Blog entry for:

and certainly an addict every single day.
as i was sitting here thinking about this, this morning, i flashed back to last night and what i heard and shared about at the meeting. it was certainly a foreshadowing of this reading, as i felt the need to respond to a few of the newer members, members that can still count their their days in double digits, when they spoke of the insanity of starting to believe they somehow has changed the basic fact that keeps me coming back. that fact? I AM AN ADDICT, PERIOD!
that fact is not in dispute, at least not today, but for me it was not always like that. denial allowed me to use for far longer and to a greater extent than was certainly very healthy for me. stubbornness and refusing to accept some truths about me, made my early recovery the hell it was, and landed me in the wrong set of rooms. only once i finally accepted the notion that drugs may be a problem, did i start my journey to accepting the cold hard fact that this little ditty started off with. BTW:

Brenda E
Thank you for 24 years CLEAN
You show me that it is possible to be more than just another…
Congrats my friend and Keep Comin' Back!

so in my just for tomorrow share last night, i spoke at length about how i got here and forgot to say, why i stay. the reading yesterday was more about why i am still here after a few days clean, and not what it was glued my a$$ to the chair, when i finally decided that maybe, just maybe, staying clean was a task worth undertaking. so why would i ever desire to be called an addict? why in the name of all sensibility would i take on that label. after all, the low esteem that society hold people of that ilk, should be more than enough for me to shy away from taking any of that on. that notion alone could be so damaging to my self-esteem, that i might feel the need to put on a qualifier or two, whenever i identify myself at a meeting. yes i am an addict in recovery, but for me, sugar coating that, to assuage my flagging self-esteem, speaks to the problem and not the solution. for me, it is simpler to be what i am, and not be dismissive of those notions, in fact it could be, because i do not soften that blow, i GET to have another day in recovery.
i may be an addict. i will always be an addict. I DO NOT, on the other hand, have to live my life in active addiction. that is the fulfillment of the promise of the fellowship i am recovering within. that is enough, at least just for today, to keep me coning back, and that is sufficient to allow me to choose to do the next right thing. yes the newcomer may be the most important person in the room, but without those of us who are here now to give away what we have, what hope, if any do they have? it is those of us, who have a day or two clean, that provides what the newcomer needs, and they give us the HOPE, that like us, they too, can stop using, lose the desire to use and find a new way of life. the day i get “cured” will be the day i walk into a legal purveyor of this or that and say, today is a great DAY TO GET HIGH! well that day is not today, and it is time to pack this in, and get headed on down the road, an addict still and grateful that i can live up to that lable, just for today.

∞ DT ∞