"If you guys had watched me more closely,” he said, “I wouldn't have taken more than I should have.” And he was serious when he said this.
I didn't bother to explain how ridiculous that sounded.
But this is typical of how addicts think before they get into recovery. We have a habit of blaming our behavior on someone or something else because we don't want to take responsibility.
Before I got into recovery many years ago I always found someone or something to blame for my addiction. My father was abusive. No one understood me. My P.O. had it in for me. I didn’t have the advantages others had. There was always somewhere else to put the blame.
And while all these excuses might have been true, I was the one who was drunk and high and broke and often in jail – the one paying the price.
We addicts start to change when we look in the mirror and recognize that there stands the responsible party. At that point we stop feeling sorry for ourselves. We realize that we are the authors of our own misery – or our successes.
And when we accept that responsibility then we can rebuild our lives. I know, because it worked for me.
