Category Archives: AA

Which Person are You?

Posted in AA, Alcoholics Anonymous, Recovery, Sobriety by

Program of ActionIts 4:17 in the morning. I’ve opened my blinds to look out onto the calm of the apartment complex. It is quiet. No dogs barking, no children playing. Just the steady hum of passing cars from the freeway.

I am struggling this morning.

Not with drinking. I don’t want to drink. I am struggling with something else. Anger, maybe. Disappointment. Sadness.

My love had open-heart surgery a few days ago. He had a bad heart valve that had to be replaced. It’s about as serious of an operation as one can get. It requires stopping the heart for several hours, cutting into it, replacing the valve with one from a pig, sewing up the heart, and then hoping it starts again. The operation takes about ten hours start to finish. It is terrifying and painful. But my love, he did wonderfully. He came back to me.

No, my lost emotion does not lie with my love, who is hopefully sleeping even as I am awake. No, I am filled with alternating rage and sadness at the people who I thought would show up that haven’t. The friends, the family, who I expected would be there with cards or love or something, a smile perhaps. I am angry with the ones that are absent. The ones that have abandoned him as he would never abandon them. I want to call them at four in the morning,  as they sleep in their warm beds and scream at them. I want to ask them if their heart is beating strong, if they can breathe. I want to tell them they are bad people.

I sigh, for I know what they will say, even without them having to say it. They will say they didn’t know. Or they would say they didn’t want to bother us. They will have a justification, a reason, unwilling or unable to admit that they are failures at compassion.

So, I sit here, angry, remembering all the things they AA has taught me over the years. And what I keep remembering is the line in the Twelve and Twelve that tells me, “We had refused to learn the very hard lesson that overdependence upon people is unsuccessful because all people are fallible, and even the best of them will sometimes let us down,” (Page 115). People will let me down, and it is in that moment, the moment of perfect abandonment that I need to be able to turn to my higher power in order to find a renewed source of strength and power to continue forward.

I know other things too. I know that if I am angry, there must be something wrong with me. I cannot help but think of all the times I have failed someone else, the times when I did not show. The excuses I do not need to hear because they come from within me; they are the excuses I have used when others needed me.

Today, I am learning that the offer of help is different from the action of help. I am learning that a text is not the same thing as a phone call is not the same thing as getting in the car and driving. I am learning that “Let me know if you need anything,” sounds different than, “If you want company, I can bring ice cream.” I am learning that sometimes when a person says they are okay, they are not.

I have learned from the ones who have failed us and from the ones who have shown up.  For the one who never came, there was the one I could not turn away. For the one who disappeared, there was another who sat with him so I could regain some sanity. There was the one that played with the dogs and the one who answered the phone. And then there was the friend and family who took off from work to sit with me for an entire day in the waiting room.

I think when this is over, I will have learned a lot about who I am and how strong I can be. But I think I will also learn how I need to rely on others. And I will learn how to be reliable for others. I will re-evaluate the person I am. I will make the conscious decision to be a person who shows up. I will make the decision  to become the person I wish to be. I will reposition myself away from the false friends and closer to the true ones. I will pay attention, so I can better differentiate when people say they are okay and when they actually are okay. And then, I will not wait for them to call me and ask for help.

I think at the end of the day, it is not just my love who will come out of this experience with a better heart.

Dealing with Death in Sobriety: Part Two

Posted in AA, Compulsive Shopping, Recovery, Sobriety by

Piscine Mourning*** I will be out of pocket this week. In my place, one of my favorite AAs has stepped in with her own two part story of perseverance and healing. The honesty of this piece rings true. I hope you pass this piece on to anyone in sobriety that is currently suffering from loss. I will be back on Thursday.***

As I ran my key down the left side of a stranger’s vehicle, watching the white streak make a line in the blue paint, I knew I was in trouble. I did it anyway despite knowing that my actions were wrong. I also justified this situation in my mind and publicly. I’m an alcoholic I can justify just about anything. I could continue my spiral of insanity or I could deal with the issue underlining my rage: grief regarding my grandmother’s death 30 days prior.

