Enough Pain

Is there a surefire and effective way to help someone get sober, to start living a life of recovery? Yes, if one has the right ingredients almost anyone can quit using and start living a sober life.

After working with addicts for thirty+ years I believe there are several factors that potentially come into play when someone is serious about a major life change like getting sober.

I remember a time about ten years ago when a fellow parked in front of our office and came in to ask for help in getting sober.  

He was well dressed, wearing a watch, driving a decent automobile, and had a woman who waited in the car while he was in our office.

We asked him if that was his car and why he thought he needed help.  Why he thought he was an alcoholic and needed help to stop drinking?  He started telling us his story about how sometimes he would have too much to drink and wake up with a hangover.  Or get into a fight with his wife.  He was afraid he might lose everything, including his wife and home.  He'd never had a DUI nor been in jail.

To sum it up, we told him he might look for someplace else.  Maybe get some outpatient treatment.  We told him that most of those who came to our program had been homeless, in jail and had suffered a lot of pain before they decided to change.  We suggested that he suffer a little more before he tried to get sober; that he still had a decent life and might stop drinking for a few days and decide that he might not have a problem after all.  We told him we didn't think he'd suffered enough consequences.  

And so he went on his way and we never saw him again.

The point of this narrative is that we must suffer enough pain to want to change.  While he had gone through some discomfort from drinking our opinion was that he hadn't reached a bottom where he would be motivated to work on some gut level recovery.  He still had too many resources to be on fire to change.

While TLC accepts anyone who asks for help we like to think that they've had enough pain and loss to want to change. While we'll help anybody we like to use our resources for those who have a strong motivation.  Life will eventually let this guy find out if he has a problem, maybe if he starts feeling some real pain.

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Homelesss

Today our managers took a caravan of vehicles and went to an area of Phoenix where the homeless camp out near the center of the city.

It was probably a hundred degrees when we arrived a bit before 9:00 a.m.  Most of us had cases of water, bags of clothing, socks, tee shirts, underwear and toiletries with us.  We passed them out on a first come first served basis.  And within a half hour we pretty much had given out everything we had.

We didn't go there to recruit clients, or to tell them of the benefits of recovery.  We were there to help those who had less than we do.  And also to remind ourselves where we might be living if we don't continue rebuilding our lives.

As I drove home I reflected on how or why they'd decided to live that way.  I'm sure that some of them had mental problems or were addicted to something.  Half of them looked as though they might be employable if they were motivated.  

But many of them were showing the effects of living in tents on the sidewalks.  Clothes were sweat stained. They wandered aimlessly, going nowhere in particular.  None asked me for money or any kind of help.  A few said thank you, even though they knew we were there for our own reasons, which we were.

My thoughts were that we make choices in life.  And they gave to us by showing what can happen when we decide to live a certain way.

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Gratitude

Today I opened my email and received a message of gratitude from a former resident.

I forwarded the email to the director of the women's houses, knowing that good news is part of what keeps us motivated to do this sometimes difficult work.

The message talked of this former resident's 10 month stay at our woman's program in 2013 and 2014.  She said that while there she learned to live in sobriety and that she now had eight years and two months of recovery.

She wrote about how her experiences at TLC had recently helped her land a job managing a program similar to ours, helping others change their lives.

Emails like this one are rewarding to me because I get to see how the seeds we planted many years ago have spread and grown into opportunites for others to change into productive human beings.  One thing I've learned in my 30 years of recovery is that if we share our message with others they sometimes spread the good things they've learned to those around them.

And to me there's nothing more rewarding than helping others live a better life.  It's one way of making our world a better place.

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Enjoying Life

When I was a kid - a long time ago - I remember my parents had one consistent goal in life: they wanted to work until they were 65, then draw Social Security.  And they never waivered from that.

They never talked about vacations.  Or visiting family.  Just drawing Social Security and then kicking back at home.  I remember the only thing they regularly did together was watch television.  My stepfather had a small plot of land behind their double-wide where he grew tomatoes and chili peppers.  While he was busy with that my mother was working on one of her sewing projects, at which she was quite adept.  During the week they might have a drink or two.

And they followed their plans for the rest of their lives and seemed content to be doing what they were doing. Eventually my stepfather died and my mother moved to Arizona where she passed away a few years later.

