Tag: MondayBlogs

Our writer has lost his voice

I feel that I’ve lost my voice in my writing. Since I started this blog, my posts have been largely confessional in nature. Early on, a lot of my posts were about my struggles with various aspects of the 12 Step world as I understood it at the time. Some, but not all, of those misgivings arose from my own misunderstandings of things.

Between years four and five I became much more comfortable with the program, largely as a result of allowing myself abandon the god of my childhood and embrace my own understanding of the mysteries of the universe. And as a result, my writing slowed. But that’s not the only reason.

Over the past two years there have been a series of events in my life that have been incredibly difficult. These events have involved not just me, but my family. They are our story, not exclusively mine, and because they involve others I have not felt that it was appropriate to write openly about them.

This has been difficult for me, because writing about my own struggles has been therapeutic, and I don’t enjoy the cathartic release that came from sharing my story when I keep it inside me. I have shared some of these details with trusted confidants and in meetings, but by and large they have not been on public display.

I have struggled with what to post here. On several occasions I have written a post and sat on it only to decide ultimately that it was not mine to share without the consent of others involved. I know this the right thing to do, but it’s not easy to restrain from publishing.

And so, I find myself at a crossroads. I am not sure that the stories I have to tell are mine alone to tell and I am not sure how to sanitize them in such a way that I can share them. I would like to continue this blog, but I struggle to come up with content that I feel is safe to share at the moment.

I suppose this is growth — this awareness of others. In the past, I might have simply published without regard for the others involved in the stories. I am sure there is a balance somewhere, but, for the life of me, I haven’t been able to find it recently.

Posted on by damien 5

Day-Dates, Reclamation, & Courage and Strength

On Saturday, my wife and I took a drive over to Easton, MD and had lunch at one of our favorite Italian restaurants, Scossa. We ate lunch outside, despite it being 48 degrees. Admittedly, it is a bit odd to eat lunch outside in January wearing our winter coats, but it’s as close as we are coming to normal right now.

Yesterday, we met my brother and his wife and son for a walk at Cromwell Valley Park, north of Baltimore. We did a two mile walk and found an old rusted out car chassis. The engine block was an in-line six. The markings on the block suggest that it was a Chevrolet built in 1948 or 1948. Nature is at work reclaiming the natural materials that were used to build that car. It may take hundreds of years but nature always wins.

Today, I’m thinking about Martin Luther King, Jr. Our own African American pastor spoke about Dr. King eloquently yesterday and shard a recording of Dr. King speaking about his kitchen table experience in 1956, in which he talks about receiving a call around midnight with an ugly death threat, and finding the strength and courage to continue with his mission by calling on his God. My heart aches at the fact that we are still wrestling with white supremacy in this country, but I know that “the arc of the moral universe is long and bends toward justice.”

I am grateful for the day-date with my wife on Saturday, it was time together that was much needed. I’m grateful for the time with my brother on our walk yesterday, and nature’s gentle reminder that she always wins. And I’m grateful for the courage and strength of leaders which inspires me to be brave and strong.

Posted on by damien 0

Courage, Rebellion, and a Universe that has Your Back

Something that isn’t talked about enough in the rooms of the recovery community — courage. It takes courage to admit that we have a problem. It takes courage to ask for help. It takes courage to leave behind old habits and old coping mechanisms. It takes courage to get honest with ourselves and others. It takes courage to get sober or get clean.

In some ways, getting sober is a radical act. I mean, one day I was drinking to excess and the next day I made a decision not to drink. And while we use the one day at a time mantra, I knew that I was making a life decision. I knew that I was making a commitment not just fit the day, not just for the foreseeable future, but really for every day of the rest of my life. I knew that in my core.

Getting sober was an act of protest against the substance that had been my tyrant for so long. An act of rebellion. I put my foot down and said, “Enough! I can’t live like this anymore!”

But I didn’t do this on my own. I needed help. I needed people to show me the way. I needed people to lean on. People to call when things got rough. Because, let’s face it, rebellion is a hard road. There are times when we need support. A kind face. An open mind. Someone to listen. Someone to hear. Simone to cry with.

