Great and Full

I'm so grateful............

For My Higher Power

That I am sober

My family and I are healthy

I have everything I need

For Beautiful sunny days

J. (who lost her sobriety after 18 years) just moved into a shelter was at a meeting this morning and I gave her my number b/c she is not happy at her new "home"

A posh woman from my gym drove up to the meeting in her v. posh car, scared sh*tless b/c she was coming to her first AA mtg. and I got to walk in with her.

For my friends

That I am hopeful and happy

A process

Somewhere in New Jersey at an AA meeting today:

Me: I'm 4 classes away from my masters and my workout and meeting schedules are all bolluxed up. I have to put my sobriety first and sometimes being an alcoholic just sucks. WAH, WAH, WAH...

F: I learned a lot more from AA than I did from my masters degree.

As I'm walking to my car from the meeting, J. who's moving into a shelter tomorrow says. "Yea, doesn't being an alcoholic suck sometimes? But your sobriety is a gift. I was sober for 18 years and I started to drink again, and for the life of me I can't get sober again."

Later that same day:

Me to my sponsor: I was stressing out about how to do everything I want to do, and be a good mom, and put my sobriety first. Then I remembered that I have a Higher Power and I don't have to worry about all that stuff. I can trust my Higher Power that everything's going to be ok.

My sponsor: Yup, that's right. And what takes you away from AA will be taken away from you by alcohol.

I was being an ungrateful brat. I was jeopardizing my sobriety. I was trying to run the show. I am grateful beyond words to be a part of AA and to get my butt kicked back in line today. Sobriety is a process.

Quickie

I have a class at night now. Mon. Tues and Thurs. It's throwing off my meeting and workout schedule and I'm crochety about it. So I got a big fat candy bar, ate almost all of it and when I peeled away the final bits of wrapper, there was a frickin' larvae type worm thing crawling around. Not the consolation I was looking for. Serves me right for pigging out on chocolate, I learned my lesson. Won't be doing THAT again!

I want this to end. I want to be done being an alcoholic. Pam is right, sometimes sobriety is exhausting. But I want to be sober more than I want to drink so I'm good. Went to a meeting tonight, 3 guys just coming back. It was good to be there. It's a miracle any of us get and stay sober.

I'm going to hold on tight to my program. Gotta go do my homework. Sigh.

ABC's

Ahhh- the work of Lushgurl...I got tagged by Shadow, I'll get you two for this!!!!!

A- Attached or Single? - I don't like that word "attached", but I am
B- Best Friend- J, she's so smart and funny and sweet and loyal and thinks I'm cool
C- Cake or Pie- Cake, carrot cake, canoli cake, chocolate cake
D-Drink of choice- tea, hot or iced and half case of seltzer a week since sober
E- Essential Items- a wire hanger and a swiss army knife
F- Favorite color- green and/or blue or a combo of both
G- Gummi Bears or Worms- Twizzlers are MUCH better than either Bears or Worms
H- Hometown- Ardmore, PA
I-Indulgence- Regular coke, so much caffiene and sugar, so decadent!
J- January or February?- January, a new start.
K- Kids- 2 boys, 3 and half and eight years old, they are my whole world!
L- Life is incomplete without- Love, sex and rock n roll
M- Marriage Date- Nov. 7th, 1998
N-Number of Siblings- 3 most excellent younger bros.,
O- Oranges or Apples?- Apples, sweeter, better texture & crunch for oral fixation
P- Phobias/Fears- Injections, I pass out from them, even if I'm laying down.
Q- Favorite Quote- "Though nothing can bring back the hour of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower, we will grieve not, rather find, strenght in what remains behind". Wordsworth
R- Reason to Smile- waking up sober, hugging and kissing my kids, having a cup of tea, in that order
S- Seasons- gotta be summer. i love the long, hot days, the lazy sunsets, dusk, the garden, night times outdoors, swimming, not having to put layers and layers of clothes on, driving my car with the roof down, ice cream, the heat! (this is Shadow's answer, and I stole it from her)
T- Tags- Hmmm, jeez, I don't know, I'll have to think about that one.....
U- Unknown fact about me- I have psychic abilities
V- Vegetarian or oppressor of animals? - Veggie, but my husband's a carnivore
W-Worst Habit- Not flushing the toilet, it took forever to get hot water after a flush in the house I grew up in. (great way to piss off a bro. havng a shower, hee hee) Hubby's not pleased, but I always blame it on the kids.
X-X-rays or ultrasounds- ultrasounds, aren't Xrays radioactive or something?
Y- Your Favorite Food- cheese and crackers and olives and grapes
Z- Zodiac- Cancer

Looking....

