Addiction Recovery

I had a few thoughts on addiction recovery. And seven or eight years ago, I was court mandated to take some classes uh court mandated classes, as well as a requirement to attend a certain number of AA meetings. 

Now, I know that AA has done tremendously magnificent things for a lot of people. I understand that for many people, AA works. And I think that when it comes to recovery, people should use every resource available to them to get the help they need. And any resources or tools that they are open to have the potential to be very helpful. And so if that is AA or NA or whatever that may be for you, I encourage you to embrace that and utilize that. 

AA did not work for me. I remember sitting in there, and by the way, I was in those meetings having absolutely no decision of not drinking. I was drinking every single day. I was engaging in my numbing behaviors every single day. I was not in those meetings as a recovered person so just a little bit of framework for that. 

These AA classes never made much sense to me because if I am trying to not be in a state of mind where I feel like I am a useless piece of shit, it is not helpful for me, personally, to go and invest my time in listening to myself or others, talk about what a piece of shit they are. I understand that may be the only place that someone has available where they can actually talk about these things. And in that case, I think that that is very helpful that can be very helpful because for a lot of people, perhaps they are not willing to seek therapy and the act of being able to express themselves in an AA meeting is very helpful for them. 

And more power to it again, if that's what you need, do it. 

Not helpful for me. 

I also the second issue that I had with the AA meetings was that okay, I'm going to just replace one addiction for another. So instead of me engaging with my numbing behaviors, I am now going to be reliant upon going to weekly meetings or going to daily meetings or whatever. Now I'm gonna be now I'm gonna have to do that…on the regular. Otherwise, I won't be able to stand on my own two feet. Like, it's just to me, it's just replacing one addiction for it other. Yes, a better addiction, for sure. Um, but it's still as I get older, I keep thinking about the sustainability of things. Am I really going to commit to going to AA meetings for the rest of my life? 

No, I'm not. Let's not be…

I get it. If it works for you, kudos. I love that for you. But that was not the situation for me. And I remember at some point hearing some someone that was sober talk about, you know, the things that they do in their life. How they keep themselves busy…all of this. And when I initially started thinking about not drinking, the thing that terrified me the most was, who am I without it? 

How am I gonna go hang out with my friends at the pool and not drink? 

How am I gonna go out for a night of dancing and not drink? 

How? I could not fathom a life that did not involve alcohol. I could not fathom that. 

And the idea that was really scary for me. And I think that the way that I went about getting sober was perhaps different than other people's. 

I started with dry January. I started dry January because it's, you know, a good challenge. You know, I hadn't been sober for a while and maybe that would help my body to recalibrate a little bit. So then, when I started drinking in February, that, you know, it wouldn't take as much alcohol, right? 

So those are the thoughts. 

Also, I had gotten so fat because of a number of things, but particularly a medication that I had started taking, that just packed on the pounds. And even though I had stopped taking the medication and was going to the gym regularly, it was not like when I was in my 20s and started going to the gym, you know. The weight did not come off. And I knew that the amount that I was drinking, the things that I was drinking were a huge caloric intake. So my motivation for dry January was to increase my tolerance to lose a little bit of weight and have have been able to say that I was sober for dry January, right? 

Those were my immediate goals leading into dry January. And I had a friend that was doing it with me and so we were in the muck together and that's how I started it. 

And then as January progressed, I think I always knew that it was gonna be more. But there was a time that during dry January where I really made the decision that I'm going to continue. And I have not turned back. I think the initial mindset of, okay, I'm giving this up for a short amount of time. That allowed my body to equilibrate without the alcohol there. Which then allowed my mind to equitable to a point where I just didn't want that anymore. And because if I had started out by January saying, I am never going to drink again, I wouldn't have made it. Because I am very much one of those people that if you tell me I can't, I'm sure as shit gonna show you I can.

So, by telling myself I can't drink, I can't drink, I can't drink. It would have made it… “oh, yeah? I'll show you” and I would have started right back up. 

But I never did that. 

I always and still always…if I want to drink, I can drink. I have no such restrictions on myself to keep me from doing that. I have not put down new rules or anything like that. 

I don't drink because I choose not to drink. It is as simple as that. That does not align with my current values for my life, which is peace. Top top value is peace in my life. And drinking just doesn't vibe with that. 

That's why I don't drink. 

Again, I think that if I were under strict rules and you can't, you can't, you can't. Then I think that it would make me want to do it more. But that's not the case. I'm so grateful for that. 

My whole point was to like try to get us to think about these things differently. 

Let's maybe see if there's a different approach. Let's maybe see if there are different tools you can use. 

Let's maybe spend some time actually thinking about why we're doing the things we're doing. 

And I started thinking about why am I drinking? I don't know. 

Is there a big trauma in your life? 

Well, no. 

Well, why are you acting like you're an abused child? 

I don't know. 

And then I started wondering if it had just kind of become a habit. and I was just doing it out of habit. And that seemed to kind of fit, but also I knew that I was trying to numb myself from some of the guilt and shame that accompanied some of the other pages that I did while I was trying to numb myself. 

And all of that just snowballs on top of itself and you get stuck in this pattern of thinking that what you're doing is actually helping you to process or helping you to cope or whatever. 

But when I really looked at it, I realized that it wasn't. 

I realized that where I thought that drinking was making me more fun. Well, sure, maybe for the first hour or two. But then the rest of the evening and night and until the following day, I probably said things I didn't want to say.

Said things I didn't mean.

Said things you know, I stirred chaos in some way or another. 

And so the overall experience of the drinking per one night would be not positive. Because however much fun it may have started out to be, which they always do, it didn't end up that way. 

So I started to really kind of look at why I was doing those things. 

But even still, the idea of not ever doing it again, not ever drinking again. It's terrifying. I'm just gonna be some boring person. Like, that's really what I thought. That drinking made me fun and that if I wasn't drinking that I was boring. 

But you know what? I'll take boring. I'll take peaceful and boring any day of the week. versus what life held for me before. Definitely.

May we learn and grow.

Please Prioritize Self-Care and Mindfulness

All My Love,

AbFabNerd