Last Monday, I had one of those hard days. Things went off the rails with my son. I lost my temper. I was angry and escalating the situation — it’s telling that a week later I can’t even recall what the argument was about. And the I paused. I took a breath and left the Hoise for a walk, right after setting dinner in the table.

I went for a long walk and was contemplating the concept of a higher power. Contemplating how the God of my childhood had been a failure and how I had let that go. I was thinking about the mystery of the universe, and thinking about how things always seem to work out. My faith in things getting better is definitely part of my higher power.

The universe has your back.

The thought crossed my mind, just as I was looking at the liquor store where I’d been a regular customer. I kept walking, down an old rails to trails path in my town when I came upon two friendly faces from the rooms sitting outside a local coffee shop.

“How’s it going?”

“Shitty,” I said as I pulled up a chair.

We talked briefly and it felt good to let it out. There was something cathartic about talking about my feelings and frustrations, if only for five minutes. I said I needed to be going and that I was planning to go to a meeting that night.

Both men got up and gave me a hug. Hugs have been sparse in this COVID-19 world and while I’ll admit that they felt damn good, I also felt guilty for accepting them, and vaguely worried that I’d unknowingly exposed myself to the virus.

But, mostly I felt good. Even courageous and rebellious people in recovery need hugs and support.

The universe has your back.

Posted on by damien 2

Permission to Grieve

Before I begin, I want to say, categorically, that I’m not going to pick up a drink. When I think about the escape that alcohol provides, I can’t help but remember the emotional prison where it held me hostage for so long.

But I’ve been thinking.

Thinking about drinking.

Mostly it’s grieving. Grieving for things I can’t have right now.

I’m remembering the times when booze was fun. When I didn’t really have a problem with it. My 20’s. That sweet time after college when I had few responsibilities and just enough money for a little fun, when a spring day meant a mountain bike ride around Loch Raven culminating in a spontaneous barbecue in the alley in the Charles Village.

I’ve been thinking about these things, because COVID-19 makes them impossible. I can’t have friends over. I can’t go on a mountain bike ride with friends and have a barbecue afterwards. I can’t even see my family.

And while booze is something I’ve decided I can’t have (and I am quite certain about that) I have found myself going back to memories of easier times — fond memories of spring days like the ones we’ve been having here in Maryland and those memories involve beer and friends.

But the grief really isn’t about the beer. It is about the lack of connection with friends. It’s about how absolutely awful things are right now. The days blend together making every day feels the same. Every day has a background buzz, a continuous stream of bad news. Every day is more news about death, the spread of the disease, and our federal government’s abject failure to respond to the crisis appropriately.

Thank God for our governors. Real leadership is taking place at the state level and filling the vacuum created by the current federal administration’s complete and utter failure to lead. One shining star in this crisis has been my state’s governor, Larry Hogan. Today he announced that he’d brokered a deal with a South Korean firm to get 500 thousand test kits for Maryland.

In all of this, my mental state has been deteriorating. I’ve found myself sleeping later and longer than usual. I’ve found that I’m not motivated to do the things that bring me joy. I haven’t written a post here in over a month. I’m not playing the guitar. I’m less motivated to cook. I haven’t been running or cycling.

I recognize these as classic signs of depression setting in.

So today I made a bit of a change. I got to the end of the day, things felt incredibly heavy. My wife had picked out a dish for dinner that was in the latest Bon Appetite. I was feeling kind of grumpy about making it to be honest. So, at 5:30, I did the one thing that I know will make things better pretty much every time.

I went for a run.

I went out for a run with no specific training regimens in mind. Not intervals. Not a specific distance. No fucks given about my heart rate. I just ran.

And it did make things better.

When I got back, I talked with my neighbor for a few minutes, and that made things better too. Then I went inside and cooked these amazing shrimp tacos. We had a great dinner and I hit the shower and then a Zoom meeting.

I’m making a commitment to myself to do more runs. To make some phone calls. To cook more adventurous meals rather than subsistence cooking just to get calories in the body. I’m going to work to make life as close to normal as it can be while things are decidedly not normal.

And at the same time, I’m going to work to go easy on myself and my family. To wear life as if it were a loose garment.

