Hello Mandy - I want to tell you that you have made an selfless choice in seeing that you had a problem and putting your children in the hands of family in order to get your life in order. You just have to give it time now. Kids are resilient. They bounce back. Stay on track and in a year or so this moment will be a small blip. At this point you have to focus on yourself, get firm building blocks in place. Get support people in place. Recovery center, therapist who is well versed in helping people over come addiction. also try SmartRecovery.org, meetings. keep an assortment of support people and places. even when you think you don't need them. The support keeps you focused. without it you may do well for a while, but then start slipping in to old habits, patterns. write down some stuff so you have a reference point. if you feel yourself slipping read what you have wrote to give you motivation to continue in sobriety. It is important to stay consistent. your day to day life might seem less stressful now, but children and all of the must haves and things to do and daily routine of school, lunches, dinner, homework, and your meetings, job, etc will become very stressful very quickly. Don't take on too much too fast. don't make promises that are too big to keep. small and consistent is better than failing.
Really great post NTF....very helpful!
