I don't have all the answers!

I was reading today’s Just for today and I thought that it fit perfectly with an email that I received last night.

 

July 21
Surrender Is For Everyone

"If, after a period of time, we find ourselves in trouble with our recovery, we have probably stopped doing one or more of the things that helped us in the earlier stages of our recovery."

Basic Text, p.92

Surrender is just for newcomers, right? Wrong!

After we've been around awhile, some of us succumb to a condition particular to old-timers. We think we know something about recovery, about God, about NA, about ourselves-and we do. The problem is, we think we know enough, and we think that merely knowing is enough. But it's what we learn and what we do after we think we know it all that really makes the difference.

Conceit and complacency can land us in deep trouble. When we find that "applying the principles" on our own power just isn't working, we can practice what worked for us in the beginning: surrender. When we find we are still powerless, our lives again unmanageable, we need to seek the care of a Power greater than ourselves. And when we discover that self-therapy isn't so therapeutic after all, we need to take advantage of "the therapeutic value of one addict helping another."

Just for today: I need guidance, support, and a Power beyond my own. I will go to a meeting, reach out to a newcomer, call my sponsor, pray to my Higher Power-I will do something that says, "I surrender."

pg. 211

            Do you remember when you were a teenager and you thought you knew everything? This is what this Just for today reminded me of. When we first become sober we are learning all these tools to use in our lives to remain sober (our pre-teen years) then down the road in our sobriety we get comfortable-complacent if you will-we think we know everything and can do everything by ourselves (our teen years). When things get tough we don’t call our sponsor anymore or go to meetings or ask for help from our supportive recovering addicts. We are more likely to relapse and then it hits us that we can’t do this on our own we need help! We are sick and can’t not help ourselves, if we had cancer we wouldn’t expect to get better on our own will power; we would go to a doctor. And we shouldn’t expect our willpower to carry us though our sobriety.

            This brings me to the email I received last night, I was asked if I had a doctorate in substance abuse and if I didn’t what made me think I had any right helping anyone in recovery (just a summary of the email). I do not have a doctorate; in fact I don’t have a degree at all in anything. Unfortunately school was one of the things that I lost because of my addiction, along with many other things. Although I might not have a degree I do have my experience with this struggle. This blog is to help me as much as it is to help other addicts realize they are not alone. I am an addict trying to help others in hope to help myself. I don’t have all the answers nor do I think I do.

            We just have to understand this is not easy and we need all the help we can get. I struggle with this disease just like I have always done and many other people do. But today I know and choose a new way of life. I have been sober 9 ½ months thanks to god, my daughter, my family, friends, my sponsor, and other recovery addicts in the groups that I attend.

            To show that I struggle on a daily basis I am posting a journal entry that I wrote just the other day:

                        July 19^th, 2011

I want to just say screw it and get so high right now. They say the longer you are sober the easier it will be, I sure hope that’s right, because I can’t do this. Sometimes I wonder if it would just be easier to go back to my old life, I didn’t have to put up with anyone’s crap because I could just tune it out. Now I have to listen and feel and it sucks. I don’t like to feel, it is the worse feeling in the world. People say “yeah but you weren’t able to feel the good times either” who gives a shit! Right now I would trade a million good times that I can feel for just one more time to not feel a bad time. I sometimes find myself putting that mask up telling everyone. I’m ok, everything’s fine! I just want to go to sleep and wake up and be ok. No more problems, no more hurt, just rainbows and sunshine (yes I really did write that in my journal lol)

(Note: Please understand that this was how I was feeling at the time. We go trough many ups and downs. Right now I am in a good place. It is amazing what talking to someone and just going to sleep can do for you!)

            There is no shame in asking for help. As well as there is no shame in being an addict. We are who we are!

            My mom has a saying that she always tells me “It doesn’t matter what we did or who we were it only matters what we are going to do and who we are going to become.”

            Who do you want to become?

            That’s all I have for today and in the words of Haystak “I stayed strong endured the rough weather, I ain't fully recovered but I’m doing much better” It does get easier!

            For more Just for today visit here -> (http://www.naworks.org/jft.html)

            Haystak my first day (http://youtu.be/tsMEogvaNi0)