We have to recognized that things are not normal. We have to recognize that we need to be gentle with ourselves. We have to give ourselves permission to not be firing on all cylinders every moment of every day.

And we have to be able to grieve. Even if that grief is for things that we no longer really want — because this is a fucked up time that we’re all living through.

Posted on by damien 6

Semi-Viral

“People need to hear your story.”

“What do you mean, bud?”

“People need to hear your story. I think it’s inspirational. I mean you used to be a guy who didn’t do much besides go to bars and get drunk. Now, you do cool things. You love your wife, spend time with your son. You run. You hike. You bike. People need to hear your story.”

“Well, bud, some do. They hear it on my blog. They hear it at meetings. It’s why I have so many followers on Twitter.”

“Dad, you’re semi-viral on Twitter. Anyone with more than 1000 followers is semi-viral.”

“Well, that’s why people follow me on Twitter, bud. Because they get to hear my experience, strength, and hope there. And that’s why they follow me.”

I had this conversation with my son on Saturday as we finished a run that I’d made him go on. Not a long run. Not a fast run. An easy walk/run exercise to try to get him interested in running.

He fought me when I suggested it. He’s 12. He doesn’t want to run with his father. He doesn’t want to run at all. But I know it will be good to help him develop a habit of exercise. No one ever taught me this important life skill. I’m trying to break that cycle in the family.

He’s right. People do need to hear my story. People need to hear all our stories. And telling our stories is important. It’s cathartic. It helps us process the pain that caused us to drink or drug in the first place.

Sharing our stories helps others who may be struggling with similar challenges. As I’ve learned to get vulnerable and share from the heart in meetings, I’ve had many people tell me that my story gives them hope. Hope that they too can get sober. Hope that they can stay sober when the going gets tough.

I have heard enough stories in my recovery community that are like mine to know that I’m not unique. There are thousands, no millions, even hundreds of millions like me, who have given up the drink or the drug and are living extraordinary lives. We are the lucky ones.

But, in the eyes of my son I am extraordinary. That’s all I can ask for. Small recognitions from my son that I’m living up to my Higher Purpose, being a good husband and father. Doing the next right thing.

In the eyes of a 12 year old having thousands of followers is important.

Semi-viral.

Here’s to being semi-viral.

Posted on by damien 5

Skiing with the Scouts

A mounting sense of dread came over me as the weekend approached and I came to terms with the facts. I’d be driving four hours each way to a scout trip where the main activity would be skiing or snowboarding. I’d be giving up control of my weekend for the sake of my son and that of the troop.

Meals would be planned, and I wasn’t the planner. Sleeping arrangements would be first come, first served. I would not be the only one snoring in the bunkhouse. There would be communal bathrooms. The key to scouting is to keep the kids fully engaged, which meant that there would be very little downtime. And with 21 kids on the trip, it was going to be loud. I knew all of this when I’d signed up, but I had still volunteered to be a chaperone because I knew that if I didn’t, it was unlikely that my son would agree to go on the trip, and I wanted him to go on the trip.

It had been a while since he’d been on a Scout trip and his enthusiasm was waning. Over the weekend, I told another parent and a leader “Scouts teaches many meaningful life lessons to boys, not the least of which is that meetings suck but are required for successful outcomes.” My boy had only been to scout meetings and service hours since September. Not surprisingly, he was beginning to hate Scouts and frequently refused to go to the weekly meetings in January and February.

And then there was the the inherent risk of the main activity. No, not the risk of serious bodily injury. While there is risk associated with snow sports, that was not my main concern. My son wants to be an instant expert at everything that he tries and frequently when he isn’t an instant expert, he grows frustrated, talks negatively about himself, and gives up. I’ve witnessed this many times before and I knew that the probability of the weekend ending this way was statistically high.

Two weeks ago, in an effort to head this off, we’d gone on a snowboarding trip over Presidents’ Day weekend. I knew that the weekend would be busy on the slopes and so I’d done all the right things. I’d booked private lessons and paid for rentals and lift tickets in advance. When we arrived at the resort Friday night we’d picked up our rental equipment the night before our first day so as to avoid the clusterfuck that would certainly be the rental lines in the morning.

