A year...A big difference

I have wanted to write this post since April 19^th….I just now have gotten around to it! Sorry guys!

A year ago April 18^th at 5:30 pm I was walking out of Prison.

Until that point when someone would ask me what I was doing a year ago that day, I would flash back to pictures of the chow hall, other prisoners in their fashionable get-ups, and CO’s running our lives…a miserable time in my life.

NOW, when someone asks me, I no longer have to say sitting in prison…I can tell them enjoying time with my daughter and family, being and feeling free, working on myself.

Let me tell you a year makes a lot of difference when you are sober!

In active addiction the hours, days, months, and years are all pretty much the same…they all revolve around addiction.

In my sober life I have seen the changes from a year:

·       I got a job 3 weeks after I got out of prison AND I still have it.

·       I bought a car AND I still have it.

·       Kelli and I moved into our home AND we are still there.

·       I was sober for Kelli’s 6^th birthday AND I will still be sober for Kelli’s 7^th birthday.

·       I was sober for the start of kindergarten AND I am still sober as kindergarten ends.

·       I have actually seen Kelli grow…every day she wakes up I swear she is another foot taller!

·       I have a relationship with my friends and family that grows stronger every day.

·       I have friends that are there for ME not the DRUGS, and that love ME not what I can give them

There are so many things that have gone on in this year that I could not possibly list them all. Good and bad…BUT the difference this year has made is that when the bad times come I know that I do not have to use because of them. Today I have a choice and that feels so great!