I have been shopping. That obsessive-compulsive-I-am-trying-not-to-feel-shopping. My binge list included: 7 ottomans, clothes, My Little Pony blankets, dust ruffles, throws, art work, and more. It started the day of my Grandmother’s memorial where I was in charge of the food. I went to the grocery store and purchased 10 cooked chickens, a bag of salad, and dressing. I showed up and announced, “I have chickens.” I lined them up on the counter and walked away. My aunt came over to me and quietly whispered, “Mija, what are you doing with the chickens, are you going to cut them?” I couldn’t. All I could do that day was show up with chickens.

I was continuing my compulsive shopping the day I keyed that vehicle. I had shopped and like the other times, felt empty and angry afterwards. I left crying for no reason which was common these days and someone had parked so close to my car, I couldn’t open my door. I felt the rage rise up like red, hot, bile from my soul and proceeded to the thing that I never could understand that people do. Destroy someone’s property.

I emailed my therapist that night and told her I needed an emergency appointment to talk about my rage. I’m sitting on the couch and speed talking about the 5 stages of grief and how I’m only feel 5 stages of anger. How everyone in my life is going to either die or leave at some point and I might as well prepare for it now. This appointment turned out to be the catalyst for me to begin healing.

My sponsor assures me that shopping is better than drinking because I can return every item I purchased, but I cannot return a drink once I have taken it. Slowly I notice I am crying less and peace is replacing the anger. Acceptance is replacing fear, love is replacing hate, and time is healing my wounds. I do the next right thing. I have a spiritual experience that is indescribable. I laugh a little more. I return some of the wreckage of my shopping binge.

My hope is that anyone who is grieving a lost relationship, friendship, past life, pet, family member, or friend remembers this: there is absolutely no experience that will be made better by a drink. Not one. Not even grief.

Dealing with Death in Sobriety: Part I

Posted in AA, Death in Sobriety, Recovery, Sobriety by

Piscine Mourning*** I will be out of pocket this week. In my place, one of my favorite AAs has stepped in with her own two part story of perseverance and healing. The honesty of this piece rings true. I hope you pass this piece on to anyone in sobriety that is currently suffering from loss.***

I learned an early lesson in death at the age of 8 when my baby sister died 17 hours after her birth. I am positive I did not learn the lesson of grief after her death. I did learn that eating, writing, and later on drinking were suitable outlets for my emotions. From that point, on any death, funeral, or hospital was not a place I showed up at. I, physically and emotionally, avoided these events until I got sober, when I experienced 11 deaths over a 2-year span.

I learned how to show up. This was entirely due to the people in the rooms of Alcoholics Anonymous who experienced death and shared how they got through it without drinking. Lilo was the last personal death I dealt with. He was my sobriety pet. No one told me that it wasn’t wise to keep him in the bathroom (he matched my bathroom décor! ) or that you couldn’t “pet” a fish. He died shortly after that “pet.” I angrily threw him and the tank in the trash vowing that fish were food, not pets.

My grandmother had been dying for a while. Like over a year. We would gather for the last meal, fly people in from out of town, fill up hospitals rooms…and she continued to live. The doctors would say it’s time to say your good-byes…and she continued to live. By September of 2014, it was almost comical in a way. Truth be told, I wanted her to die already so I could get to the grief part. The good news was I had cried, accepted, and made peace with her passing on. Or so I thought.

On 11/4/2014, my grandmother woke up from a restless, hospice, semi-conscious state, as I stood over her bed. She recognized me and said “Nini, you came. You never have time to see me, you are always busy working.” and then closed her eyes. On 11/5/2014 she slipped into unconsciousness. I was standing over her gasping body when I felt my soul break and rage rise. I screamed, “You have to wake up and say something else, you cannot leave me with those last words!” After my screams stopped, after I cried all I could; I whispered I was sorry and ran out of the house.

On 11/6/2014, I received the call at 2:30am that she was dead. I didn’t think about drinking, I made a cup of coffee and went to show up with the rest of my family.

My family has its share of alcoholics and addicts which means that on the day of her death, they are drinking and smoking weed at 10am. As I hear that distinct pop of a beer can, I move away trying not to get a contact high. I get pissed. Who gets high and drunk at 10am? Alcoholics and addicts do. Had I not been sober, I would be drinking with them, pouring out a little for the spiritual head of our family we had just lost.

