, I saw how I had the thinking long before drinking became a problem. I remember that feeling when that stolen glass of wine at the age of 10 hit bottom and the feeling of "aahhhhhhhh!" that I got was something that stayed with me and as I have said before, when I found it, I couldn't stop there, I still had to have more. I believe the headaches and stomach aches that I was given the Valium for at 16 was my reaction to drinking communion wine at the age of 14-16. I have an allergy and a reaction to alcohol that when I taste it I want more. For two years, I had been taking a gulp, trying to make it look like a sip. I stole that glass of wine because I was wondering what everyone else was having and what I was missing out on.
I can remember going out with a fellow who drank so much that I was wondering if I could keep up with him. I started drinking rum and coke. But because he drank rye, I drank rye so I could drink his and mine. I learned to drive by cruising the backroad in the country with a mickey of rye in a Ford Comet, while smoking the boyfriend's pipe because Iliked the taste and the smell of Old Sail tobacco. I was raised a lady and spent most of my life trying to prove I wasn't one. I resented it when the 'lady' came out. She spoiled my fun and gave me immeasurable feelings of guilt which I had to bury with more alcohol and pills. I got my license at the age of 27. I qualified many times over and from that time on, my disease got worse and escalated. I decided at the age of 41 to quit but didn't know about AA. I was 49 in April, asked for help in August, stayed sober and stopped abusing my medication and then started to come off a lot of it with the help of the Social Worker at the YWCA. She wanted to go after my family doctor and have his license removed. I wouldn't give permission because he was my aunt's doctor as well and she thought he was God. It wasn't until he tried to put her on Tyenol 3s after having her on Tyenol 2s for a long time that she realized that he wasn't acting in her best interest. He had been my supplier for years. He went on a lot of vacations every year and lived well from his profession. He agreed to send me to a program at the Hamilton General Hospital. They did an accessment on me. It took 3 hours, was 8 long pages, front and back, and they told me I didn't qualify. I didn't have a problem and my doctor said I need the medication. It wasn't his fault that I chose to abuse it.
I dont' remember how honest I was on that form, but when I went into Mary Ellis House, they were surprised at the medication I had been on and that what I thought were 'nerve' pills where very strong tranquilizers. My doctor didn't think I needed to go there but gave in out of the goodness of his heart. I switched doctors.
I thought that because I could funciton, walk a straight line, throw good darts, play on a woman's snooker league, drive a car and stay on my own side of the road (even had police follow me 10 miles home and not pull me over), worked on banquets (called me Gravy Jo), volunteered for the Community Committee putting on Euchre and movie nites, was Zone Sports Officer for 13 branches and put on euchre, cribbage, dart and bowling tounaments, went on parade sold poppies, fund raising tickets, and the list goes on, that I was alright. What I was a irresponsible mother who left her son with her father or babysitter while she went out and was the Big Cheese trying to fit in and got a ride to a lot of free booze and was handy for any more she needed. The motive and intent were for my honour and glory and oh wasn't I just wonderful helping all these people. Selfishness, self-centeredness is the core of our disease. Looking outside of myself to make me feel better. Finding no love and acceptance from within me, I looked to people, places, and things to make me feel better.
When I opened the group the Freedom of Recovery, there was a young man came to a morning meeting and said, "I am not sure if I have a problem. I have a 24 sitting in my apartment waiting for me to go home. I said, "Only you can make that decision. You can go home and drink that 24 and then decide whether you have a problem or not." He was back at the meeting the next morning. A young fellow complained to me one morning. I just got my hair cut and no one notices. I said, "You have to remember two things. You usually have your hair in a pony tail so the length of your hair wasn't really noticeable. You have to realize that you are sitting in a roomful of alcoholic who think everyone is looking at them and they are just not going to notice." The group was made up of a lot of new people. Head Office said we bought more meeting lists for our group than the other 40 groups in the City. As a result, we had a large turnover, they later joined bigger groups, and eventually they came back to carry the messge to others. There were 7 meetings in 6 days and it was a great way to get them involved. People said you needed time in the fellowship before you can take part in a meeting. These were a group of people, young in sobriety but with a lot of will and determination and felt the security and the safety of the meetings. It was a group of meetings registered in New York. For the most part, I was the only one with over a year of sobriety. Hamilton Housing came to me and asked what can be done about the alcohol and drug problem in their buildings. I said, "Nothing! What you can do is make space available for a meeting so that when they do decide for themselves they want help, they have a place to go to." I was just over 3 years sober and I continued doing service for 7 years until I went back to school. Many relapsed and yet many returned and said, "I am glad you are still here." I qualified many years before I got here but when I finally made it, I saw people doing what I had been trying to do my way for 8 years and my way hadn't worked. I wanted what they had.
