Stuck Points
But Very, Very Bruisable...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2001
Location: Palm Springs, Ca.
Posts: 548
Stuck Points
Well, someone has to break the ice...
When recovery becomes real-life with bills, relationships, career, and outside interests it seems, for me anyway, that even though I know I need to continue a minimum of meetings, the motivation sometimes just isn't there.
The reason I got sober was to have a real life. Now that I have one, it is easy at times to justify not going to meetings, or excuses to not call my sponsor or AA friends.
Intellectually I know whats going on and can practice contrary action. But actual feelings of guilt arise when I miss a meeting or a call. Even if the reasons were completely justified. (My opinion, of course.
)
So, what to do about feeling "stuck"?
When recovery becomes real-life with bills, relationships, career, and outside interests it seems, for me anyway, that even though I know I need to continue a minimum of meetings, the motivation sometimes just isn't there.
The reason I got sober was to have a real life. Now that I have one, it is easy at times to justify not going to meetings, or excuses to not call my sponsor or AA friends.
Intellectually I know whats going on and can practice contrary action. But actual feelings of guilt arise when I miss a meeting or a call. Even if the reasons were completely justified. (My opinion, of course.
)So, what to do about feeling "stuck"?
Member
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Dreaming Summer
Posts: 821
I really seem to struggle with this one.Now that I'm no longer confined to the house,I should be eager to get out and about.But I'm having a hard time.I stopped by the Serenity House today.Picked up a new meeting schedule,stayed about 5 minutes,and went home.Friday night,and my kid was off to a pizza party.I could've gone anywhere,but I just went home.I know I need to be connected with others in recovery....
phoenix
phoenix
Member
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: The Basement
Posts: 724
It's so easy to do. The program gives you a life and then you start to move away from the program. It's happened so many times in my recovery. I am also not one to take action by simply knowing I should do something. Unfortunately my back has to be up against a wall, until I surrender and have no choice. That's also happened many times in my recovery.
One time I relapsed, one time my husband relapsed, one time my good friend od'd on crack......whatever the circumstance has been that has brought me back after getting, caught up in "life," .......I consider gods grace because one thing I took with me from AA, wherever I went in my life, was to pray every night for willingness. I would say whatever version of the seventh step prayer I could remember at the time even if it was just, please remove whatever stands in the way of my being useful to you and others and give me the strength, as I go out from here, to do your will for me, Amen.
After I moved and had my kids I didn't go to meetings for 2 years, now I go all the time. I do believe that hp will always bring me back to where I need to be, if I ask enough.
One time I relapsed, one time my husband relapsed, one time my good friend od'd on crack......whatever the circumstance has been that has brought me back after getting, caught up in "life," .......I consider gods grace because one thing I took with me from AA, wherever I went in my life, was to pray every night for willingness. I would say whatever version of the seventh step prayer I could remember at the time even if it was just, please remove whatever stands in the way of my being useful to you and others and give me the strength, as I go out from here, to do your will for me, Amen.
After I moved and had my kids I didn't go to meetings for 2 years, now I go all the time. I do believe that hp will always bring me back to where I need to be, if I ask enough.
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Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Posts: 14
I couldn't help but jump in as well....
When I was 24 I got clean and sober and did all the right things:
-90 meetings in 90 days
-treatment
-aftercare
-moved into a sober rooming house
-continued to work the program, etc...
Then I went back to high school, graduated with honours, went to University and then obtained a graduate degree (7 years of school), got married, had two amazing children, landed the perfect dream job directly related to my education, bought my dream house and the list goes on....
8 years into sobriety, I thought I was cured...and started to drink again, and ended up in a hotel room all alone, on my 35th birthday, on my third straight day smoking crack.
Everything the program gave me led me to think I was cured...
Quite ironic.
Thank God I made it back alive and still with my house, kids, wife, job etc.......
-William
When I was 24 I got clean and sober and did all the right things:
-90 meetings in 90 days
-treatment
-aftercare
-moved into a sober rooming house
-continued to work the program, etc...
Then I went back to high school, graduated with honours, went to University and then obtained a graduate degree (7 years of school), got married, had two amazing children, landed the perfect dream job directly related to my education, bought my dream house and the list goes on....
8 years into sobriety, I thought I was cured...and started to drink again, and ended up in a hotel room all alone, on my 35th birthday, on my third straight day smoking crack.
Everything the program gave me led me to think I was cured...
Quite ironic.
