Hi. My name is Jessica. I heard that you have been clean for a lot of years. Were you in N/A the whole time? When did you start to feel "normal" again? I've been clean for a little over a month and I have no energy, I think about pills constantly. I have days were I am really anxious and feel bad. I'd just like to know how you did it for all of these years. It seems like I'll be fighting this battle forever and it's exhausting. I have 2 small children who inspire me to stay clean and I am grateful for that, but it is still a struggle.
Sugarbear, I think the best way to approach this is not to look at it as something you have to deal with for the rest of your life. Look at it as something you have to deal with just for today. Here is my story, take it for what it is worth.
I have been clean and sober for a number of years. Three times since getting sober I have had pain meds for medical reasons: broken leg in 1993 (4 wks); dental surgical infections in 2002 (3 wks) and cancer in 2003-2004 (7 mos). Each time I was able to walk away from the meds by following the same game plan that worked for me when I got sober in 1990.
Getting sober was about the hardest thing I ever did, I will not sugar coat it for you. I had nearly 20 years of drug and alcohol experimentation under my belt at that point dating back to my teen years at the tail end of the psychedelic era. In 1989 and 1990, the economy was in the toilet due to the S&L bailout. People in my line of work were hitting the street in droves. I was about to lose my job, and was on very shaky ground financially. My life was falling apart and this was the culmination of years of drug abuse. My professional life was crumbling and I was powerless to reverse the process.
Two years earlier, I had made a horrible scene at the wedding of a friend and had quite literally lost every friend I had. For years, I had stumbled blindly from one casual relationship to another, and had finally fallen for a girl only to be cruelly rejected when she chose to have an affair with an acquaintance in a manner that would assure my catching them.
I had tried quitting on my own, with some success. I would go for a month, two months, perhaps even longer, but sooner or later, some event would occur, a holiday, a bad day at work, etc, and I would use. I would convince myself that this time it will be different, that all I really needed to do was clean it out of my system and that I would be able to handle it better this time around. I would generally start out with such an incredible binge as to be right back in my old patterns of using within a few days.
I had been told to seek psychological help or get another job, since by that point I was having trouble dealing with several people in the office. After about a year of therapy I began to understand some of the underlying reasons that I felt so bad when I did not use and I also began to understand that the solution was not going to be as simple as willing myself to quit.
On New Years Eve, 1989, between sets at a Grateful Dead concert I stumbled upon a group of dead heads who were completely clean and sober and they invited me to join them. I did not really buy their trip, and they asked me what was my problem? I told them that I was an atheist and really did not want to get into the entire religion trip. One of them turned to me and smiled and said, "We are not about religion, we are about spirituality. Religion is for people who want to get to heaven. Spirituality is for people who want to leave hell." I thought about that for a couple of months while I slid deeper into my addiction.
Finally, on February 27, 1990 I faced up and admitted that I was an addict. I got the phone book and found an NA meeting and showed up. I took their suggestions (I switched to an AA meeting a couple of weeks later because I felt more comfortable there), because it was completely obvious that I was incapable to getting off the stuff on my own.
It was hard work.
They suggested that I do 90 meetings in 90 days. I started to object and explain to them what a high powered, important person I am and they just told me that I had always managed to dedicate at least an hour a day to using, and that I could find a way to dedicate an hour a day to living sober. I didnt like it, but I did it anyway.
I wanted to go back out, to use, just once dozens of times, but each time, I simply redoubled my meetings. There were lots of days when I really felt lousy, but the only commitment that I never wavered on was making at least one meeting a day. Some days the meetings sucked. Most days they saved my life.
They told me to find a faith in a higher power. I read the literature, which can be boiled down simply to try to keep an open mind, and I managed to find a higher power.
They told me to work the steps in every aspect of my affairs and I began to learn the steps.
When I felt bad, they told me that feelings were not facts and that I should act as if. I had no idea what that meant, but I tried to follow their advice. When I could not sleep, they told me that no one ever died of insomnia. I believe that they were correct.
There were many people in the meetings that I did not like. They told me that if you spot it, you got it, and sent me off to work a fourth step on the resentment I was carrying. I learned that most of the criticisms I had of others were things that I was very, very guilty of myself. I learned to tend to my own emotional garden and to work on the issues I had with others from the inside out. I learned restraint of pen and tongue, to resist the urge of pointing out the flaws in others while ignoring the same flaws in myself. I still struggle with this to this very day.
I lost my job as well as my reputation and faced dismal financial failure. They told me that sometimes we will realize that God is doing for us that which we could not do for ourselves. Losing that job was the best thing that ever happened to me. They told me to put one foot in front of the other, to stay in the present, and do the next right thing. I have always managed to exceed the salary I left behind, even during the year that I dealt with the cancer.
Lots of times I just wanted to use very badly. They told me that sooner or later, nothing would stand between me and using other than my faith in a higher power. I cannot emphasize how correct they were on this one. Most of the time, they said what needed to be said in a loving manner. Sometimes they told me to get off my arse and stop felling sorry for myself. I listened carefully regardless of whether or not it offended me and my pride.
