Celebrate
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Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: TX
Posts: 481
Celebrate
Today is my fourth AA birthday. And I wish to say congratulations to my sponsors, the fellowship, the steps, Bill and Bob who put our program together, and the Higher Power I've come to find as the result. For it is only through the removal of my compulsion, obsession, and desire to drink alcohol that I have enjoyed sobriety. And it is only through this Higher Power that this has occurred. Never in all my attempts did this destructive force of mind leave me. Until AA.
I tried so many times so many ways to deal with my alcoholism. Doctors, shrinks, a hypnotist, counselors, and even a clergymen or two along the way. There were the self help books, various chemical replacements, vitamin regimens, pre-drinking rituals, and all manner of other failed attempts. This went on for better than twenty years. And there was much mental, emotional and physical suffering as the result.
Then, on December 22nd 2010, out of sheer desperation, I did the one thing I fought against so hard for all those decades trying to moderate. I came into the rooms of AA. I literally had nowhere else to go. All other avenues had been tried and failed dramatically. They had also left me feeling that if I did manage to be sober one day, I would be miserable. Just as I was each time I quit on my own. I was therefore petrified that my life was over when I walked through the door. Little did I know I was right. That person died. But a new one was born.
To say that I found something beyond my wildest dreams would be to sell this experience short. It has literally changed my life in unimaginable ways. Given me happiness, joyousness, and freedom such as I've never known. Given my wife a husband, kids a father, Mother a son, employer a worker, and the world around me a stranger with a kind heart willing to help where he can. It's given me my senses, my mind, and greatest of all, my dignity back.
This started with not taking a drink one day at a time. But it goes so much deeper than that. Sobriety is just the bedrock. Recovery is the real prize. Just as the book proclaims, I have recovered from a hopeless condition of mind and body. With that being said, I will always be recovering. I have a daily reprieve contingent upon the maintenance of my spiritual condition. Just because it's here today does not guarantee it tomorrow. I have to work at this thing each and every day. Just like I drank.
As it turns out, AA IS the easier, softer way. If it weren't, I wouldn't keep coming back.
I tried so many times so many ways to deal with my alcoholism. Doctors, shrinks, a hypnotist, counselors, and even a clergymen or two along the way. There were the self help books, various chemical replacements, vitamin regimens, pre-drinking rituals, and all manner of other failed attempts. This went on for better than twenty years. And there was much mental, emotional and physical suffering as the result.
Then, on December 22nd 2010, out of sheer desperation, I did the one thing I fought against so hard for all those decades trying to moderate. I came into the rooms of AA. I literally had nowhere else to go. All other avenues had been tried and failed dramatically. They had also left me feeling that if I did manage to be sober one day, I would be miserable. Just as I was each time I quit on my own. I was therefore petrified that my life was over when I walked through the door. Little did I know I was right. That person died. But a new one was born.
To say that I found something beyond my wildest dreams would be to sell this experience short. It has literally changed my life in unimaginable ways. Given me happiness, joyousness, and freedom such as I've never known. Given my wife a husband, kids a father, Mother a son, employer a worker, and the world around me a stranger with a kind heart willing to help where he can. It's given me my senses, my mind, and greatest of all, my dignity back.
This started with not taking a drink one day at a time. But it goes so much deeper than that. Sobriety is just the bedrock. Recovery is the real prize. Just as the book proclaims, I have recovered from a hopeless condition of mind and body. With that being said, I will always be recovering. I have a daily reprieve contingent upon the maintenance of my spiritual condition. Just because it's here today does not guarantee it tomorrow. I have to work at this thing each and every day. Just like I drank.
As it turns out, AA IS the easier, softer way. If it weren't, I wouldn't keep coming back.
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