But I am sober. I know as much as I want to be around my family right now I must remove myself and go take care of my sobriety. I am responsible for my recovery no matter what. I go to a meeting and share. Afterwards I pick up 2 new sponsees who say they want what I have. I asked why, they said because I am sober and at a meeting despite the emotional pain I am in. They save my life in a way that working with another alcoholic does. This holds the same truth today as it did when I first begin the practice of Step 12. It is impossible to be working with another alcoholic and thinking about yourself in the same moment. For anyone in pain right now, go out and work with another alcoholic for an hour. The miracle of feeling better through this work will come true.

Lydia: Thirty Days and a Thousand Nights

Posted in AA, AA Fiction, Alcoholics Anonymous, Revovery, Sobriety by

Thirty Days and 1000 KnightsLydia sat in the Starbucks at Echo Lane, sipping her green tea latte, and people watching through the windows. Over the last couple of weeks, Lydia had grown to like her little window seat on the world. It had become part of her new daily ritual along with the 3:15 meeting and the thought, if not the actual practice, of doing yoga.

So, on the day of her thirtieth chip, Lydia sat in her corner and looked upon the world. Echo Lane, Lydia had decided, was an fascinating cross-section of society. Students of Memorial High School, laden down with books and aspirations, filtered through the Starbucks and Baskin Robbin in the free spirit special to youth. It had reminded Lydia how happy she had been before Tuck died. She once had dreams and interests that mattered. She wanted to fly to Paris and sketch where the great artist sketched. She wanted to read the great works of literature, not because it would make her sound more interesting at dinner parties, but because all people should. The students of Echo Lane reminded her that life at one time seem mysterious and adventurous, something to revel in and enjoyed.

The other half of Echo Lane was comprised of the parents of the students. Most were like her, trying their best just to make it through the day. The dog had to go to the groomer. Sally needed a new tutu for dance. The parking lot was a juggernaut of SUVs with Cheerio-ed back seats and varsity club stickers. All those things, she thought, once seemed so important. In the microcosm of Memorial, so much rode on the perception of imperfect perfection, of unaffected beauty. There need to be a certain ease of life that was anything but easy to attain. But they all tried. Lydia had tried.

So, it was in this place that Lydia most often came to reflect on what should have been, what was, and what might be. She looked down upon her notebook where she had been casually tracing over the date. It was her thirtieth day of sobriety. She wondered how such an important day could go completely and utterly unrecognized by the entirety of her world, but that was the case. She had yet to tell any of her friends, nor her children, not even Henry about her sobriety. There was a part of her, she figured, that felt if she told them, it would make it real. One would think admitting one’s faults to oneself would be the hard part, but no… it was the telling to people who already knew, that you knew too. She couldn’t figure out how that could be, but such was life.

Lydia couldn’t help but think about her thirty days. Thirty days. She wanted not to think about it actually. She wanted somehow to be better that that. “Oh, thirty days. Yes, no big deal. Just called my sponsor and read the Big Book, yes, yes.” But it wasn’t like that. It was hard. She was embarrassed that only a couple of days ago the desire to drink came over her in such a torrent that she tore through her house, and had she found anything, she surely would have drank it. The thirty days felt a bit fraudulent. She felt she had failed.

Lydia did not know how long she had been lying on the floor of her kitchen that day, but it was long enough for the ceramic tile to slowly warm to body temperature; the bottle of vanilla extract resting in her palm.

Slowly, she ran her empty hand down her side to her jean pocket. With a nudge of her finger she edged her phone out of her pocket.

Lydia brought the phone up to the same level as the bottle and disengaged her stare from the first object to the second. She ran her fingers over the screen to unlock it. Henry was speed dial one. Her thumb hovered over the screen. She had not talked to him since she picked up her desire chip. She desperately wanted to. She wanted to call him and tell him everything her heart so achingly wanted to say, that she was sober and she loved him and missed him and wouldn’t he please come home. She would tell him that she needed him. He would come. He always came. But she didn’t. Instead she pressed speed dial seven.

As the phone rang in her ear, Lydia pressed her hand against the tile and lifted her frame off the floor. She walked over to the sink and as the voice on the other end said, “Hello,” Lydia had poured the vanilla down the drain. “Hi, Tracy. I think I finally understand what you mean by powerless.”

Twenty minutes later, Lydia and Tracy had met under the shade tree in the parking lot of the mall to reconstruct what had triggered her. Talking took the power out of it. And then she kept going; Lydia told Tracy about Tuck, the accident, the hospital, Henry. She spoke and spoke and spoke until her throat became raw and the sky started turning the shade of twilight. But it had worked. The demons that had haunted her day had diminished my nightfall. Lydia went to a meeting, then another, then drove home and went to bed. And as she laid her bed on the pillow, she remembered what Tracy had told her, “Any day I don’t drink is a successful day.”

