Missymae737

Chiy,

Sending strength your way...

I feel sad that you went back out there again...I am also glad you made it back to us...

Chiy, next time you may not make it back here...Have you thought of that?

Aysha

Here it goes again. The emotional craziness that follows. I cleaned the house last night. Today I am really tired and depressed. I hate being depressed.
I really dont have anything to say. I know I could have tried harder. I wanted to get high and that sickens me. I am always going to want to get high. The question is ...When am I going to get it that I CAN'T?
Anyway I appreciate you all being here.

Emimily

chiy, i've read your threads since i first came here. i never respond because i'm not sure that i have anything constructive to say. well, one thing struck me in your last post -

"I am always going to want to get high. The question is ...When am I going to get it that I CAN'T?"

in my opinion, unless you get into a real program of recovery, then you'll get that you CAN'T when you end up in jail. or an institution. or dead. whatever path to sobriety you choose, you're gonna have to throw yourself into it headfirst. you seem headstrong, and that can be a great thing, except when it leads you to self-destruction. my mom (who's in recovery as well) says that alcoholics/addicts go between self-destruct and be well. she says that in an addicted mind, the big choice is that battle between taking care of ourselves and self-destructing. so, the choice is yours.

it's not a joke. recovery takes hard work. you are a hard worker. make it happen.

tay-lyn

Hi again;
I'm not in any position to give advice or to pontificate about recovery, BUT I do want to add a couple of things here:
You may not ALWAYS want to get high.
You may realize that it isn't just that you CAN'T get high, but you don't want to.
I recently was this close to having a slip, fortunately I was able to make it through without picking up. And what I realized was that it wasn't simply NOT wanting to pick up that kept me sober, but that I wanted to be SOBER more than I wanted my doc.
I was told by many that is when you are on the road to recovery, when you want sobriety more than you want your doc..
Now you may say, but I DO want sobriety....I desperately do! I totally get that cause I too was so desperate for sobriety I knew I would die without it. But.....I was so used to my patterns that they seemed greater than my desire for sobriety. So I began the work. SR, meetings, sponsor, reading, prayer, looking inside, etc., etc.. 40 days later, I am only scratching the tip of the iceberg of my problems. But at least I am finding my strength to do that. You can't find that strength without doing the work.
You're going to have to really put recovery first. Make THAT your priority above all else.
You can do it. If I can do it, anyone can.
Sincerely,
Tay.

Aysha

Well..Since I have the rest of the week to myself and now dont have to work on Friday. I AM making that Friday night meeting. So maybe I can find a way that I can possibly get a ride every week. Start working this F2F approach.
I am not a people person. There is alot more to work on than my drug use.
I really dont like me. Not how I look..how I am..where I am at...and like Emmily said. I am too head strong and I hate it! I have no reason to be at all. I am nobody.
And I hate that too. Because I use to be somebody with alot of potential in life. I was so different than I am now. I was quiet and shy. But I didnt care cause I knew who I was. Now after being in the drugs for so many years. I question myself everyday and it drives me insane.
I feel like I am mental. Crazy and emotionally all over the place.
Like right now. I feel like...why am I posting this. Nobody wants to hear this ****. Your just a freakin lunatic. Get over it.
I feel like I am going to really make myself go off the deep end with all these conflicts I have with myself.
I'm gonna shut up. I dont even make sense right now.

gravity

Hi chiynita,

Hope this helps. My own somewhat limited experience with AA is:

-Helped me sort out my emotions & destructive thought patterns - I had similar thoughts as you - many are now changed or gone. The step work makes so much sense.
-Allowed me to see & open up my spiritual side - could be as straightforward as helping others (a spiritual activity in my humble opinion) or praying for help
-Provided so much support & people to talk to who understand me

In my case, I made the committment to myself to get a sponsor (the right one is a must) & work though the 12 steps no matter what (even if at some point I felt I didn't need to anymore). Right now, I am away from home in a hotel room, super stressed, and my buddies are downstairs in the hotel bar getting drunk. This is my #1 trigger. But you know, I absolutely do not want to drink right now! Somethings working!

I also just have to add that you are someone with alot of potential in life. I can now envision my own future free from alcohol, it's really exciting & amazing. You can get there too. Take care.

Pinkcuda

Do I detect a "Silver Lining" in this otherwise Dark Cloud?

Aysha

I do have to add that this relapse isnt like the rest. Lord knows I have had alot of them. But I get so depressed and disgusted with myself I let it keep me down. And I climb right on that pity pot and pout.
Not this time. I F'ed up in a big way. Losing the job is the worst part of it. Because I dont have alot of options without a car. But I really hated that job so it doesnt really even bother me.
My big hang up is that I stopped halfway up to get the car and said to myself "You can stop right now and turn around." But I didnt. I kept going. Came home for more money and kept going knowing full well all I had to do was stop. I was already going through hell all day. What was another night? It pisses me off I was conscious to the fact I was in fact going and even gave myself an opportunity to not go and did anyway.
I wanted to get high. I believe now that I look at it. I did all along. Not only because I was obsessing about them leaving. But because I started thinking about filling my script of xanax. I even wanted to get a bottle of wine. I dont freakin drink. Never have. I wanted to smoke a joint. I thought anything besides crack. I was setting myself up in a big way and just fooling myself into thinking I was trying to distract from just one drug.
Tricky , tricky this addiction.
But I guess I can learn from this. I know I can do it. Well....I hope I can. I want to be careful with that confidence thing. It seems to be my downfall.
I am going to try really hard to hit an AA meeting tomorrow. As petrified as I am of that. I need to. I am really looking forward to the Friday NA meeting. It will be my first one on the outside.
I am going to the one place I really wanted to work before I took the lazy asses needs a mother to clean up after them job. Hopefully they will give that 2nd interview and dont take me turning them down in a bad way. It was only because of the hours they were offering. But I need to be somewhere I like. Not somewhere I think I need to be and miserable.