Thank God I made it back alive and still with my house, kids, wife, job etc.......
-William
Member
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Dreaming Summer
Posts: 821
Originally posted by William
8 years into sobriety, I thought I was cured...and started to drink again, and ended up in a hotel room all alone, on my 35th birthday, on my third straight day smoking crack.
Everything the program gave me led me to think I was cured...
Quite ironic.
Thank God I made it back alive and still with my house, kids, wife, job etc.......
-William
8 years into sobriety, I thought I was cured...and started to drink again, and ended up in a hotel room all alone, on my 35th birthday, on my third straight day smoking crack.
Everything the program gave me led me to think I was cured...
Quite ironic.
Thank God I made it back alive and still with my house, kids, wife, job etc.......
-William
AA says we have a daily reprieve contingent on our spiritual condition.It also says that the delusion that we are like other people,or presently may be,has to be smashed. And NA says that we are powerless over a disease that is incurable,progressive and fatal.If not arrested it gets worse until we die.Both seem clear that the disease is not curable.
phoenix
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 17
Hi everyone,
I know I'm new here and don't know everyone real well, but I wanted to contribute something because everyone has been so kind to me...
There are times when I know I need to get to a meeting, but I have also had some experience with being stuck in a general way. And then I read a book that talked about the desert experience in spirituality. Sometimes we are in a period where nothing is going on and it is the most arid, nothing place, but, in fact, it is important to stay there and perhaps learn patience or whatever... or how to keep on keeping on... or that fallow times are imporant too.
I know I'm new here and don't know everyone real well, but I wanted to contribute something because everyone has been so kind to me...
There are times when I know I need to get to a meeting, but I have also had some experience with being stuck in a general way. And then I read a book that talked about the desert experience in spirituality. Sometimes we are in a period where nothing is going on and it is the most arid, nothing place, but, in fact, it is important to stay there and perhaps learn patience or whatever... or how to keep on keeping on... or that fallow times are imporant too.
Guest
Posts: n/a
Great topic & lively discussion. You know what's helped me when I get stuck? Attempting to reach out to one or two other individual people at meetings -- doesn't have to be a sponsor, just someone maybe who said something that moved you: someone who has in some way touched your heart in his or her share. While the effects of a meeting can be wonderful, for me it always has to include TALKING to someone else in particular -- building, over time, friendships with people whom you feel you can call now & then when that feeling of "stuckness" hits. The great kicker for most addicts and alcoholics I know is feeling isolated. Anything we can do to break through that will help. And in reaching out to talk to someone else, you're helping them. Which, I suppose, isn't incidental to what heals.
member
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Posts: 281
I'm new here to soberrecovery and the truth is the word "soberrecovery" isn't really applying to me yet. It does bother me that my addiction will continue to come back to haunt me in my life no matter what I do even after treatment. I feel like and I am such a freak because I know I'll never really be "normal" or be able to just drink under control. It is mentally so simple. You just simply set a limit on the number of drinks you have and stop when you've reached that limit, but yet when it comes down to it somehow it ends up much more complicated than that. I just don't get it but like everything else in life the more I seem to experience the less I seem to know or understand. It seems like life after recovery is like having a part time job you just don't want to go along with the full time job "normal" people have.
Member
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Dreaming Summer
Posts: 821
Originally posted by Captain Morgan
It seems like life after recovery is like having a part time job you just don't want to go along with the full time job "normal" people have.
It seems like life after recovery is like having a part time job you just don't want to go along with the full time job "normal" people have.
Recovery is a lot of work at times.But it's not nearly as much work as using and drinking had become.In the end most of my day was spent getting,and using,and finding the means to get more...and it was never enough.Recovery is so much more rewarding.Here are the promises from the Big Book.
"If we are painstaking about this phase of our development, we will be amazed before we are half way through.
We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness.
We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.
We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace.
No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others.
That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear.
We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows.
Self-seeking will slip away.
Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change.
Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us.
We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.
We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.
Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us, sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them. "
These things really will happen if you put the effort into recovery that used to go into drinking and using.Hang in there.
phoenix
member
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Posts: 281
Thanks for your insight Phoenix. I guess it's just hard from a current alcoholic's point of view to realize there really is a life after alcohol. I really want to believe that and hope to reach that point in my life.