Lydia picked up her latte and walked out to her car. There was something to subtly awkward about not drinking, she thought. It shouldn’t be a big deal, and yet it was. It shouldn’t be so hard, and yet, well, she had made it. That’s all that mattered, she supposed. As she opened her car door to get in, Lydia looked out one last time over the parking lot, she looked at the ladies with their grocery bags and strollers. Quietly, to herself she whispered, “Thirty days and a thousand nights.”

Among Them You Will Make Lifelong Friends.

Posted in AA, AA Friendship, Recovery, Sobriety by

Active Addiction Guest ListAs the eight of you who read my blog regularly know, a couple of weeks ago, I got engaged to my lovely lovely. But that is not what this blog is about. This blog is about the guest list.

Eight years ago, I lived in a run-down apartment off 59 and Newcastle in Houston, Texas. My roommate, a girl I knew from work, came home one day and informed me that she was moving out. It seemed she suddenly and unexpectedly eloped with the chef at our restaurant because her student visa was running out and she was going to have to return to Russia. (No, I’m serious. I’m not making this stuff up.) She suggested either we break the lease or I find a roommate. The simple thought of living with someone new terrified me in my final days. Looking back, it is almost humorously tragic to contemplate. There was zero chance of me opening up my existence to the scrutiny and judgment of a stranger.

So, I sat on the floor of my apartment and continued to drink and chain smoke in total isolation.

Not long after, I woke up one morning in withdraws. I was dizzy and shaking. It felt like a worse version of the flu. I knew if I drank something, I would feel better, but I could not think of one person in the world who would bring me something to drink. But more than that, there is not one person in the world who would bring me anything: not a cup of soup, a blanket, or a kind word.

I often write of loneliness because it is the emotion I most remember from of those days. I was so incredibly lost and ashamed and alone. I think, honestly, I give my immediate family a bad rap in this memory. Had I called them, had I reached out and asked for help, I am sure I would have been in rehab by dinnertime. They love me and are good people, but I was so disconnected from them. My pride, even in those down times, was so entrenched it would have been impossible for me to reach out to them for help.

But that was eight years ago. This year, I will be making the promise of friendship and fidelity to another person. With that comes a wedding and a party. A few days ago, I began the amazing task of writing down a list of all the people we would like surrounding us on our special day. First I listed my family, the people who are here now that I could not let be there then. Then I listed sponsors, then sponsees, friends from our home group, ladies from my yearly retreat, buddies from his half-way house. As one piece of paper filled, I flipped the page and continued to write. I could not help but smile as our small intimate wedding soon turned into a celebration of AA proportions.

“You are going to meet these new friends in your own community… High and low, rich and poor, these are the future fellows of Alcoholics Anonymous. Among them you will make lifelong friends. You will be bound to them with new and wonderful ties, for you will escape disaster together and you will commence shoulder to shoulder your common journey,” (Big Book 152-153).

True, it is our past that originally united us. AA supplied me with a place to meet people, people who like me experience fear and neurosis, people who suffer from guilt and shame and heartache. But it is our future which will keep uniting us.

And through the process, AA has begun the process of trying to teach me how to be a friend. I’m still not very good at it. I’m still really quite self-centered. But I’m better. At least I can see my faults, apologize, and try again. Once of my favorite lines in the Twelve and Twelve is “We have not once sought to be one in a family, a friend among friends…” (53). Today, I seek to be better.

Of all the blessing I have received from AA and recovery, my friends (and my honey, of course) maybe the greatest blessing of all. I like to say I belong to the “No Matter What Club,” but if I were as lonely today as I was on February 27, 2007, I’m not sure that I would still be sober. My AA friends save my sanity on a daily basis, but more than that, they have saved my life. Now… For the rest of the journey…

The Most Satisfactory Years of [Our] Existence Lie Ahead.