I had gone into that weekend with high hopes that we’d both learn enough to enjoy a few runs down an easy trail on the mountain. I’d envisioned myself snapping selfies of the two of us on the chair lift, and gently carving down the hill together. A real 2020 Norman Rockwell father and son kind of weekend. It was a shit show.

When it became clear to the instructor that my son needed more help than me, he directed his attention to my son. I was grateful for that. Hugo worked diligently with Mr. Grey for nearly 90 minutes. And at the end, Mr. Grey still could not get up on the board on his own, let alone slide down the bunny slope. I suggested that we take a break and get some lunch. That’s when I discovered that my wallet was missing. (After much panic on my part, my wife found it at the lost and found, complete with all my credit cards and money.)

After lunch I worked with my son for a while, but when he was getting frustrated enough that he was yelling at me, and I was starting to yell back at him on the side of the slope, we called it quits. I can’t recall if we’d even tried on day two or not. I think we did, but I have blocked it from my memory.

Expectations can be a killer for a guy like me. When my expectations were not met, I found myself wanting to go down to the lodge bar and order a bucket of bourbon. I’ve found that when I give those cravings space to exist, and then voice them, they go away, which is what I did that afternoon.

So, I had been ruminating on the events of Presidents Day going into this past weekend. And I was expecting disaster.

Mr. Grey and I had separate lessons. About mid way through my lesson, he showed up in tears on the side of the hill. There was no doubt about it, my lesson was over. And I was okay with that. I’d already fallen on my tailbone and I was beginning to doubt whether I really wanted to learn to snowboard or not, considering that I knew I could ski.

Over a Cherry Coke and a Kit Kat bar, we discussed whether or not to try more boarding or to get skis. Mr. Grey said he wanted to try skis. So we went back to the rental shop and traded in our boards for skis and went outside just in time for a leader to tell us that it was time to meet as a troop for lunch.

While at lunch, I discussed the situation with the leader who had organized the trip, who was also an avid skier. Brian agreed to try to teach Mr. Grey to ski and spent about 45 minutes with him before Mr. Grey threw in the towel. It was 1:30 on Saturday. We had the rest of the afternoon and the evening to fill and I was worried.

I fully expected my son to say that he wanted to go home, which would have been impossible because we had another scout in our car and there was no other car with space for him to ride home. I also fully expected that my son was going to demand that I stay by his side for the rest of the day. In an instant I saw not one but two ski trips gone south.

Mercifully, before I could get caught up in my own head, some of the scouts my son’s age were also tired of skiing and he synced up with them to go tubing and to play video games for the rest of the afternoon.

I went skiing.

I hadn’t been skiing in 17 years, but it came back like riding a bike. I spent the rest of the afternoon enjoying the slopes with a few other adults from the troop. We had dinner (taco salad which was surprisingly good) and went back out under the lights. I hadn’t skied at night since grade school, but it was fantastic. I skied until 8:30 when I was tired and cold. I called it a night after the fastest run down one of the steepest slopes and returned to the cabin.

The next morning, after breakfast, we skied for another two hours and then drove the four long hours home. I arrived home around 5:30 and my son told me that he was bummed that the weekend was over. He said he didn’t want to go to school. I told him that I didn’t want to go to work either.

While we were on the first trip, Mr. Grey asked me, “Dad, why did you stop doing all the cool things you do?” I asked him what he meant. “Well, you played guitar and stoped. You skied and stopped. You were an artist, and you stopped drawing.” I looked at him and said, “Well, sometimes when someone starts drinking, they stop doing all the cool things they used to do. But, I’m picking up those old things again now that I’m not drinking.”

There is a part of me that gets a bit regretful about that. But I do not regret my past. I’m just grateful to be able to do these things again. And as I reflect on this past weekend, I’m overwhelmed by my good fortune. We only have a short time on this stone hurling through space and we might as well make the best of that time.

Posted on by damien 3

Feelings and Fentanyl

It’s been over a week since I was released from the hospital. Generally, I’m feeling much better. I’m still a little weaker than normal, a fact I was reminded of by a short hike yesterday.

While I was in the hospital I had some strong feelings. Feelings that I haven’t had in a long time. Old feelings that no longer serve me. And yet there they were. Gnawing at me from the inside.

