Don't Analyze That

Despite spending most of my blog time analyzing life to death I'm getting better at not doing so every waking moment. Sometimes when I catch myself living in my head I think, "Don't analyze that, just [enjoy, accept, let go of, deal with] it." And amazingly I'm able to for that moment. As someone who excels at living life from the neck up, this is progress.

So bear with me while I continue to hash out the feeling-like-I'm-drunk-post-sedative-episode I had earlier this week and stuff that's old news but is still rattling around in my head. I've shared the sedative incident twice at meetings this week and with my after treatment counsellor. I think it takes a fellow addict to appreciate how very scary it was to love that drunk feeling and experience a 20 year time warp as if my sobriety had never been. One of the things I had to not dwell on this week was how seductive that drunk feeling was. There's a clarity now - knowing if I ever take a sip it will take supernatural help to sober up again. Oh, who am I kidding - it takes supernatural help to stay sober today, every day. My after treatment counselor told me she knew several people who had lost their sobriety from experiencing what I had with the sedative at the hospital. It was good to get confirmation that scared shitless was an appropriate response to loving that drunk out of my mind feeling. She recommended that I talk to my doctor about never getting that particular drug again. The risk is too huge. I know me too well. I'd look forward to another colonoscopy if it meant getting that drug again. Cunning, baffling and powerful is the voice of addiction.

My AA meeting today was incredible. Lots of laughter, incredible sharing and an all around good time. I am so thankful I could share honestly. I have a hard time doing that. I tend to feed my ego little slips of miracle grow and end up wanting to impress someone with where I'm wishing I was at instead of sharing where I'm really at.

When I was at my parents a few weeks ago I went to an AA meeting in a scary, not safe part of the city. It was the only meeting I knew how to get to. I like routine, comfort zone, small meetings. This meeting met none of those criteria. The first guy who shared that night left his ego behind and I am always in awe when I hear someone share so freely just how it is with them. I have much to learn. I look forward to the day when I'm not out to impress someone, including myself.

I had a neat experience after the meeting today. One of the members recently celebrated 20+ years of sobriety. The thought came to me awhile ago to buy him this little book I read all the time. Because it comes from a Christian perspective I wasn't sure I should buy it for him. I didn't want to offend him. I happened to find a copy of it in a book store in the city I grew up in. It took two trips to the store before I bought it. Today I was able to give it to him. I slid it across the table to him before the meeting was over and he looked at it, looked at me and mouthed the author's name with a question mark expression on his face. I nodded yes. After the meeting he told me that author had been recommended to him for a long time but he'd never read him and looked forward to doing so. Cool, eh?

Yesterday my sexual abuse counselor helped me see that feeling like I'm stuck in a rut, falling backwards, and having an incessant need to talk about the whole radio documentary process is most likely because I'm preparing to face fully forward for the first time in my life. What will I grasp at once I leave behind me the identity of sexual abuse victim/survivor? There will always be residue from experiencing what I did, it's shaped who I am, but it's not the whole of who I am. It needn't define me. Do I have the courage to truly own my choices in life? Even as I type that I can hear a sputtering "But..but....but" in my head.

For today I can do this.
I can even live it from my heart.
Celebrate progress not perfection.
Enjoy taking baby steps.
Continue to grow up.
And they all gathered 'round
and said,
"Amen. Amen. Amen."