Guest
Posts: n/a
Captain Morgan --
The exasperating thing about what we call "recovery" (those of us who've been hit on the head badly enough to decide/feel/know we want to stop using or dirnking) is that it has to come from within. I know so many people who, like you, first came to AA in the hope of learning to drink "safely" or "moderately" and when they realized that AA advocated complete abstention would sometimes tend to freak. "Never have another drink for the rest of my life? Can't IMAGINE that." Sometimes, after banging their heads against the same brick walls -- after realizing, in other words, that no matter WHAT their determination to drink "safely" may be, they can't -- these same people will come back to meetings with a different curiosity. I know this was the case for me. When I finally couldn't stand the pain and the despair, when I finally realized that what was triggering that pain & despair more than any other single thing was my drinking, I came to AA with a wholly different attitude. I truly wanted to see what a "sober" life -- a life without drinking at all -- might be like. What this devolved into was, I started listening. Listening in a whole new way.
But as you know, no one can have this initial revelation but you. The fact that you've jumped into the mix here tells me you may not be far from it. Know that no one here will judge you; know that we're here to save OUR butts. There is a way to be "happy, joyous and free" through the whole process of "the program" -- and if you want it deep down in your gut, you'll find it. There's abundant help to be had once you round that crucial corner.
Prayers are with you.
The exasperating thing about what we call "recovery" (those of us who've been hit on the head badly enough to decide/feel/know we want to stop using or dirnking) is that it has to come from within. I know so many people who, like you, first came to AA in the hope of learning to drink "safely" or "moderately" and when they realized that AA advocated complete abstention would sometimes tend to freak. "Never have another drink for the rest of my life? Can't IMAGINE that." Sometimes, after banging their heads against the same brick walls -- after realizing, in other words, that no matter WHAT their determination to drink "safely" may be, they can't -- these same people will come back to meetings with a different curiosity. I know this was the case for me. When I finally couldn't stand the pain and the despair, when I finally realized that what was triggering that pain & despair more than any other single thing was my drinking, I came to AA with a wholly different attitude. I truly wanted to see what a "sober" life -- a life without drinking at all -- might be like. What this devolved into was, I started listening. Listening in a whole new way.
But as you know, no one can have this initial revelation but you. The fact that you've jumped into the mix here tells me you may not be far from it. Know that no one here will judge you; know that we're here to save OUR butts. There is a way to be "happy, joyous and free" through the whole process of "the program" -- and if you want it deep down in your gut, you'll find it. There's abundant help to be had once you round that crucial corner.
Prayers are with you.
member
Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Posts: 281
Thanks GuyBlaKekett, your absolutely right I would love to believe I could just drink under control. I am to the point I know I can't, and this is just a hard pill to swallow. It's funny because I do remember my life before alcohol, and truthfully I'm not sure I want to go back to that any more than I want to continue being an addict.
Guest
Posts: n/a
Hey, Capt --
I think I may have some good news. You will, I can promise you, NOT go back to any life you had before alcohol: in fact, there's no going back. Your experience sober will be completely new: I'm not saying there won't be challenges or it won't be unnerving, but it will be completely new. Sometimes you can get to the point of realizing it's an ADVENTURE. Like taking a trip to an amazing new world you never knew existed. More good news: once you've made the decision to embark on this journey, you've got a lot of people waiting for you on the other side to help you get to know the lay of the new land.
Probably the BEST news is that this is a decision you can make at any moment and that it only involves deciding not to drink one moment at a time. Don't think of it as "never drinking again." Just think of it as not drinking today.
Although I'm new on this board, I think I can guarantee that everyone reading these posts is pulling for you... And every one of us knows what you're feeling.
Guy
I think I may have some good news. You will, I can promise you, NOT go back to any life you had before alcohol: in fact, there's no going back. Your experience sober will be completely new: I'm not saying there won't be challenges or it won't be unnerving, but it will be completely new. Sometimes you can get to the point of realizing it's an ADVENTURE. Like taking a trip to an amazing new world you never knew existed. More good news: once you've made the decision to embark on this journey, you've got a lot of people waiting for you on the other side to help you get to know the lay of the new land.
Probably the BEST news is that this is a decision you can make at any moment and that it only involves deciding not to drink one moment at a time. Don't think of it as "never drinking again." Just think of it as not drinking today.
Although I'm new on this board, I think I can guarantee that everyone reading these posts is pulling for you... And every one of us knows what you're feeling.
Guy
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Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Posts: 14
Phoenix,
I think you may have misread my post...
