Blog entry for:

to build and sustain healthy relationships, was never a goal of mine, way back when i first got clean. although i would have denied it, all i really wanted from my relationships was to get something. whether that something was sex, money, drugs or an ego boost by having someone attractive on my arm, it was always about getting and giving the bare minimum to keep that stuff coming. as i sit in the process of learning to forgive the perpetrator of a childhood event that ended up shaping my identity, i see that maybe, just maybe there is a way to allow my experience as being the toxic member of relationships to guide me in that particular journey.
i may still have more than a few relationships in my life, where i live in the familiar world of getting and not giving, boundary violations and vengeance for imagined harms. when i trip across those or the remnants of those, i have the 12 steps to guide me in finding a different manner in which to act and react. do not get me wrong, i still want what is mine and strive to grasp the stuff that i may feel i am entitled to, even with a minute clean. the difference today, is that i uncover my part in that lifestyle, much quicker than ever before. i know that because of this program of recovery i have the choice to condition down the road to perdition of free myself from the chains of what i think i “need” to do. i am not an expert by any means about HOW to do that, but i am an experienced novice, so there is HOPE for me yet.
moving forward into today, it is time for me to take care of myself and get some miles under my belt. one of the most toxic relationships that are still in my life, is my relationship with me. it is still difficult for me to accept that i am deserving of taking care of myself by being good to myself. there is still a shard of not being good enough that echoes in my head, when i find myself doing something ignorant or totally human. as many of my peers are fond of saying, and this morning i do not disagree, that is the place addiction slips in and starts to work me over. today, and just for today, i think i will deny that part of me, any power and place my FAITH and TRUST in the program that has led me to becoming a partner and not a perpetrator in the relationships that fill my life.

∞ DT ∞