I had a lot of support from friends and family during my hospital stay. I had text messages, phone calls, flowers from friends across the country, tweets, and in person visitors. I felt lifted up. Supported.

And I felt unworthy. I felt that I didn’t deserve the support that I was getting. I felt like I was too much of a burden for folks. Not because anyone made me feel that way — everyone attempted to make me feel the opposite actually — but my own self talk told me that I didn’t deserve the love and support I was receiving.

It’s been suggested to me that I wouldn’t stand for a stranger talking to me the way my internal speaker does.

It’s true. I’d tell anyone who told me the things my own mind says to me to fuck right off. And yet, when I’m in a foul mood, or when things aren’t going very well, my internal dialogue goes straight for the jugular.

I don’t think I’m alone in this. Some might call this “alcoholic thinking,” but my experience tells me that nearly everyone has these internal doubts. I believe it’s part of the human condition rather than a feature of my addiction.

The difference between me and someone who hasn’t suffered through an addiction is how we have addressed those thoughts. I used to cover them up with a heavy salve of alcohol. And it worked for a while, until it didn’t. And when it didn’t, it was terrible.

It was terrible because it just made the self doubt, the self hatred, worse. I knew that I was fucking up my life and the lives of the people who I loved the most, and I was powerless to stop it. Until I wasn’t.

When I made the decision to get sober and acknowledged that I was powerless over alcohol, I reclaimed some measure of power. I may be powerless over alcohol, but alcohol no longer holds power over me.

Some may argue that this is delusional thinking, that it’s is my disease talking, but I know it to be true. I know that I don’t ever want to be where I was again and that I’ll go to any lengths to avoid it. I also know that i can’t live my life in fear.

After I woke up from surgery in the post-anesthesia care unit (PACU), the nurse offered me pain medication. At first, before the anesthesia wore off, I said I was fine. But as the anesthesia left my body, the pain became real. It was a 10. I asked what they would give me.

Fentanyl.

I looked at the nurse and said, “I’m kinda scared of Fentanyl.”

Before I could go on she said, “that’s because of what you read.”

“No, it’s because of what I’ve seen. I’m in recovery. I don’t want to get addicted to Fentanyl.”

The nurse assured me that they would not let me get addicted to Fentanyl. She told me that they could give me micro-doses and that they would stop giving me any once I said the pain was better. And she told me that once I was out of the PACU I would not be given any more. They couldn’t give it to me in my room.

I was never into opioids or opiates. Frankly, they always just made me tired. I never enjoyed a high from an narcotic in my life. I knew this in my bones.

I had a decision to make. Agony or Fentanyl. Trust in modern medicine or not. Trust my own previous experiences with opioids and opiates or buy into the stories and fear that I’ve heard so many times in the rooms.

I chose Fentanyl.

They gave me three micro-doses and the pain subsided. I was in the hospital for another two nights and didn’t need any more narcotic pain killers. In fact, by the next morning I didn’t even need Toradol, a NSAID similar to Ibuprofen delivered intravenously.

I never had any cravings and don’t believe that I was negatively impacted by accepting the Fentanyl. It served an immediate medical need, and the dosage was supervised. I did not feel high — I just didn’t feel the pain. The drug did its job.

Would I do it again in a similar situation? Probably.

That said, I understand that others in recovery might choose differently. I also understand that for others it would have represented a huge challenge and possibly led to a relapse.

As for the thoughts of being unworthy, I’ve begun processing those in therapy. I don’t know that I’ll every rid myself if the negative self talk, but I do recognize it when it’s happening and can call bullshit on it in the moment. It’s progress.

I’m grateful that for me, my experience with Fentanyl was not a problem and didn’t lead me to a relapse.

I believe addiction and recovery exist on spectrums. That’s why no two stories are identical. There are many paths up the mountain.

Posted on by damien 8

Fragility, Acceptance, and Patience

We are fragile creatures. We like to think that we are at the top of the food chain, the apex predator, the all powerful human beings, but in reality we are sensitive little organisms going about our lives as this tiny planet spins around on its axis orbiting one of billions of stars in the expansive universe. And we can be conquered by organisms that we can’t even see with our naked eye.

