Grateful for life.

[Nia]

In all honesty I should be dead right now, sometimes I think there's a bigger purpose for me or something, because stuff doesn't make sense.

When my mom was pregnant with me she got in a really gnarly car wreck, basically semi + small toyota + highway= doom. I survived somehow, and had no damage to myself, though my neurologist thinks that may be where the scar on my brain came from.

When I was like 4 or 5 I got really sick once, and my parents ended up taking me to the ER and I was given something way too strong. I got looked at again after and they were telling me to do little things like turn my head a certain way and stuff and I couldn't do anything. (I don't remember any of this, I've been told about it) The doctors said that had it been anyone else at my age that they would have died.

About a year ago my psychiatrist came up with the idea I might be schizophrenic so she had a MRI done, and when they looked at it it ended up I wasn't, but that there was something on my brain. They said it was either a tumor or maybe a scar or cyst. We call up a neurologist, he doesn't look at these scans for 6 months. If it had been a tumor I'd be dead for sure by now. It's now decided it's probably as scar cause it didn't grow.

Last August a friend of mine died. He was 15. We had gotten really into smoking weed around the same time, but then after a while i stopped hearing from him and I knew something was up. Didn't know what though. After not having a real conversation with him or knowing what was going on from the end of the year before until then I got a call. He'd gotten in an accident coming home from a party. They found meth in his system. It scared me, I was the one who had done worst things than him before, and had been getting messed up a lot longer than he had, and suddenly this happens. I stopped for a while just cause I just didn't want to touch anything after that, but recently have been having issues with cravings again...

[gravity]

I believe that we all have a greater purpose than to be a slave to addiction. That's why we are here and why we are fighting back. I really believe that I should be dead by now given the situations my drinking has resulted in. Somebody was watching over me & didn't want me to end up dead in an ER in some strange city.

Thanks for the post. I am so grateful for second chances & new beginnings.

[ANGELINA243]

Sorry to hear about your friend, Nia. He was a young man. It makes me think--why have I "escaped death" so many times? What is so special about me--an alcoholic--who is currently struggling with trying to stay sober. God only knows. I don't know why I am still here--except that it probably has to do with me "helping someone else along the way" on my road to Recovery.

[Creekryder]

Life is such a thin, golden thread. Beautiful, shinning, full of wonders, and so very fragile. We all need to take time to realize what a magnificent phenomenon life is. Embrace it, enjoy it, explore it...in an instant it could be gone, like a shadow dissolved by the clouds capturing the sun.

Padraic