I'm looking for that feeling of spirituality that I had a while ago. I'm praying and reading the BB. I'm sure it's all around me, I just need to tune in. 78 days sober. My HP is definitely with me, I just don't feel as serene and spiritual as I did before. I know it's going to be okay.

My trigger, my son

Sorry this is a little long, and this is the abridged version...haha...

My oldest son L. just turned eight. He is intense. VERY, VERY intense. He has been this way since the second he popped out of my body. He was never really able to soothe himself as a baby and it's sort of continued to this day. This is a MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR trigger for me.

My son has been assessed as "gifted". This is great, but it is also a curse. I think one of the reasons he's gifted is because he takes a lot in. He has invisible feelers, he can pick up on the tension or the joy in a room. He grasps things easily and remembers everything! But it's a burden for him because he feels things intensely. He has moments where he gets "the thing", which is an overwhelming feeling of sadness or worry or anxiety or all of these emotions at the same time. I talk him "off the ledge" so to speak, or I have him draw a picture about it (which has resulted in him being a really great artist) or other things to calm him down. I held him back a year in school because emotionally he was not ready, he was hitting himself in preschool when he got stressed.

I will do anything for my kids and I've gone to great lengths to help my son. Books, therapy sessions, anything, etc. etc. I used to pray for HP to take from me whatever it took to help my son feel good and at peace and to please help my son.

My son is in a tailspin about something right now. Last night I talked to my therapist about it and I'm getting really, really sick of people telling me shit like, let him know you love him, give him reassurance, set limits, talk it out, don't talk it out with him blah blah blah. Eight years I've been doing whatever I can for this kid and it is never enough. His need is bottomless. No matter how much I give, it is never enough for him and he sucks me dry. I am left utterly spent. I need acknowledgment that his needs are special and unique and not the run of the mill bullshit you can hear on Oprah for Pete's sake.

My therapist says maybe he's anxious because I was drinking and couldn't address his needs. Bullshit. And I say no I didn't drink like this eight years ago. I did not drink then to check out. When my son is "off" it's a trigger for me. I'm looking for a way in sobriety to deal with it instead of checking out with a bottle of wine. For fuck sake!

I have a brother with a similar disposition. He was diagnosed as bi-polar or schizophrenic or a combo of the two. I haven't seen or spoken to my brother in three years. He doesn't want me and my other brothers to know where he is because he paranoid. I check the John Doe's in the state where I think he's living to see if there are any unclaimed bodies that might be my brother. He breaks my heart.

I am scared shitless that my son is going to take his first drink and FINALLY be able to soothe himself and become an alky like me, or he'll end up being committed like my brother was. My son is terrific and has a lot of really great qualities, but when something bothers him, it rocks his whole world. When his world is rocking, so is mine. I am too emeshed with him, I feel his pain and hurts.

Sorry for the long rant, I want the peace of mind, acceptance, spiritual solution many of you have found in sobriety. It's the only way I can deal with this particular trigger. I had no desire to drink over this yesterday. 75 kickass sober days!

Working with Others

"Let your friends know they are not to change their habits on your account. At a proper time and place explain to all your friends why alcohol disagrees with you. If you do this thoroughly, few people will ask you to drink. While you were drinking, you were withdrawing from life little by little. Now you are getting back into the social life of this world. Don't start to withdraw again just because your friends drink liquor". BB pg. 102

I have two best friends. The three of us did a lot of "research" trying to disprove that I'm an alcoholic. Believe me, we were thorough in our research. I tried a lot of things, only drinking on the weekends, only drinking light beer, being the designated driver. But alas, on my knees bloody and bruised, I had to admit I am, in fact, an alcoholic. The three of us have only gone out once together in the 73 days since I've been sober. And seriously, they were way more worried about it than I was. They felt like they needed to go to an Al-Anon meeting before we went to dinner. I told them they could carry on as usual, but they would not drink while we were out.

My sponsor says I am lucky that my friends don't feel comfortable drinking around me and that they are giving me a gift I should accept. I'll listen to my sponsor because she knows more than I do. However, I don't think my friends should feel they need to shield me from their drinking. I have my sober peeps on the other end of the phone and I'm in a good place spiritually right now. I'm not trying to put myself around alcohol "to steal a little vicarious pleasure from the atmosphere". I just don't want my friends to feel so awkward when we are together in a nice restaurant celebrating a birthday or something. It's just early days I guess.