It took several months in the program to get the nerve to ask who John Barleycorn was. Those in the know laughed and said, "It is surprising how long it takes people to ask if they don't know. It takes awhile to get up enough confidence to ask a question. There is no such thing as a stupid question in AA. If you don't know, ask! John Barleycorn is alcohol which is made from barley and corn.
To be continued...
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Post by caressa on Feb 25, 2009 4:58:13 GMT -5
How true this is! Even in my denial about my alcoholism, I knew that I didn't want to go back to where I came from. I went through a week of hell detoxing on my own in the YWCA not knowing about detox and that I didn't have to do it alone. The first migraine last three days. The second last two and I couldn't move from my room except to run down the hall to the bathroom. I was grateful that my room was close to the facilities, it isn't easy being sick when all you have is a communal facility. It wasn't easy for the other girls either. It was a constant parade and pain I had never experienced before. The last migraine was only one day and it was worse than all the others combined. Remembering that pain helped me not o pick up. I didn't think it could get any worse, and I wasn't about to try to drink and drug again to find out. In order to help me come off my medication and take me off it, I had to go to the drug store every day to pick up that day's supply. My doctor had continued prescribing a pill for the neuralgia in my face from the Bells Palsy. It was a difficult pill to come off of. The specialist told me later that if it hadn't worked in five months, it wouldn't work at all and I was on it for five years. I had to come off of it a half a pill every three days. I was to continue having migraines for the next seven years of sobriety. I firmly believe it was the fact that I was allergic to smoke that caused them even though at the time they changed my blood pressure medication. If I hadn't had that experience, I don't know that I would have quit drinking.
Even in my denial, I just knew that if alcohol and/or pills took me to where I was at, I had to stop taking them. I didn't want to quit cigarettes, in fact my doctor put my on an inhaler so I could continue smoking because he said it would be too hard on my system to quit it all at once. The social worker wanted me to attend the meetings that were held at the Y every Sunday morning. I couldn't bring myself to go to them alone but I did make myself get up and go and have breakfast when they met in the cafeteria for the meeting before the meeting. The Sunday before going into rehab I sat with a young fellow who asked to join my table and he shared about trying to get his kids back and he was later one of the persons who kept me coming back. Unfortunately, he didn't keep coming back for himself and eventually went back out. I often wonder if he is still alive. The last time I saw him was about 8 years ago and he was driving cab. I asked him if he remembered me and he said yes.
Getting honest was difficult for me. I compared instead of identifying. I didn't do that. I didn't drink that way. Always forgetting that while I was drinking I had all this medication in my system enhancing the effects of the alcohol. I hadn't been able to take action. I had major attitude and it was everyone else's fault for so many years and I had to take ownership and look at me. I didn't want to even look in the mirror at the outside let alone the inside. The time between my last drink and going to rehab on November 2nd, 1991 is a big blur, most of it blanketed by pain. I often wonder if I had gone to detox and not had such a difficult time coming off everything that I might have glossed over it all and gone back out and used again.
I didn't know about Steps. It was the Slogans that kept me together at the beginning. They saved my life. Keep coming so you don't have to come back was something that I held onto. I thought I was an honest person. I didn't know that being cash register honest wasn't the same thin as self-honesty. I thought I had honesty first but in truth I got it last. I had an open mind to learn how to do what these people were doing because they had managed to do something I had been trying on my own for eight years to do. I could stop, but I couldn't stay stopped. I was willing to go to any length not to go back to where I came from. Yet to honestly look at me, that was another story. I honestly didn't think I had a problem and it was all the people in my life who had caused it and that I was where I was as a result of their choices not my own. I was the victim and although I didn't want to admit it, I played the martyr role to the hilt. I am so hard done by don't you know. If only...
