Austin4Wyo

A couple thoughts I've been working through over the last couple days after a friend died...

I was told in both my 90-day inpatient programs that of all of us with addiction issues, a third will get recovery the first time around, a third will relapse a number of times but eventually enter into meaningful recovery, and a third will die in addiction. I cannot speak to the veracity of these numbers. I can, however, say that I've taken it very much to heart. I have ten months and change since the last drink. I was a chronic relapse case. That means I'm not in the first third which got it the first time around. That also means that if I go back out, I'm facing a 50/50 chance of making it back (and I often feel that's being generous).

I have a friend of 4 years that I ran this past some months back. At that point, I had not dealt with a close loss of anyone I knew in recovery. That changed about ten days ago, when a great friend I'd known since long before both our addictions took hold passed away. He'd relocated out of Wyoming to Los Angeles. Somewhere, after four years of recovery, he made a switch, and didn't come back from it.

I'd waited to post about it until I got details. I tried to reserve judgement regarding the situation, but the numbers...the logical, analytical side of my brain wouldn't let them get away from me. When I talked to his brother, it was confirmed that he'd been drinking heavily prior to his death.

I haven't gotten close to too many people in recovery. That's something I'm working through, and stems from some social difficulties that were part of the reason I started drinking some 13 years ago. Another female acquaintance, who I had often talked Iron Maiden and Megadeth with prior to meetings and bummed cigarettes off of, passed away recently as well, but she and I were hardly close. I just saw her obituary on the newspaper's website today, actually. Had my friend and I not been close for years before our respective alcohol abuses took over, I doubt this would be having much effect on me.

I shed a couple tears the other day, but I'm more or less past that part of things now. We were remarkably close (I stayed with his family after my second 90-day program), and I still have a coin he gave me in my wallet. I won't be making it to Wyoming for the services this Saturday. Not sure what I'll do, other than not drink and take the day as it comes.

I am, however, firmly committed to the idea that I'm flipping a coin if I ever pick back up again. It's a dedicated, vigilant effort that keeps me out of my thinking errors that would allow me to rationalize the danger away. I don't gamble, I rarely even care to play a hand of poker, and slot machines are WAY too erratic for my tastes. 50/50 odds are way too risky for me. I think, if I can keep anything in mind going into Saturday, that it will be most helpful for me to remind myself that flipping coins is a lousy way to rationalize living versus dying.

Thanks for letting me ramble...