I cannot tell you when things began to radically change for me because they did not radically change. I realized that I was a hard case and continued to attend meetings every day for years following that initial 90 in 90.
Looking back, I see that my journey out of addiction was a long one. I had to shed all of my old ways of thinking and doing things and had to learn many lessons that normal people learn before graduating high school. The struggle to be a better person continues to this very day.
However, as the weeks turned into months and the months to years, I gained a sense of balance that I had never had before. I noticed that people began treating me with respect, and the phone rang for the simple reason that many folks preferred an honest, humble lawyer to a rich, egotistical, high falootn one. What I lost in being so impressed with my own brilliance, I seemed to make up for by being down to earth, pragmatic, and straightforward. I learned that each day I must all of my honesty and integrity on the front line of my work and no amount of money is worth compromising these precious commodities.
I took up new interests, and instead of sitting on the sofa thinking of all of the great things that I would do some day, I actually went out and did most of them. I developed new friendships, and became unafraid to try new things, to place myself in the position of abject beginner. I found that I really liked the challenge of learning something new and becoming an expert at it. When I ceased running away, the scorched ground beneath my feet grew lush and green. I had found a new life.
It is possible to break free of the chains of addiction but it is not as easy as swearing the stuff off and promising to never use again--at least it was not this easy for me. I needed a lot of community support to reinforce my commitment to being clean on a daily basis, I needed to learn certain coping tools that I failed to develop due to being behind the barn stoned for 20 years, and yes, without fail, I had to develop a sense of spirituality to deal with the lack of self esteem that 20 years of addiction had robbed from me. I did not want to embark on any of these tasks but I was so desperate to quit that I was actually willing to listen to others suggestions. It turns out that they knew what they were talking about. I used to tell my sponsees that getting sober is not unlike the journey of Odysseus in the Iliad. It is the archetypical journey from childhood to adulthood. It was so worth it in every sense of the word. I know not how I would have coped with my year of cancer without the Steps.
I hope some of this helps. To summarize, if you stay clean, you will eventually feel better. To stay clean, you should not use, even if your arse falls off, and attend lots, and lots of meetings. Remember, commitment is all we have left after the initial adrenalin shot of enthusiasm fails us.
Good luck.
August.
PS: all those friends I lost during that wedding in 1987 gathered around me during my chemotherapy and brought me food, drove me to my infusions and even threw me a party when I went into remission. It took a while, but I eventually got my life back and much more than I ever dreamt was possible.
I have been clean and sober for a number of years. Three times since getting sober I have had pain meds for medical reasons: broken leg in 1993 (4 wks); dental surgical infections in 2002 (3 wks) and cancer in 2003-2004 (7 mos). Each time I was able to walk away from the meds by following the same game plan that worked for me when I got sober in 1990.
Getting sober was about the hardest thing I ever did, I will not sugar coat it for you. I had nearly 20 years of drug and alcohol experimentation under my belt at that point dating back to my teen years at the tail end of the psychedelic era. In 1989 and 1990, the economy was in the toilet due to the S&L bailout. People in my line of work were hitting the street in droves. I was about to lose my job, and was on very shaky ground financially. My life was falling apart and this was the culmination of years of drug abuse. My professional life was crumbling and I was powerless to reverse the process.
Two years earlier, I had made a horrible scene at the wedding of a friend and had quite literally lost every friend I had. For years, I had stumbled blindly from one casual relationship to another, and had finally fallen for a girl only to be cruelly rejected when she chose to have an affair with an acquaintance in a manner that would assure my catching them.
I had tried quitting on my own, with some success. I would go for a month, two months, perhaps even longer, but sooner or later, some event would occur, a holiday, a bad day at work, etc, and I would use. I would convince myself that this time it will be different, that all I really needed to do was clean it out of my system and that I would be able to handle it better this time around. I would generally start out with such an incredible binge as to be right back in my old patterns of using within a few days.
I had been told to seek psychological help or get another job, since by that point I was having trouble dealing with several people in the office. After about a year of therapy I began to understand some of the underlying reasons that I felt so bad when I did not use and I also began to understand that the solution was not going to be as simple as willing myself to quit.
On New Years Eve, 1989, between sets at a Grateful Dead concert I stumbled upon a group of dead heads who were completely clean and sober and they invited me to join them. I did not really buy their trip, and they asked me what was my problem? I told them that I was an atheist and really did not want to get into the entire religion trip. One of them turned to me and smiled and said, "We are not about religion, we are about spirituality. Religion is for people who want to get to heaven. Spirituality is for people who want to leave hell." I thought about that for a couple of months while I slid deeper into my addiction.
Finally, on February 27, 1990 I faced up and admitted that I was an addict. I got the phone book and found an NA meeting and showed up. I took their suggestions (I switched to an AA meeting a couple of weeks later because I felt more comfortable there), because it was completely obvious that I was incapable to getting off the stuff on my own.
It was hard work.
They suggested that I do 90 meetings in 90 days. I started to object and explain to them what a high powered, important person I am and they just told me that I had always managed to dedicate at least an hour a day to using, and that I could find a way to dedicate an hour a day to living sober. I didnt like it, but I did it anyway.