I bring this up today because once in a while someone will ask me when I'm going to retire and start enjoying life.  My answer is usually the same: I am enjoying life.  And I'll probably keep doing what I'm doing as long as I'm able to do my job.

I don't know a lot of people who have a job they love and look forward to going to work each day.  But, for me it's always a privilege to help my fellow addicts do something positive with their lives.  To see them find a good job.  Or a good relationship.  

To see them walk away from TLC and into a normal life.

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Acccepting Change...

I don't know what you were doing when the pandemic struck.  But me, I was following the same routine I've been following for the past 30 years of my recovery.  Except maybe Sundays.

I'd show up at the office every day.  Maybe resolve a few problems when staff or clients would have trouble communicating.  I'd go to the gym.  Maybe have lunch with co-workers and friends.  Take maybe four or five vacations a years.  Attend meetings.  Life was good, better than I'd planned.

Then this pandemic whacked us.  It was like a science fiction story.  It couldn't be happening.  Then slowly and insidiously this mystery bacteria that couldn't be seen with the naked eye swept the world and turned things upside down.

Millions died.  Economies crumbled.  Politicians went crazy.  Some people wouldn't take the vaccine because they thought it was a government plot to control our lives. Suddenly change was upon us with no sure outcomes.

And then just when I thought the vaccine was working I planned a trip to the Yucatan Penisula to look for a home where I could live part of the year and read and write.  But all of the sudden the government shut down the border because the pandemic was mutating or changing form.  So I could go nowhere outside the United States.

What to do?  Not many ways around this one.  And for sure no trips to Mexico for me.  What to do?  Fret?  Feel sorry for myself.  Or just keep on track with my routine?

I chose the latter.  After all, I'm the messenger of change.  Change is all we can count on.  Accepting change is being mentally healthy.  And while we might not like the change, accepting it robs it of its power.

We live in the real world and are grateful for what we have right now.  That keeps us strong and healthy.

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Something New

Someone asked the other day why did I always write about the same thing?  Why didn't I find something new to write about? And you know they were right about one thing:  the only thing I really do write about is getting sober and staying sober. It's the same thing all the time:  recovery.

After 2900 blogs I still haven't learned much new about recovery because when one thinks about it the basics we learn in the 12-step meetings and in the Big Book are what staying sober is all about.  It doesn't shift or change.  We follow the guidelines and we get the results.

Now what does changes is the people involved.  Most everyone has a different story of why they decided to get sober, to change their lives. People come in with different stories all the time.

But isn't that what life is really about?  There are guidelines for most everything.  And when people discuss whatever it is:  a trade, religious beliefs, a hobby, or a sport, music, whatever, it's always with a recognition that not much changes in the short term.

This is especially true in recovery.  Those who don't follow the guidelines, eventually fall off the path if they don't adhere to what they've learned.  So that's why I attempt to tie everything in this blog to recovery so that eventually it sinks in so deeply I'll never want to relapse again.

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Blaming Ourselves

 I have a female relative who is beautiful, intelligent and talented who makes her living in the music world.  Yet, in spite of all her talent and gifts she has never succeeded with her long term relationshionships.  She does quite well financially - but when it comes to dealing with other people she's an abject failure.

And when I say relationships I don't mean with just some people - she doesn't get along with anyone for very long.  Anytime she has a problem with someone she blames them.  Her primary target is her mother.  And no matter what goes wrong she somehow ties it to the way her she was raised.

But, the interesting thing is that she was raised very well.  She was dressed well, she was sent to decent schools and lived in nice enough neighborhoods. Her mother always put her welfare first and made sure she had the best she could afford to give her.  Yet, even now, she behaves the same way she did as a child.

No matter what setbacks she has, they're are someone else's fault.

I bring this up today as a topic because, even though she's not an addict she displays many of the characteristics of a addict.

Before I got sober all of the bad things that happened in my life I blamed on others.  My life changed when I looked in the mirror and said there's the problem.  I was the author of my own misery, the creator of my problems.  

And the interestng thing is that once I took that stance, accepted that I was responsbile, my whole life changed.  If you're an an addict and you're looking outside yourself as the problem, then you'll never get sober and start living a normal life.

If you don't believe me, try it.

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