Weasel1966

I have been through quite a few versions of sobriety. I didn't know it then but every version was just a rework of the last failed attempt to mold sobriety as I saw fit. To make it bend to my will. To take the so called "logic" I applied to it and deliver to myself a solid forthright answer for why I was doing insane things.

How could this person... So strong in everything he does... End up trying to sleep curled in a ball in just his underwear on the front porch in the middle of winter?

You cannot apply logic to addiction.

I felt really guilty for drinking or using so I tried to do things that would, in my mind, balance out the guilt. Really silly things like going to get ice cream in the neighboring town. Or going to dinner out when I would normally be drunk only to return home from these attempts and run over to the bar because I had to catch up to where I would normally have been in my drunk routine.

Or the period of time when I would track my good and bad days. I thought that if I could quantify my behavior I could reason with it. What I didn't see was this was just another way to try and balance my guilty days with "look at me I am a good person and ok today" days. Really... I thought that was ok. A respite for my aching heart as I sat in the ice cream place watching the good people of the world swirl around me. Fuzzy headed I was still dying inside.

Each version, or cockamamie way I approached getting sober was nothing more than my attempts to sooth my guilt and shame.

There is this line I see when I think of my life events. A big thick line that took many attempts and many versions to get through. It's this place where I stopped trying to drag everything I was dragging forward with me. I simply could not and can not move that much baggage. I had to let's some of it go. Big huge chunks of who I was just didn't work.

I cannot feel guilty for learning. I have read that "The guiltless learner learns easily because his thoughts are free." I cannot carry the burden of the lesson with me to the next. I can only take the strength from the lesson.

I spent much time trying to compromise with my guilt. I think the reason I am sober and really feeling better these days is because I have stopped trying to do that. I still shudder, often in fact, when my mind wants to go back to moments that shame me. I don't compromise with it. I don't seek to bury it. I don't ask for forgiveness from it.

In those moments I remind myself that it was a lesson. I learned from it. I can take from it the strength. I can leave with it the burden. That lesson... That has freed me to look forward. To stay sober... To live sober... And I cannot be any more grateful than I am today for it.

K

Jipsee

I love this post and can totally relate to "the many versions" of getting sober. I too have been doing this since I have been 29 (now 54). I was thinking about it last night and had a 10 year period of sobriety: treatment, then lots of work, raising my kids and oh guess what: I didn't drink so I was sober LOL

I read somewhere on here that Shame means we are bad and Guilt means we did something bad. I'm embracing the guilt part and going to work on letting that go. Have a happy Sunday.

Weasel1966

Thank Jipsee... yeah it takes some work. Every attempt was in earnest but I just did not see what I was doing. I guess I kind of matured a bit.

biminiblue

Quote:

I cannot carry the burden of the lesson with me to the next. I can only take the strength from the lesson.

This is a keeper. You have given me my thought for the day.
That sounds a little like Atlas?

SoberLeigh

^^^^^Yep; that's that part of Weasel's post that resonated with me, also.

Great post; thanks, W.

fastfocus

excellent post thanks

livingnow

You should write professionally.
Awesome wisdom
Thank you

LBrain

well done weasel

Soberwolf

Well done Weasel

razor15

Thanks for this.

Jwalker

So beautifully written and so apt a description of the last years of my drinking! Thank you for this reflective post -

Jwalker

Dee74

Great post K - thanks

D

Hevyn

I just love the way you think, K - thank you for a heartfelt and valuable post (yet again).

DoubleDragons

I loved this, Weasel! I think this is why the term "high functioning" alcoholic is so prevalent. I think a lot of us tried to overcompensate in other areas to "make up" for the guilt and shame that came from our drunken incidences. When I sobered up, I actually started cutting myself a break in other areas in my life and became really aware of what parts of my life felt like they were really part of the "authentic" me and what parts needed to be discarded because they were part of what I thought I should be doing. When I was a drinker, I did a lot more of my perceived "shoulds", believe it or not, because in my mind, I was covering for my "bad" drinking self.