Holding Hands

Almost ten years ago, I held my mother's hand as she softly took her last breath. Two years later, I held my father's hand as he faded from consciousness until the doctors made me leave while they unsuccessfully tried to resuscitate him. The following day, my mom's father, my granpop died. Six months later, my brother's brother-in-law died at age 47 of brain cancer.

I was really, really pissed off at God for a while. I couldn't understand why lovely, kind, vibrant people had to be eaten alive by cancer while some dangerous criminal somewhere got to live. Even now, I can hardly bare to think of my brothers' agonized faces as we went through all those losses together.

I still don't understand why all that happens. But I'm not mad at God anymore. I think one of the reasons it took me so long to get to AA is because I just couldn't see how an HP would take care of me, when that HP took so much from me.

Today I found out a mom in my neighborhood is visiting her father in hospice care. He may live about six more weeks. Another family that we're friends with was just told that their mother's stomach cancer is no longer treatable. My "sober sister's" mother's cancer has continued to progress, she is in excruciating pain and will be spending Mother's Day in the hospital. Another sober sister's Uncle died when we were all at a meeting together this Tuesday night. A woman from this morning's meeting is in the hospital and is not expected to make it.

I am grateful that I am sober today so that I can share my experience, strength and hope of terminal illness, loss, grief with some of these people. Maybe that is why I had some of the experiences I've had, to be there for someone and hold their hand. Maybe my HP waited until I was sober to put all these people I can help in my path.

My hands are still shaking from what I just saw. I was coming out of my Dr's office and I saw a guy stumble/fall off of a bus. From the momentum, he continued stumbling into a hedge. Then he bounced back toward the bus. He was like a rag doll, he didn't put his hands down to stop his fall(s). He fell down and I didn't see him anymore. I started to run over to where he was and the bus was about to pull away. A woman on the bus jumped out of the back door of the bus and made the driver stop.

The man's body was on the sidewalk and his head was in the street under the bus. A river of blood was running down the hill from his head. He was drunk, it was 9:00am. The woman ran into the Dr's office and they called 911 and a bunch of doctors ran out. I rubbed his back and told him everything was going to be okay and I'd stay there until the ambulance came. I said a prayer for him and the woman from the bus told me she's NEVER on this bus. I told her she was an angel today, she stopped the bus from running over this guy's head. She said, "Yes, it's the Lord's work that I was here today".

There but for the grace of God go I.

Half Measures

Tonight's meeting topic was "Half Measures". Many people shared that they've gone out because they did not give themselves completely to the program and follow what was suggested to them.

My sponsor told me to call three other alcoholics today. I figured I called her, so that was one. I called another woman and she wasn't home, that's two and I put off the third call until it was too late. Why do I have to call three other alcoholics? I don't know, but if I don't follow through on what my sponsor tells me to do, I'm not giving my recovery 100%. It's simple, call three alcoholics. But it's not easy for me. Isn't that stupid? Guess I'll call six alcoholics tomorrow and put as much effort into my recovery as I used to put into my drinking.

Waterworks

I'm not sure why, but for some reason I started crying at the meeting today, and I couldn't stop. It has something to do with my friend D. We did a lot of drinking together, of course I was always more drunk and more out of control.

She has seen me bloodied and bruised from drinking, literally. She has spoken with my husband when he didn't know what the hell to do about my downward spiral. She spoke to me while I was in the ER as a result of my drinking. She did not have a problem being on the scene when I was a mess.

But now that I am attempting to get my act together, she doesn't want to know from me. I don't understand why. I heard from our mutual friend that D's marriage is still in the shitter, but that she's staying in it unless she meets Mr. Right who will love her and her kids.??? Huh? I feel very, very bad and very sad that her marriage is still a mess and that her kids are in the middle of it all the time. She is very unhappy about her life and also she is depressed about her relationship with me. It's just not the same anymore, we rarely speak. I don't want it to be like it used to be though, I'm not depressed about that.

Not to get bogged down with gory details, but I was with her the last time I drank. We got in a fight because she wanted to go home and I wanted to stay out drinkinkg. The next morning, I didn't remember the details of the fight, just that we had one about drinking. It was then I decided to go to AA and address my "drinking problem".