In Al-Anon they have the three Cs. I didn't cause it, I can't control it, and I can't cure it. This pertains to another person's drinking. It also applies to my addiction to alcohol as well as feeds into the roles I played as Ms. Fix-it, Ms. Caretaker, Ms. Perfectionist, Ms. Be-All, etc. all the roles I took on to mask the pain inside. If I could fix the outside or fix you, then I didn't have to look at me. I could use you to make me feel better. I could forget about me when I was helping you. I didn't know I was just addicted to people and places as I was things. Some things seemed healthier than others, but it all lead to the same soul sickness.
Continued...
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Post by caressa on Feb 26, 2009 14:16:28 GMT -5
Well I didn't want to tell anyone anything. Everything was going to be a big secret and would go with me to my grave. Then I hear, "You are only as sick as your secrets." What brought you to AA will take you back out if you don't deal with it.
I thought I knew who God was and from what I knew, He was left wanting. According to the old tapes running in my head, He was a punishing God and was going to strike me dead and I was wondering why I was still walking around. All my life I had been told "Thou shall not!" Most of my life, I spent proving that I could.
Time and energy, who had any? I had spent my last years taking pills to shut it off and make it go away. Today there aren't enough hours in a day. Why would I want to help someone else, I had enough pain of my own without taking someone else's on. That had been my problem, didn't know I could carry the message, but didn't have to take on the burdens of others. I was to guide and direct but not show them the way. I couldn't play God in someone else's life. I am a leading authority on everything didn't you know. If you would just do what I say everything would be just fine! I had to have a major attitude adjustment. Then I was told that in order to keep my sobriety I had to have some to give. I had to give it away in order to keep it. Whatever 'it' was! It was all a miracle and a myster to me. How could they laugh? I am hurting and in pain you know? If you had been through what I had been through, you wouldn't find it so funny. That was the funny thing, they had been. They had been were I had been. They weren't laughing at me. They were laughing with me. If they hadn't done it, they had thought it or had heard the story somewhere else.
I didn't know I had a disease. I learned to accept it more when I heard someone say dis-ease. I was at dis-ease with myself and others all my life and I used people, places, and things to make me feel better. I had no life skills. Alcohol was the tool that gave me the courage and I didn't know that it was false and that it would become my enemy instead of my best friend.
I found hope when I came through the doors. I had been trying to quit my way for eight years. I was mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically bankrupt. I owed my soul. I was a Soul In Need. I wasn't a bad person trying to get good. I was a sick person trying to get better. I was willing to go to any length not to go back to where I came from. I was willing to open my mind to other people's ideas and concepts. That didn't mean I always agreed, but I was open to listening and learning. I was willing to do what ever it took to not pick up that first drug. For me it was alcohol, pills, food, and men. They told me that HOW the program worked was Honesty, Openmindedness, and Willingness.
I didn't think I was selfish and self-centered. I had been a caretaker all of my life. I had no sense of self. There was no me left. Yet all my life I had been out to look after #1. When I looked at motive and intent, it was about me. I had to have that change of attitude. I had to become humble (to become teachable) and admit that I didn't know. Ms. Indendent, Ms Perfection, Ms. Caretaker didn't care for that role. My sponsor said it was okay to be a caretaker as long as I learned to take care of myself. I had no concept of this. I had been abusing myself and allowing others to abuse me for years. I had a lot to learn. I had a lot of healing and change to go through, and in order to do that, I had to learn to apply the other steps.
I didn't want to carry the message "To use is to die!" I chose to live! I keep coming so I don't have to come back.
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Post by DJgrrl on Dec 16, 2011 17:16:55 GMT -5
If you don't know, ask! John Barleycorn is alcohol which is made from barley and corn.
Oh my gosh.. that was me. I was reading the Big Book and did not know who John Barleycorn was. I kept reading the book.. like a good mystery novel...to find the answer !!
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Post by justjo on Dec 16, 2011 18:21:00 GMT -5
Thanks for sharing DJ, it is nice to know that I am not the only one. I ended up not asking, and finally heard an old timer say, "I bet you are all wondering who John Barleycorn is and are afraid to ask." I know I felt sheepish, even more so when I found out the answer. I was glad he was talking to someone else, so the onuses wasn't directed at me. Good to see you here and posting, please keep coming. Attachments:
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. I will be back looking for Lin and others.