From Selfishness to Self-Regard, Self-Respect
 

Before entering recovery I was selfish and lived in a “me centered” universe. I had to be this way because I was an alcoholic and an addict. When you’re this way you have to put yourself first because you have to make sure that you will always be in “control” of your access to alcohol. You desperately need that because you’re in mortal fear of doing without it. And in one way you’re right. Things could get pretty dicey if the alcohol is taken away. (The trouble is that things get even dicier if the alcohol stays). I felt I knew all the ins and outs, had read all the important books. And I thought I was in “control” of the alcohol supply, was sure I could give it up if I had to. But not just yet. Maybe tomorrow.
It took me a long time, a long, long time to discover that I wasn’t “in control” at all. I was “under control”. The alcohol controlled me-not the other way around. And I was selfish in the sense that a slave has to serve its master.
By some stroke of fate- “higher power”, the help of others, sheer desperation, just being sick and tired of being sick and tired, I managed to enter recovery. And, through the years, I gradually found that selfishness had given way to self-regard, self-respect. Although I no longer lived in a “me centered” universe I ceased acting against my own best interests, no longer was I my “own worst enemy” (as a doctor once told me I was many, many years ago). At first I felt guilt, shame at what I had been, what I had done. But in time I managed to forgive myself and hope that others may have forgiven me.
It hasn’t been easy to do. And I don’t think I could have done it without lots of help. If any credit is due it is primarily to those who cared. The best I can do now is to tell them how much I care in return...:tyou:c011:

W.