Time is Not Passing Me By

It is August and I thought about something that had happened by in January. When I look back over the last nine months I become keenly aware of the time that has passed. It seems like such a long stretch and I can focus on each month, one at a time, and make a mental list of situations that transpired, events I participated in, conversations I've had, and other general happenings.

When I was drinking, when I think back to that time, months and years are a blur. When I try to focus on something that happened at a particular time, it seems to be tied to drinking. Three days, three weeks, three years- it was all the same. Time was irrelevant to me back then. I didn't keep track of it; possibly because I was either drunk or hungover and it turned into something not so memorable. Oh, I was drunk that night. Oh, I missed out on that because I had a hangover.

I love my life right now. I am actually living it where before I was merely existing. I was drinking (or getting high) and that is what mattered. I cannot believe all of the time I wasted being wasted. As a friend in the rooms says, "Everyday was the same. Everyday ended the same way. Nothing new was going to happen. Nothing exciting or wonderful was going to happen to me as long as I was drinking."



I am so grateful to be sober today. I make sure to bring that to my awareness every single day- especially the days that I find myself down or frustrated. I can get through all of the funk as long as I'm not drinking. Today something wonderful may happen and I will be able to be present. Tomorrow will be totally different and life is full of possibilities- as long as I stay sober.

(I wanted to come back to this and elaborate. I was in a funk yesterday over three unrelated situations that were beyond my control. I kept trying to have patience and not react. I asked for help to turn it over every time the ick feeling rose to the surface. These are the times when I feel drained, emotionally distraught, helpless, and off balance. These are the times when I would isolate and drink in an attempt to forget what was happening- that was my solution.

I did try to isolate yesterday, but thankfully other alcoholics interrupted my plan. It is weird that the times I need to reach, but for some reason will not allow myself to do so, other alcoholics reach out for me. Somehow a phone call, a text, or an e-mail will come to me when I seem to need it the most. An alcoholic called me yesterday afternoon and she coaxed my funk right out of me.

Yesterday, I didn't drink over my upsets. The rooms, the program, and other alcoholics have taught me new solutions that I can utilize and that actually work. I knew that I could allow myself to feel what I was feeling and it was okay. I knew that tomorrow would be a new day and that what was seemed so pressing right now in this moment might not feel so unsolvable in the morning. And low and behold- it worked!

My old solution would have been to drink which always seemed to keep me in the exact moment I was trying to escape. It would hold me down and smother me with all of those bad feelings I was trying to forget. The moment would continue in the next day and the next; as long as I kept drinking I stayed right there in that funk. Drinking never got me to a place I wanted to be.)