I wanted to go back out, to use, just once dozens of times, but each time, I simply redoubled my meetings. There were lots of days when I really felt lousy, but the only commitment that I never wavered on was making at least one meeting a day. Some days the meetings sucked. Most days they saved my life.
They told me to find a faith in a higher power. I read the literature, which can be boiled down simply to try to keep an open mind, and I managed to find a higher power.
They told me to work the steps in every aspect of my affairs and I began to learn the steps.
When I felt bad, they told me that feelings were not facts and that I should act as if. I had no idea what that meant, but I tried to follow their advice. When I could not sleep, they told me that no one ever died of insomnia. I believe that they were correct.
There were many people in the meetings that I did not like. They told me that if you spot it, you got it, and sent me off to work a fourth step on the resentment I was carrying. I learned that most of the criticisms I had of others were things that I was very, very guilty of myself. I learned to tend to my own emotional garden and to work on the issues I had with others from the inside out. I learned restraint of pen and tongue, to resist the urge of pointing out the flaws in others while ignoring the same flaws in myself. I still struggle with this to this very day.
I lost my job as well as my reputation and faced dismal financial failure. They told me that sometimes we will realize that God is doing for us that which we could not do for ourselves. Losing that job was the best thing that ever happened to me. They told me to put one foot in front of the other, to stay in the present, and do the next right thing. I have always managed to exceed the salary I left behind, even during the year that I dealt with the cancer.
Lots of times I just wanted to use very badly. They told me that sooner or later, nothing would stand between me and using other than my faith in a higher power. I cannot emphasize how correct they were on this one. Most of the time, they said what needed to be said in a loving manner. Sometimes they told me to get off my arse and stop felling sorry for myself. I listened carefully regardless of whether or not it offended me and my pride.
I cannot tell you when things began to radically change for me because they did not radically change. I realized that I was a hard case and continued to attend meetings every day for years following that initial 90 in 90.
Looking back, I see that my journey out of addiction was a long one. I had to shed all of my old ways of thinking and doing things and had to learn many lessons that normal people learn before graduating high school. The struggle to be a better person continues to this very day.
However, as the weeks turned into months and the months to years, I gained a sense of balance that I had never had before. I noticed that people began treating me with respect, and the phone rang for the simple reason that many folks preferred an honest, humble lawyer to a rich, egotistical, high falootn one. What I lost in being so impressed with my own brilliance, I seemed to make up for by being down to earth, pragmatic, and straightforward. I learned that each day I must all of my honesty and integrity on the front line of my work and no amount of money is worth compromising these precious commodities.
I took up new interests, and instead of sitting on the sofa thinking of all of the great things that I would do some day, I actually went out and did most of them. I developed new friendships, and became unafraid to try new things, to place myself in the position of abject beginner. I found that I really liked the challenge of learning something new and becoming an expert at it. When I ceased running away, the scorched ground beneath my feet grew lush and green. I had found a new life.
It is possible to break free of the chains of addiction but it is not as easy as swearing the stuff off and promising to never use again--at least it was not this easy for me. I needed a lot of community support to reinforce my commitment to being clean on a daily basis, I needed to learn certain coping tools that I failed to develop due to being behind the barn stoned for 20 years, and yes, without fail, I had to develop a sense of spirituality to deal with the lack of self esteem that 20 years of addiction had robbed from me. I did not want to embark on any of these tasks but I was so desperate to quit that I was actually willing to listen to others suggestions. It turns out that they knew what they were talking about. I used to tell my sponsees that getting sober is not unlike the journey of Odysseus in the Iliad. It is the archetypical journey from childhood to adulthood. It was so worth it in every sense of the word. I know not how I would have coped with my year of cancer without the Steps.
I hope some of this helps. To summarize, if you stay clean, you will eventually feel better. To stay clean, you should not use, even if your arse falls off, and attend lots, and lots of meetings. Remember, commitment is all we have left after the initial adrenalin shot of enthusiasm fails us.
Good luck.
August.
PS: all those friends I lost during that wedding in 1987 gathered around me during my chemotherapy and brought me food, drove me to my infusions and even threw me a party when I went into remission. It took a while, but I eventually got my life back and much more than I ever dreamt was possible.
August, what a GREAT post..
August, I really love your posts, and I liked the way you put it..."it is not as easy as swearing off and never wanting to use again..."
Also, about learing lessons that some had learned in high school...lol...I am finding I am as emotionally developed as a 15 year old sometimes...
You are an honest inspiration to us..
kerry
Also, about learing lessons that some had learned in high school...lol...I am finding I am as emotionally developed as a 15 year old sometimes...
You are an honest inspiration to us..
kerry
"getting sober is not unlike the journey of Odysseus in the Iliad. It is the archetypical journey from childhood to adulthood."
You make me smile August. M.
You make me smile August. M.
I don't know august but i think you missed your calling.. you're a writer and a good one.. has anyone read those books by that lawyer author? well he better step aside.. august would run him over! lol