gravity

Now that's a good plan! All the best!

Tazman53

I felt the same way for many years, guess what! If you work and live the steps that very feeling will be lifted from you, I drank for 40 years, the last 5 I had no choice, I physically had to dring or bad things started happening to me. The steps restored my sanity and resulted in my mental obsession to drink being lifted!

Totally correct, drugs and alcohol are but a symptom of the disease, work the steps, clean up your side of the street, mend the damages and you will be free.

serenityqueen

[I[I]](((Chiynita)))

Today is the first time that I have became aware of what happened. I do want to say this, I love you and I can so relate to the pain you are feeling. I have been there so many times in my past. I would like to commend you for your honesty, it took a great deal of courage to come on here and to admit not only your relapse but also to share the pain that you are going through.

However, many things jumped out at me as I read through your posts. Chiy, I feel as though you totally set yourself up for this. I had sent you a PM, letting you know that I was here for you whenever you needed to talk. You had no problems coming here and sharing with us your anxiety and fear about when you had the house to yourself. I question why you didn't set up a :ghug3relapse prevention plan to keep you occupied in Recovery related activities while they were away. I didn't discover SR until a few months ago, so I haven't followed with you your several month struggle. I never realized that you weren't going to regular meetings. I was quite shocked to be honest. I don't see how anyone can obtain any kind of Recovery, not just clean time, without AA/NA or intensive groups. I was a little angry when I heard you say that they only have a meeting CLOSE TO YOU on Friday nights. And also that you don't drive so it's hard to not only get to meetings but job prospects were slim as well. I have not had a driver's license in over 5 years. That never, ever got in my way when I wanted to get high or drunk, so I don't let that be an excuse as to why I'm not going to meetings. The first 9 months that I was in Recovery and in intensive outpatient, I took a bus, I need to clarify that it was actually two buses five days a week to get to group. I had layovers for nearly an hour in between each bus. And I live in Ohio, this 9 months was in weather from 90 degrees to 5 below zero, rain, shine, snow, whatever. I never let the weather stop me from getting what I needed to stay clean and in Recovery. I was willing to go to any length. I had broke ties with every one of my so called friends back in July of 2005 when I got clean. They all used so I knew I could never, ever be around them again. The only Family members who still spoke to me by this time was my Mom and my Son. Mom's health problems began a few weeks before I went into detox and my Son was not yet old enough to drive. The people that I was in the group with,for the most part, were all still using. I didn't ask them for a ride. One of these women lived about 4 blocks from me and had offered many times to give me a ride there and back. Some mornings when it was extremely cold or raining, she would drive by me at the bus stop. She'd stop, ask me if I wanted a ride and I would thank her and wave her on. Why? Because I knew that if I got into that car with someone who was still using, I might, just might get sucked back into the hell I had fought so hard to climb out of. I decided that the snow, rain, whatever wasn't going to kill me, but the risk of using damn well could. There was finally a woman who started in the group who after time I realized had changed everything in here life. Not only was she not getting high or drinking anymore, she was developing the same tools of Recovery that I was. I would see her several times a week at meetings, even after both of us had met our requirements for group on the signature verification sheet. I finally humbled myself to ask her where abouts she lived. Turns out, she doesn't live anywhere near me, but she saw how serious I was about my Recovery as well and began to pick me up every day for group. I helped her with gas and we developed a great routine in the mornings on the way. I'd read out of one of the meditation books and we'd discuss it on the way.

Hon, you also cannot let a job or anything else come before your Recovery. There are ways of asking for a particular day of the week as one of your days off without giving up your anonynimity. I never had a problem asking off on Saturdays for example every week because I knew I would still be drunk from the night before. Jobs come and go. Just like we all have another relapse in us, but we aren't guaranteed another Recovery.

Chiy, I hope you don't feel as though I am attacking you by my post here. I wrote all of this here not just for you, but anyone else who thinks that their Recovery doesn't have to come first. Like so many others have said on here, without out Recovery, none of these other things would be there anyway.

I'm here for you. I take it that your Gram and the rest of the Family will be gone for a few more days, right? I hope you will get to some AA meetings if you can't get to NA everyday. Remember, NA is for a lack of better words a branch off of AA. That's where the entire concept came from.

Chiy, I will Pray that you learn from this relapse enough to realize what happened along the way that led up to it and to put a very strong Recovery Plan in action.

God Bless,
Judy[/I][/I]