We spoke about our fight and I thought we were okay. But she doesn't want to hear about my sobriety, or what getting sober is like or anything for that matter. She doesn't seem to be able to handle the fact that I'm not drinking. And I don't know why I couldn't stop crying about it at the meeting today.

PS-Sober family and I are alright, I have not been disowned. :)

On my way....

Thank you so much for those of you who offered your thoughts on my last post. I'm in a little bit of a tailspin about the whole thing, but just a little. I am on my way to a meeting to see a bunch of peeps from my "sober family", so I will find out if I'm in the dog house for skipping their gathering. I'm thinking everything should be okay. All this drama is BS, I don't need this and it's of my own making.

My sponsor actually called me yesterday to tell me what a great time they all had at the gathering and how much I would have liked it. Instead of being crazy and paranoid, and thinking that she is being passive aggressive or some such nonsense, I am going to assume she was just being nice and keeping in touch.

We'll see how it goes...........Hey and on the bright side: 66 days sober!

Peer Pressure

Early this week, my sponsor told me about a "sober family gathering-baby meeting" that her sponsor's sponsor and friends were having today. At first I told her I might go. Then she told me this gathering was taking place in Manhattan. I told her I wasn't so sure I could make it. She told me that everyone would be going to a meeting after the gathering, but we would just head home and skip the meeting.

After a lot of thought, I decided to skip this gathering. I felt that I would only be attending this gathering in response to pressure from my sponsor to do so. I was torn because I want our relationship and my relationship with my "sober family" to work out. By sober family I mean my sponsor's other sponsees, her sponsor and her sponsor's sponsees, my "grand sponsor" etc. We all go to a lot of the same meetings, and we often speak with each other during the week. We all go to a 7:30 meeting on Saturday morning and then our "family" meets and has our own BB meeting.

I am starting a summer course towards my master's degree in two weeks. I only have three or four classes to go to finish this program. This course will be intense and I will be working my ass off, especially on the weekends. I wanted to spend time with my family today, because once this course starts, I am not going to have free time on the weekends.

I explained this to my sponsor. She wasn't so nice about it. She said that she would like to spend time with her family today, too. But that we were strongly, strongly encouraged to attend this gathering. She also told me that if I didn't attend these types of gatherings, my family wouldn't have me around to spend anytime with at all. But that I could decide if I wanted to take her advice or not.

I'm a little pissed off that she didn't respect my boundaries on this one. I'm committed to my recovery and I take her up on her suggestions. If I wasn't taking a course this summer, I would have attended the gathering despite the fact that it's on a Sunday afternoon (what I consider family time). Am I in the dog house now with my whole "sober family"? If so, am I going to have to find a whole new group of meetings? Is my sponsor going to respect my boundaries? Does she expect me to blindly follow her instructions no matter what my gut tells me?

She wants me to call her everyday. If I have nothing to say, I can just leave a message that says, "Hi, it's me and I'm an alcoholic". Do I want to do this? Nope, but I will. I'll go to meetings when I don't want to. I'll do a lot of things I don't want to, but not when I tell her "No, I'm not going to do that". Does that mean I'm not willing to go to any lengths? Does that mean I'm doomed for relapse? I sure as hell hope not.

Obsession, Patience and Procrastination

My obsession to drink has been lifted (for now). But I know it is patient, waiting for me to let my guard down. I can keep that obessesion at bay by being patient and not procrastinating. When I am closely connected with my Higher Power I am content and serene. When I'm losing my patience easily, I need to find my spiritual center.

Like many people, I procrastinate about things I don't want to do or that I find unpleaseant. For example, I'm pretty shy and sometimes I put off RSVP'ing to my son's friends' birthday parties. I put it off and put it off because I'm uncomfortable making that phone call. Then I start to feel stressed because it's getting closer and closer to the party date and this mom still doesn't know if my child's attending the party. Simple things like that I procrastinate about!!! Duh! When I do that, I'm messing with my contentment and serenity. Can you imagine the lather I can get myself into when it's something really bad and uncomfortable?

In sobriety, I've noticed the way I feel physically when I'm inpatient or I procrastinate. I wasn't really aware of these physical sensations when I was drinking. For me, recognizing these sensations and working to act in a way that minimizes them is a growth process. This is the type of growth I was hoping to find in recovery. It's still early days and I'm already evolving towards the person I would like to be.

"Established on such footing we became less and less interested in ourselves, our little plans and designs. More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of His presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow or the hereafter. We were reborn". BB, Chapter 5, pg. 63