Posted in AA, AGK, Alcoholics Anonymous, Alcoholism, Recovery, Sobriety by

Self PortraitA couple of years ago, through a series of unusual events, I found myself swimming along with my aunt in the sea off the coast of Cancun. My aunt, the wife of a Lutheran minister, is an incredible woman of natural spirituality and grace. So, we were bobbing along in the ocean, talking about life when she said, “It must be interesting to have a relationship where from the beginning, you each knew the worst thing about the other person. So many times, people in relationships try to cover up and hide the worst parts of themselves, hoping the other person will not see it.”

I’ve thought about that sentiment many times over the last couple of years. It is true. When I had two years sober, I got my very first apartment all by myself. Up until then, I had lived in sober living. I was struggling. I had those thoughts of “If I drank, no one would know.” And it scared me. One night I found myself at a ten o’clock meeting. In short time, I found myself comfortably sharing in the quiet dim of the candle light. Free from imagined judgment, I was able to share my deepest insecurities and fears.

It was in this setting that my love and I spent many months sitting across the room from each other, before we ever went for our first cup of coffee. In fact, if you asked him, he would readily admit that he originally felt sorry for the poor, lost girl who didn’t believe in God. What I remember about those times was his honesty in admitting his social anxiety and how we both bonded over our shared hatred of driving. (I do most of the driving now. I figured living in Houston, one had to work through this fear. He’s fine with letting me process my recovery as he sits in the passenger seat.)

I’ve had a lot of conversations with lot of different women over the years regarding whether or not one should date within the program. I know many people who are attracted to the idea of dating a “normie.” I get that. I get the idea of swaying away from the fear of potential relapse and the emotional baggage that follows in the wake of any given alcoholic. “But it is from our twisted relations with family, friends, and society at large that many of us have suffered the most. We have been especially stupid and stubborn about them. The primary fact that we fail to recognize is our total inability to form a true partnership with another human being,” (Twelve and Twelve page 53) Trying to align oneself with a narcissistically immature misanthrope can be a bad idea.

Yes, there is something to my aunt’s words; we do know the worst about each other. But we also know the best. I know my sweetie wakes up each morning and prays. I know at some point in the day, he will read and meditate and go to a meeting. I know he will talk to another alcoholic and ask that man for a slice of wisdom. I know he will help someone.

And I know with my sweetheart, I never have to apologize for working my own program. I never have to procure a reason for going to a meeting. A sentence like, “I’m going to call my sponsor,” doesn’t send him into a spiral of insecurity. Saying, “I’m crazy and I don’t know why” or bursting into tears for no reason doesn’t require really any more explanation than that. Cause he knows why. I’m an alcoholic and some days are just like that.

Our love is predicated not on fear of relapse but on the combined spirituality and growth that active recovery ensures. I can tell you in all honesty, we are better people today than we were five years ago when we met. Over time, some of the anger, jealousy, and fears have subsided. We have worked through abandonment issues, monetary insecurity. When we argue, phone calls are made and inventories are taken (our own, not each other’s). We look at our character defects, apologize, and make honest attempts to do better next time. But y’know, it is not even how far we have come that calms me; it is the thought of how much more we have to grow. I look forward to seeing what will become of us, for I am sure, “The most satisfactory years of [our] existence lie ahead” (BB 152).

On January 8th, Bob got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I said, “Yes.”

 

Lydia: Day 22

Posted in AA, AA Sponsor, AA Stepwork, Alcoholics Anonymous, Recovery, Sobriety by

Powerless

It had been a week since Lydia had asked Tracy to sponsor her, and even though she had no idea what the role of a sponsor truly was, she relinquished as much as she could to the idea of vulnerability. Tracy had insisted that Lydia call her every day. At first, the conversations had been awkward and stilted. While she had many women friends in her life, Lydia had never been one to share intimate details about herself or Henry. It only took a few phone calls, though, for her to realize that Tracy was not intending on being her friend, but rather something more altogether. Their conversations were sometimes short and sometimes long, but they always focused on recovery, the steps, and emotional sobriety. Lydia tried her best to answer Tracy’s questions honestly, but sometimes Tracy’s observations cut Lydia to the quick. Never had she felt so shallow as when she reflected Tracy. It only took a matter of days for Tracy to earned her trust.

In one of their initial conversations, Tracy had given her a short list of things to do, and so far, most had been accomplished.

The first item on her list was to read the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous. Lydia had already bought a Big Book a couple of weeks before. Normally a voracious reader, on a good day she could easily polish of an entire Danielle Steele or Barbara Cartland novel. But this book was different. If Lydia concentrated, thought really hard, she could make it a couple of pages before her mind wandered to what she might find on TV. Maybe it was the language. Maybe it was the subject matter. She didn’t know why, but most of what Bill Wilson wrote about was completely lost on her.

