lostmyway

...and I just had to share.

I had a terrible, rotten day today at work (I work with at-risk youth who have not completed high school...we don't use the word "drop out.") It's rewarding to me in many ways when I see them move on and be successful in life, but there's always a bad egg or two around.

Our most recent bad egg is bipolar and not taking her medication. Long story short, she flipped out today and tried to punch me in the face.

The cool thing (if I may toot my own horn for a moment) is that I caught her by the wrist, avoided getting punched and pinned her to the ground (I didn't hurt her; I had no desire to, I was simply defending myself.)

The non-cool thing is that the experience left me feeling angry, frustrated, sad, depressed, and unable to cope. I did not know what to do with these feelings. I was thisclose to going home and drowning my sorrows in alcohol.

But why throw 23 days of sobriety down the drain? I've worked hard for it.

So I went home, called a lady from my AA group and unloaded on her. That helped. Then I did the most random thing and decided that instead of drinking, I would dye my hair. Hey, whatever works I guess.

Today gave me hope that I can get through even the hard times without picking up a drink, and for that I am grateful.

Shifty

That little demon loves these little excuses to drink. Good on ya for staying one step ahead

Dee74

thanks for sharing that LMW
and congratulations!

D

serenityqueen

Glad you shared that with us. . . you should be proud of yourself. I'd like to share something with you. I envision my disease as one of those huge blow up characters that are outside fast food restaurants when they are running a promo w/ a new movie that's out. . . those big things that hover over the rooftop. Well, mine isn't the cute character from the movie, but it's that big. Every single time that I don't give in to the urge, I deflate just a little bit of air out of it, take away some of it's strength. As you deflate it, you build your strength up.

I'm so glad that you called someone from AA. It's important to get comfortable with the people we meet at AA so when situations arise like this, you don't hesitate to call them. Sometimes that phone weighs a thousand pounds . . . it's hard to pick it up to call someone. But when you hold those things inside, even if you didn't drink over the situation at the time, you're giving a little bit of that strength back to your disease. . . it's ammunition for when something else happens, you have a pile of sh*t beginning to grow. Then, when that pile gets big enough, you drink over it all.

And by the way, welcome to the Color of the Month Club! lol My Son used to joke w/me that I changed hair color so much I should start a Color of the Month Club!

God Bless,
Judy

NewMe11109

Great use of your new life coping tools ... keep it up. Great idea to call your friend at AA! Together we can do this.

geekorunique

Well done...you did well to avoid getting hurt...and if you had picked up a drink...it would have hurt a lot more than that punch in the face would have. You did so well to distract yourself. I used to clean in early sobriety, I was quite manic about it. My sponsor has now taught me how to just sit and be calm and deal with what I need to. But my house isn't as tidy when I do that!!

I'm proud of you for not drinking, emotions are what I drank on and I can identify with just wanting to put them out of your head.

You picked up the phone...instead of a drink...which is amazing!!

CrackQuack

I like to get a tattoo when I feel at loss for coping! LOL... Good thing I don't have much money, or I'd be covered.
Anyway, nothing wrong with the word drop out. PC is really making our nation soft. I am a high school drop out who got her GED IN ACTIVE ADDICTION, and plan to do something with it starting this year. Hopefully February, but if I can't find my 2008 stuff, definitely by July, this year, I'll be in school!
And I don't plan to be soft on the youngin's when they cross my door cuz being hard will be what got them to me in the first place (I am going for juvie probation officer).
Congrats on how you handled things! I am proud of you!

lostmyway

CrackQuack...wow! What an amazing and inspriring story. My trouble is that I'm a bleeding heart. I've been through so much of what the kids I work with are going through...I've been addicted to alcohol, sleeping pills, I've suffered with depression, I made a serious suicide attempt and am very lucky to be alive today. Instead of being tough on them, I want to save their lives...there I go again, putting the weight of the world on my shoulders. But as I well know, you can't help someone who isn't ready to be helped, as was the case with the girl I dealt with yesterday. I'm sure a few more years in this field will toughen me up a bit. My boss has been doing this job for 11 years and he definitely doesn't take any sh*t!

A tattoo, BTW, was my first impulse, but I was lacking the funds for that as well, so that will have to wait