I have been reminded of this over the past week as I’ve sat in a hospital bed, tethered to an IV drip of a cocktail of antibiotics, saline and non-narcotic pain medications.

About a week ago I did something that millions of people do every day — something that I’ve done hundreds of times before in my life without incident — and it landed me in the hospital.

I plucked a nose hair.

Yes, I plucked a nose hair and set off a series of events that I could not predict nor control. The small trauma inside my nose was invaded by a virulent microorganism that appeared to be resistant to antibiotics. I began to feel pain on Monday last week and thought I had a pimple on my nose, but there was no evidence of one. By evening, my nose was starting to swell and looked a bit pink. Tuesday morning, it was swollen and red and I went to urgent care. That afternoon I found myself leaving the ENTs office with instructions to head straight to the ER for a CT scan. I was admitted to the hospital that night.

After 48 hours of two of the strongest antibiotics we have available, I was still getting sicker and my nose had ballooned up to the size of a golf ball. I had cellulitis (an infection of the soft tissues) and an abscess forming. I had surgery on Thursday evening and felt relief from the pressure within a few hours.

I’ve had a lot of time to think about acceptance while was in the hospital.

We were supposed to leave for a vacation on Thursday. It was abundantly clear on Wednesday that we would not be able to go. In the past I would have felt that it was unfair. That I’d been wronged. That surely someone was responsible. And that I was owed something by the universe.

I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to having a little self-pity party on Wednesday. But it was clear that there was nothing I could do to change my circumstances. It was clear that I’d only create more misery for myself and others if I got angry and frustrated about it. So, I spent some time feeling the disappointment and practicing letting go.

On Friday, after surgery, when I was staring to feel better, I started to have the self pity again. My situation sucked. There was no way around it. I’d been stuck inside for days — hadn’t left the room in days — I felt trapped and annoyed about things. But I knew that I needed to accept the current situation and I needed to not judge it.

I got past my self pity when I found way to get connected to the program of recovery. On Wednesday I reached out to friends in recovery and this agnostic asked for, gasp, prayers. Yes, it’s true. As I mentioned in my post on the eleventh step, my understanding of what constitutes prayer has changed and I’m now comfortable asking for them, and accepting them when I need a little help.

On Thursday the program came to me. I got a lovely text from a gentleman who I’d told my story to a month ago — a friend of a friend whom I’ve never met in real life — with a picture of his 1 month chip and a note of thanks. This little message lifted me up and reminded me that small actions can have big impacts.

Friday afternoon, I worked from my hospital bed to connect a young man who I know in recovery with some resources in the city where he will be attending college. It turns out that one of my connections at my alma mater, Penn State, who is the faculty coordinator for the collegiate Recovery Center on campus knows the coordinator of a similar group at my friend’s school.

By getting out of myself, and finding ways to be of service to others, I was able to pass my time here in the hospital in a productive manner and make a difference for other people.

There have also been some lessens in patience for me here. As I mentioned I was admitted on Tuesday and had surgery on Thursday. I would have liked to have had surgery sooner, but it turned out that the abscess just wasn’t ready and surgical intervention prior to Thursday would have been pointless. And so we waited. And my nose got more swollen, and more painful.

After surgery, I had two full days of sitting in that small room, waiting to be released. Again an exercise in patience. I was physically healthy enough to leave on Friday but wasn’t released because cultures take time to grow. And my doctor wanted to ensure that we had the right treatment in place before sending me home. So I waited. My patience was thin, but I reminded myself that getting out of the hospital only to have the infection come back would be worse.

So I made some calls to friends in and out of the program. I texted with a friend new in recovery. I took laps around the floor. The decision was not mine to make and it would come when it came.

On Sunday morning I woke to the news that my cultures were done and they had a treatment plan. I was sent home at 10:00 AM, with a prescription for a ton of antibiotics over the next ten days.

This too shall pass.

Posted on by damien 6

Step 12: Give Others Hope

Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Fundamentally, the 12 Steps are a roadmap for change as well as a guide for living a rich and full life. Whether one calls it a spiritual awakening or something else is immaterial. Some folks do feel that they have undergone a monumental psychic shift as the result of working through the steps. Others feel that the change is more subtle.

