Blog entry for:

the agony and pain of ACTIVE addiction. as i sat down to write this, it was going to be all about those of my peers, who never seem to leave the lobby and move ahead in their lives. then as i paused, i considered why that may be. i cannot cast motives to their behaviors, nor will i judge the “quality” of their recovery. for me, if i was stuck in the “No Matter What” phase of my recovery, i would be a miserable wretch. just the idea of having to deal with the desire to use, day after day, is frightening enough to me. the notion that everyone who uses or walks into the rooms must be an addict, is more than a bit disconcerting. i am certainly grateful that, for me, life in recovery, is more than just staying clean and the desire to use, has left me for quite some time. recovery, at least for me, is the means and the end to a better, more comfortable life, and i am grateful, i did not get “stuck” for very long, in any one phase of this journey, save at the very front door, and i certainly have shared about that before.
as my life gets better, as i get better, those days of of turmoil and angst, as i struggled with the weight of legal consequences and my overwhelming desire to use, fade into the background noise of daily life. i would be willing to wager that the average newcomer does not want to hear that after nearly two decades clean, i still struggle with the desire to use on a daily basis. where is the HOPE in that message, when for me, i very rarely even think about using, much less have the desire to use. i am here for the duration and the very long haul, as evidenced in my commitment to my local fellowship. i can tell you this, If when i finally decided to surrender and admit that maybe i belonged here. i had heard someone with decades clean, sharing about how they struggle daily with the desire to use, i would have been headed out the door, as a grim, dull future under the cloud of a desire to use, was the last thing i wanted, when i finally became a member.
does that mean that i ignore what addiction is, and do not take my recovery seriously? not hardly, but it does mean that i do NOT see myself bifurcated by addiction and recovery. i do not have part of me that is an addict and part of me that is not. one of the greatest gifts of my recovery journey has been the integration of the “parts” into a whole, coherent being. no longer am i Sybil, walking around wondering who and what i am today.
it is certainly true that i grow weary of having to go to meetings and hearing the same stuff, all the time. i wonder when i can just walk away and be okay. then i do remember what it was like when i lived a fractured life, stuck in the need to use every day and all of my thoughts and behaviors being dictated by addiction. i remember the horror of not knowing what the day would bring and what i may have to do, to use. even worse i remember those days in my early recovery when nothing was good enough and i believed life was a punishment instead of a reward. today i really am in for the long haul. i believe that because of the program of recovery i choose to live, my life is better and that life in the rooms, is worth whatever it takes to foster my recovery, including those times when it seems that going to a meeting, taking that call or listening to someone share about how “their disease talks to them.” today i am grateful that i do not NEED to use, and more importantly recovery is not the burden it once was, it is a good day to be clean.

∞ DT ∞