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and Tradition Ten is one of my favorite topics. in the literature of the fellowship that is the place i found and continue to find my recovery, this tradition speaks to who does and does not get to have an opinion. it speaks to the fellowship as a whole having an opinion on any outside issues, which i have come to discover means anything not dealing with the identification and treatment of addiction, through the TWELVE STEPS. it does not, however, constrain me from having an opinion, including how well the fellowship as a whole is living up to this ideal. in fact, this tradition encourages me to have an opinion on everything and share about those things that affect my recovery, which may be just about everything. 😈
this tradition does provide guidelines and strong suggestions about how i share about that shit and when it needs to be done. in an open meeting i would never share my opinion on Drug Replacement Therapy, as i believe that is not an appropriate topic to share about. in this forum i can happily and readily share my opinion, an addict on Drug Replacement therapy is being hoodwinked into believing they are making progress to having a normal life and is NOT clean. it is my very strong opinion that medical professionals are using DRT to make an addict socially acceptable without treating the underlying malady. that addict may not be stealing from unlocked cars to get their fix and might actually have a McJob, but in the long run, it has been my experience that they eventually relapse and end up worse than they were when they started. i have never had to sponsor a man who insisted on using that crutch and when the day comes that i am asked, i will have to consider long and hard if that is a direction i wish to go.
this morning, as i am tripping through my various opinions, some of which were established back in the “work the steps or die, MoFo” days of my local fellowship, i see that they may require a bit of revision to meet the current circumstances. the opinion i elucidated above, however, is not one of those. my opinions about addicts managing chronic pain, or having actual and real mental health diagnoses, rather than the make-believe ones they get assigned to in treatment, certainly have been altered as i watch the men i sponsor, deal with the reality of their lives. i, however, am going down a rabbit hole that i lack the time and desire to find out what is at the bottom. i know that there is one binary thing in the fellowship that i have built my life around, specifically, if i use drugs today, i am not clean. that statement needs no clarification or qualification. that is not an opinion, that is a fact of life for this addict and one that i have lived within for a 9598 days in a row and when today ends, if i allow myself to use the power provided by the POWER that fuels my recovery it will be 9599. anyhow it is time to post this and get working on my next work project and see how much i can accomplish when i put my best effort forward, just for today.

∞ DT ∞