I personally suspect that the degree to which one feels a change is highly dependent upon how circumstances of their active addiction. For an addict who found himself or herself living on the street, steeling to survive, and living in constant fear, the shift is undoubtedly monumental. But for others who managed to keep their outward lives together while they suffered existential dread internally the shift may seem less dramatic, at least from outward appearances.

Personally, it took more than the 12 Steps for me to feel a fundamental shift in my outlook on life. Specifically it has taken the support of friends and family as well as trauma therapy. I began trauma therapy about nine months ago and as I’ve learned what triggers me, how to recognize with these triggers, and how to be with these triggers in the moment, I have felt a calmness that I’ve never known before in my life.

Many people do find this calmness through the 12 Steps. I didn’t. I felt just the opposite for a long time because the 12 Steps tripped my triggers. I am triggered by the word God. I am triggered by the the notion of an omniscient, omnipresent, and benevolent deity. The root of these triggers are in my life experience. I suffered spiritual trauma when I was told that my birth father could never go to heaven because he died of suicide. Additionally, my life experience is at odds with the idea that there is a benevolent deity directing the world — my direct experience is the opposite. The universe is chaos.

And yet, I’ve learned to accept this. I’ve learned that even if the universe is chaotic, it can still be a power greater than myself. I’ve learned that the mystery of the universe shows me that there is something more out there. Something that deeply connects us to all other things in the universe.

Recently, I was reminded of the scientific Law of Conservation of Mass, which states that matter can not be created or destroyed. When I consume food, that matter gets converted into either cells in my body or waste. For my rational brain, this is proof enough of the interconnectedness of everything in the universe.

For the past few months, I’ve been attending a Unitarian Universalist church and have found in this church a welcoming of my skepticism. It’s as if I suddenly found a bunch of people who think like me. Who suspect that there is something out there but who may not always be sure. The church is welcoming of theists, non-theists, atheists and agnostics. There is very little dogma. They don’t tell me how to believe. And that’s what I needed. This is my spiritual tribe, at least for now.

Importantly, I couldn’t have considered attending this church without going through the therapy process. I needed to deprogram old thinking and old patterns of behavior that no longer served me.

In the 12th step, we are asked to carry the message to other alcoholics. I believe the message is simple. There is a way out of the horrors of addiction and we can have a happy, healthy, and full life without the bondage of addiction. In short, it is a message of hope.

That is what I felt when I came into the rooms in 2015, a great sense of hope. Hope that I could turn things around. Hope that I could feel better. Hope that I could get the monkey off my back. Hope that I could be free. Hope that I might live past fifty years old.

Interestingly, when I was in high school I knew the importance of hope. In a very dark time I scrawled out a short poem that likened life to a matchstick. It shines bright and strong. Intense and dramatic after being lit. And then it’s over. The poem asked the question, if there’s nothing more than this life “why even spark the match?” Years later, one of my teachers found this poem tucked inside my old social studies book and got it to my mother.

And so, when I was confronted in therapy with the question, “what does a God provide to people who believe?” I knew the answer even if I wasn’t ready to accept it. The answer is hope and meaning.

And hope was vital. Without hope, my recovery would not have been possible. And so, even if I don’t like the words, I’ve had what one might call a spiritual awakening.

We need to be able to see that there is a way out of the things that we struggle with. We need to see that our struggles are part of the human condition. All humans struggle with “character defects.” All humans have problems with their egos. All humans have thoughts that if given voice might cause others to pause, to be taken aback. There is nothing unique or special about alcoholics and addicts that predisposes us to these things. The difference is how we have attempted to cope. Alcoholics and addicts have attempted to numb the pain of being human. But numbing the pain doesn’t make it go away.

What helps in times of struggle is the belief that the present reality won’t always be the reality. That things can and will get better. It doesn’t matter what the struggle is — it may be addiction but it may be something else — the message of hope is the answer.

I carry the message of hope with me in my daily life. Through my words and actions, I share it with others who are struggling. Sometimes in one on one conversations, sometimes in tweets with the RecoveryPosse on Twitter, and sometimes here on this blog.

Posted on by damien 5