Category Archives: Addiction

And on the 366 day…

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You better get up

Now don’t you understand?

And raise your hand

Hey, hey, hey

I said, raise your hand!

- Bruce Springsteen (Raise Your Hand)

I did it! Errr, well, I guess I did something. I mean, I did get a big ovation, lots of smiles and a heavy new medallion complete with a plastic wrapper. My wife gave it to me along with a kiss, a hug, and a cake that I wasn’t allowed to eat. I did get to cut it up though. After the chips lady awarded her chips for various lengths of sobriety, she asked people to raise their hands if they had a year or more to show that the program worked, I proudly put up my hand for the first time.

So here I am at a year and a day, close to two years after I started this journey. You know, “trudging the Road of Happy Destiny” along with the rest of the drunks and addicts.

See, here’s the thing. The day after THE DAY, was just another day in the journey, a journey that will never, can never, stop as long as I want to live. I’m the motherfucking Flying Dutchman, man. If I stop sailing the Seven Seas of Recovery, I’m gonna die. That’s a fact!

Fortunately, I’ve taken the wheel with my higher power filling my sails and and a crew of my fellows, we can stay out here forever. Ulysses ain’t got nothing on me.

Or won’t.

That dude got home in a decade or so. My Odyssey is just beginning to continue and  tomorrow is another day.

Peace out,

M

Addicted? To Chewing Gum? You Betcha!

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Just how bad are you when gum addiction is a possibility?

I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I go into paroxysms if I don’t get it. For the first fifty-two and one-half years of my life I wouldn’t even touch the stuff. I used to look at gum chewers as cows chewing their cud. Gum snappers were even worse. I can go still go days, weeks and even months without having any at all.

But, give me a pack and it’s gone within an hour or two. That’s right, fifteen sticks of gum, chewed and swallowed (I know, icky), gone. Who eats a pack of gum in a few hours? Me.

I chew it for a bit and then, without even thinking about it, I swallow it and reach for another piece. It’s not like being addicted to gum is that bad for you or even that costly. I can buy a pack for .89 cents. It just seems so…ridiculous.

I started chewing it because my wife noticed that I had bad breath, breath she said smelled like moth balls. I have excellent teeth and clean gums, so we went to the gastro guy and, for various other reasons as well, he did an upper endoscopy.

My stomach was fine, there was nothing either in it or my esophagus that would cause me to have bad breath. So, my wife suggested that, in between tooth brushing, I chew some gum.

And look where that got me!

I mentioned this to my therapist today and she was pleased that I was so self-aware. I guess I’m taking forward steps in recovery. I wonder if I should add that I can’t chew gum in safety to my inventory?

Peace out,

M
In Recovery Blog Facebook Page

Progress, Not Perfection

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Progress, man’s distinctive mark alone,
Not God’s, and not the beasts’: God is, they are,
Man partly is and wholly hopes to be.
- Robert Browning (A Death in the Desert)

 I ran across this quote the other day when I was searching for another Browning quote,

Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,

Or what’s heaven for? (Andrea del Sarto)

and I thought they form an interesting pair in their relationship with each other and in consideration of my ongoing recovery.

They say that if you aren’t working on your recovery, you are working on your relapse and, from previous experience, I believe this is an apt expression. The most important part of the work is to completely stop what you ought not do. No “dalliance” with this step in recovery is acceptable. You’re either in or your out. Perfection, not progress, is the rule.

In every other aspect, recovery is always a work in progress. God and animals need make no progress, they merely are and that is all they ever need be. Man alone attempts progress, as Browning aptly stated. At ten months of sobriety, I have progressed exponentially during my ten months of sobriety. While progress, not perfection is the rule, my sobriety requires perfect progress. Therefore, my grasp must be within my reach or there is no heaven.

Peace out,

M
In Recovery Facebook Page