The second item on her list was to attend an AA meeting every day for ninety days. Although she had attended a meeting everyday for the last 22 days, sometimes two or three, the idea of ninety somehow seemed ridiculous. Lydia tried to argue this fine point with Tracy, but her sponsor seemed to have none of it.

Finally, Lydia was to begin her stepwork, the point that had brought her to her granite countertop on a Tuesday morning with a steaming coffee cup of green tea neatly positioned at a forty-five degree angle to a new journal, bought from Barnes and Nobles and bound in antiquated brown leather. Lydia had even bought a special fountain pen to record every piece of her step work. She wanted it just so. Even though she had only been sober a short while, Lydia looked forward to the day when she would have her own sponsee. When that time came, she wanted to be able to tell the girl that she worked her steps perfect.

On the first page, Lydia had neatly scrawled, “important phone numbers.” On the second page, she had neatly begun a list of goals. The list included running a marathon and writing a book. She even thought about returning to school, maybe getting a degree in psychology or addiction counseling.

But it was the top of the third page of the journal that had Lydia had become stuck. At the top, she slowly retraced the word powerless in the line, “1. Admitted we were powerless over alcohol and that our lives had become unmanageable.” On some base level, Lydia knew she could not drink anymore, therefore the correct answer simply had to be alcohol. And yet, the word powerless seemed more perplexing than that. If, she though, the line had instead read, “Admitted we were alcoholic and that our lives were unmanageable,” the answer would be more direct, simpler. She could admit she drank too much. But powerless. What did that mean? She wasn’t powerless against alcohol. She had a house and a life and, at least for the time being, a husband and a family.

After a few minutes, Lydia moved her pen down from the word powerless and slowly wrote, “Alcohol.” With a sigh, she set down her pen and closed the book.

5 Sober Activites Worth Remembering January 2nd

Posted in AA, AGK, Alcoholics Anonymous, Ann G. Kroger, Recovery, Sobriety by

Amateur Night

New Years is one of my favorite holidays of the year. I think it is about the closest normies ever get to working the program. I mean, let’s admit it; there’s the reflection on past, the admission of shortcomings, and an somewhat earnest attempt to change the negative aspects of their personality or physique. From a young age, I was drawn to this idea (or maybe I was just drawn to New Years because it’s the only holiday based on the self-centeredness.) Anywho, when I got sober, I thought the days of the New Year celebration was over. Little did I know….

So, without any further ado: five ideas for New Year’s celebrating, old school style.

Go Dancing!: I heard a great story once when a friend of mine was getting married. The wedding planner, a woman baffled by sobriety, made the comment that no one was going to dance if there wasn’t any alcohol served. My friend answered something to the effect of, “Well, you haven’t met my friends.”

I honestly think dancing sober is high on AAs list of fears. It only took me one boy-girl dance in middle school, awkwardly dancing in a circle with my friends, to know that sober dancing, for me, was never, ever going to happen. I was a club hopper in my day, but it always took an insane amount of liquid courage to get me out on the floor. So, when I got sober, I naturally thought I had to hang up my dancing shoes.

But then I went to a sober dance. My friends dragged me over to North Wayside on a Saturday night. I was amazed by the sheer number of people out there in the dance floor, cutting a rug, and having a great time. It immediately took all the fear out of the situation for me.

Many AA clubs sponsor sober dances for New Years, and many of those are free. So, grab your nearest sober buddy and have a blast!

Movie Marathon: This one stemmed from a recent conversation I had with my brother. I have never seen Star Wars 4, 5, 6 (Or is it 1,2, and 3? Whatever, the new ones). I feel this is a major gap in my cultural education. I can’t tell Mozart from Bach and I haven’t ever seen the new Star Wars. So, this New Years, I am going to sit down and see arguably the greatest movie I’ve never seen. So, I pass this on to you. What movies are on your bucket list? The Caine Mutiny, The Godfather, Gone with the Wind? Put your feet up, pop the popcorn, and watch away.