It was not the program at all that made me think I was cured. What I was saying was as a result of AA, which has such a positive impact on my life, I achieved so much (for me) and started to feel so good that I (and I alone) started to think that maybe I wasn't an alcoholic all those years ago and maybe I was only a kid at 24 and was too hasty to label myself, etc....
This lead to a long drawn out process of isolating from program friends, slowly moving away from AA so that eventuall I wasn't going at all and ultimately made the decision to drink again.
I know today how wrong that thinking pattern was....
Thanks,
-William
I think you may have misread my post...
It was not the program at all that made me think I was cured. What I was saying was as a result of AA, which has such a positive impact on my life, I achieved so much (for me) and started to feel so good that I (and I alone) started to think that maybe I wasn't an alcoholic all those years ago and maybe I was only a kid at 24 and was too hasty to label myself, etc....
This lead to a long drawn out process of isolating from program friends, slowly moving away from AA so that eventuall I wasn't going at all and ultimately made the decision to drink again.
I know today how wrong that thinking pattern was....
Thanks,
-William
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 17
I'm reading a book called Radical Self-Acceptance and the first thing I read last night was the following line:
"If we are stuck, we must infuse ourselves with massive doses of self-love." !!!
The writer goes on: "This is hard because it seems to be our nature to attack ourselves when we are down. Beliefs that we are supposed to be perfect--as defined originally by someone or some standard outside ourselves--are unthinkingly made on our own. This, in itself, is often a large part of the problem.
One of the greatest occasions for self-abuse is the belief that we 'should' be able to change things by ourselves."
I know it's not AA literature or one of Guy's books, but it just struck me that I wanted to share. thanks everyone.
reminds me of one of my current conundrums -- do I need tough love or more self-love as this guy describes??
"If we are stuck, we must infuse ourselves with massive doses of self-love." !!!
The writer goes on: "This is hard because it seems to be our nature to attack ourselves when we are down. Beliefs that we are supposed to be perfect--as defined originally by someone or some standard outside ourselves--are unthinkingly made on our own. This, in itself, is often a large part of the problem.
One of the greatest occasions for self-abuse is the belief that we 'should' be able to change things by ourselves."
I know it's not AA literature or one of Guy's books
, but it just struck me that I wanted to share. thanks everyone.reminds me of one of my current conundrums -- do I need tough love or more self-love as this guy describes??
Last edited by EvrWideninHeart; 03-10-2003 at 07:50 PM.
Guest
Posts: n/a
Hey, sounds good to me. And certainly right in line with anything I've heard in "the program." My way of thinking of it is, you can't have too much compassion for yourself.
Then, of course, you gotta DO something. But doing it out of love means it will work.
Thanks for this...
Guy
Then, of course, you gotta DO something. But doing it out of love means it will work.
Thanks for this...
Guy
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 17
Doing it out of love
"Doing it out of love" -- the work of recovery -- that's cool. I love that.
And you're right, as Horrible as I felt when I first went to the program, I was doing it out of the tiniest bit of love for myself. I didn't really know it at the time, but as I look back, it really was a mini leap of faith...
And you're right, as Horrible as I felt when I first went to the program, I was doing it out of the tiniest bit of love for myself. I didn't really know it at the time, but as I look back, it really was a mini leap of faith...
Member
Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: Dreaming Summer
Posts: 821
Originally posted by William
Phoenix,
I think you may have misread my post...
It was not the program at all that made me think I was cured. What I was saying was as a result of AA, which has such a positive impact on my life, I achieved so much (for me) and started to feel so good that I (and I alone) started to think that maybe I wasn't an alcoholic all those years ago and maybe I was only a kid at 24 and was too hasty to label myself, etc....
This lead to a long drawn out process of isolating from program friends, slowly moving away from AA so that eventuall I wasn't going at all and ultimately made the decision to drink again.
I know today how wrong that thinking pattern was....
Thanks,
-William
Phoenix,
I think you may have misread my post...
It was not the program at all that made me think I was cured. What I was saying was as a result of AA, which has such a positive impact on my life, I achieved so much (for me) and started to feel so good that I (and I alone) started to think that maybe I wasn't an alcoholic all those years ago and maybe I was only a kid at 24 and was too hasty to label myself, etc....
This lead to a long drawn out process of isolating from program friends, slowly moving away from AA so that eventuall I wasn't going at all and ultimately made the decision to drink again.
I know today how wrong that thinking pattern was....
Thanks,
-William
Yikes....I did misread it...sorry.
phoenix...having a Homer Simpson moment (((DOH!!!!!
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