Clean House: In my super early days of sobriety, I kept hearing people talk about the importance of “Cleaning house.” I didn’t really understand it. I went home and thought, “They want me to clean my house?” I spent the rest of the night scrubbing down my apartment. Since then, I’ve clearly learned that “cleaning house” is a metaphor for the spiritual inventory that comes from getting down to causes and conditions. But still, in my head, the two cleanings are linked.

My mom always says, “If you haven’t worn it in a year, you’re not gonna wear it.” Throw it out. Donate your clean, slightly used clothes to a women’s halfway house. These women often need clothes befitting their newly sober lifestyles. Additionally, I’ve seen first-hand what perfume and nice bath products like Bath and Body can mean to a newly sober women. These items take on a whole, new level of luxury because many of these women have been struggling so long just to survive, that they have forgotten entirely about small gifts of beauty. Clean out your bathroom closet. Make a nice care package and deliver to a woman’s shelter. This may not be the funnest thing on my list, but I promise you, you’ll feel great afterwards.

Get a Makeover: It’s 2015! Halfway to 2020. Time for a contemporary haircut and some fresh makeup to get you ready to tackle new adventures. Don’t go for the same old same old. Don’t stick with the usual. Go to a new hairdresser and let them choose the style they think would be the most flattering on you. Let go of the control. Then walk over to the Mac make-up counter and ask for a makeover. It’s free. This is not time to play it safe. Let the girls to do it up, and while a Mac makeover can be a bit much for everyday wear, I guarantee you by the time it is over, you will feel awesome. Then buy the florescent blue eye shadow, even if you only wear it in the house on Sundays. Afterall, just because you are sober does not mean there isn’t still a little rocker left in you.

Game Night: Game nights are an opportunity to get together with one’s closest friends and make complete fools of ourselves. Over time, I’ve come to the decision that game nights not only work best with an even number of people, but one needs a variety of fun games and ridiculously junky food. So, call your friends up and invite them over. Tell each one of them to bring their favorite game and their junkiest appetizer (Remember! Resolutions start the next day!) Proper game nights are not for the faint at heart. Get the mini frozen eggrolls and fried cheese. Put the RedBull on ice. Have the stogies at the ready). My favorite games for groups are Taboo, Pictionary, and the old standby, Trivia Pursuit.

There is a total misconception that once we stop drinking, fun has to end. The truth is, AAs are by and large a ridiculous fun and stupidly adventurous group of individuals. Whether its New Year’s skydiving or Polar Bear swimming off Galveston, someone’s bound to be doing it. All you have to do is make a few phone calls. And the greatest thing about whatever it is you do this year? You’ll remember it Jan 2nd.

Happy New Years!

An AA New Years

Posted in AA, AGK, Alcoholics Anonymous, Big Book, Recovery by

Well... I'll just start tomorrow.I know we have yet to have Christmas, but this morning, I woke up thinking of New Years. New Years holds a special place in my heart. I love it. Now, but especially in my disease, New Years was my favorite holiday. I always appreciated the symbolic nature of reflecting upon the past year and resolving to do better. I never made it more than a few days, but I always tried. This year I am going to stop smoking or cursing or eating fried foods. I’m gonna lose weight and go to the gym and yadda yadda yadda. But the best part of New Years, by far, was the solidifying one’s new resolutions with champagne and party hats.

I got sober in February, 2007. I was shaky and tired and green. I was so sick from DT’s that it was easy, on some level, to stay sober for the first few days. But as days turned into weeks, I really struggled with the concept of never drinking again. I thought, how to people get married and not have toasts? How do people go on vacation and not have cocktails on the beach? And especially, how does one celebrate New Years?

The night before I picked up my four-month chip, I had this dream: It was New Years. I was on my way to meet sober friends in order to see the fireworks in downtown Houston. I was sober, but I couldn’t see midnight coming without a toast. So, in my head I decided that if I made it to the liquor store by nine, then fate was telling me I could drink. I would buy a couple of nips and then meet my friends. Right before nine, I walked into the store. The entire place was dirty. There was a film of greasy dust on everything I touched. Except for the liquor bottles. No, the liquor bottles were sparkly and glistening, like cut crystal.

As I made my way to the counter to get my nips, a woman yelled to me, “Hold on. I’ll be right there.” And then, to my surprise, I realized there was a crowd of people right next to me. They were seated, but at that moment, they all got up, held hands, and recited the Lord’s Prayer. As they broke up, the woman came over and apologized. She told me the usual place where they had their AA meeting had been closed for New Years, so they were meeting here. I realized it must have been an eight o’clock meeting that was closing just as I walked in. The woman then asked me what I wanted. “I’m okay,” I said. The woman reassured me that the group had no judgment upon drinking, and that she would be happy to get me whatever I wanted. I looked up at her, into her eyes, and said, “No, really. I’m okay.” And I set my four-month chip on the counter and walked out the door.

It is hard for me to articulate why this dream has meant so much to me over the years. I always found it somewhat relevant that I had the dream the night before I picked up my four-month chip, as if to say that day 120 is a gift, but day 121, not so much. I also know it was the first time, I did not drink in my dream. Over the years, I have met many people who have using dreams in which they turn down the proffered alcohol. It’s an insane realization to know that one cannot even get high in their subconscious. “Ideas, emotions, and attitudes which were once the guiding forces of the lives of these men are suddenly cast to one side, and a completely new set of conceptions and motives begin to dominate them,” (Big Book 27). But to me, it also answered a personal fear of New Years. I woke up the next morning thinking, I do not know what I will do for New Years, but I do know AA will be there.

And it always has been.

Matching Calamity with Recovery

Posted in AA, AGK, Alcoholics Anonymous, Big Book, Houston, Recovery by

Matching Calamity with Serenity

I have come to the conclusion that good students make bad AAs. No, this has nothing to do with intelligence. I think super smart people are often terrible students. I am talking about the front row sitters with their hand in the air, apple for the teacher type students. Here is my thought: there are the answers that are right and there are answers that are truthful. And those aren’t necessarily the same thing.

Last week, my love needed a heart catheterization. While the procedure is fairly routine, it feels scary. It feels like something that should not be done. I was calm when we heard the news, calm on the way to the hospital, calm checking him in. The cath was to take a few hours. I had my Big Book. And I won’t lie, I started writing my blog entry right there, right up in my own head: matching calamity with serenity. Ahhhh….

And then I got to the waiting room. As I entered the room, I immediately assessed the situation. The room was smaller than my bedroom, with chairs lined around the periphrases. There were no windows. The air hung heavy with smells of people and food and hospital. Two ladies were simultaneously talking on their phones in different languages. The TV, set to a local morning news show, added another certain comedic element as I imagine the beautiful people laughing along from the safety of their kitchens. I had no choice but to enter, to follow my love to two seats in the corner. Because it was my job. Because it is what we do. But right before the door shut behind us, I felt my serenity say, “No way, I’m not doing this. Meet you at Starbucks.”

A short time later, they called my love away to be prepped. They told me to continue to wait and I could see him before the procedure. I waited in the room with no air until I could not handle it anymore, and then I decided I was just gonna have to wait in the hallway. I honestly picked what I thought was the least obtrusive spot and sat down. It was about three minutes later that a man told me I would have to move, that I would have to wait in the room with the teenagers engaged in hilarity and the sunny talk show hosts and the smells. And that’s when I started to cry.

I know what the correct answer is. I remember doing my first 1st step. My sponsor made me do worksheets. One of the questions was, “What are you powerless against?” I didn’t understand the question, but I knew the correct answer had to do with alcohol. So, I answered it alcohol and she said “Good,” and we moved on. Because I never asked, I never understood there was a deeper question and a more profound answer.

It was not until I stopped answering correctly and instead answering honestly, that I felt recovery. Over time, I have learned that AA is not about memorizing the Big Book or sounding good in meetings. It is about humility and time and quiet. It wasn’t until I asked for help, that I got it. It wasn’t until I admitted that I had no conception of powerlessness, did I begin to regain my strength.

So, instead of writing the “right” blog about matching serenity with calamity, I write this honest one: I did not match calamity with serenity. I was not the embodiment of stoicism nor grace. I cried and then wiped my nose on my sleeve.

But after I cried, I washed my face and bought a cup of coffee. And then I walked into the “Spiritual Care” office and spent some time talking to a chaplain. He was kind and reassuring. He said he didn’t know if AA existed in the hospital, but he would be sure to find out. And he did.

I left the hospital that day, not secure in the knowledge that I have reached total spiritual enlightenment, but that I never necessarily have to. I never have to be a beacon of independent strength because I’m never alone. I didn’t match serenity with calamity. But I matched egotism with humility. And together, we matched calamity with recovery. And today, that’s good enough.