The Last Chance Texaco · Tales of Recovery from Crystal Meth Addiction

How deep is your love?

March 14, 2010 in Gratitude, Humility, Service by Chris | 4 comments

It’s occurred to me a couple of times recently that as a class, we addicts are often born with an unusual capacity to love and very little facility for it. ”We couldn’t seem to be of real help to other people,” could well be understood as, “We couldn’t seem to express our love to other people.” The love I felt, the love I wanted to share with those closest to me, was just another conviction I couldn’t live up to, even though I wanted to. I knew it was there. I knew I was trying to share it. Yet I knew something was wrong because all I ever seemed to get in return was hurt.

Even at my best it seems that every time I tried to give love it always unconsciously came with strings. In the end of my drug use it was especially obvious. Everyone in my life was there because either they wanted something from me or I wanted something from them. I had abandoned all my real friendships, and the only reason I kept up the appearance of a relationship with members of my family was to use them, even though I didn’t want to. My relationship with my mother was particularly problematic. As much as I loved her, I was angry with her; angry for things that she actually did horribly wrong.

I’ve been going with my mom to her outpatient group for family night, and that has been wonderful for me. Last week I even learned something. One of the feeling my mother drinks to deaden is the feeling that she has failed her children. I knew that making her feel guilty for failing me would always line my pocket, so I always used guilt to stay afloat and stay high. Which led to more drinking. Which led to more anger. Which led to more guilt trips. It was a predictable dance we both used to keep our addictions alive. If you had asked me three years ago if I would ever have a supportive, respectful relationship with my mom I would probably have laughed at you. But there it is. I go to treatment with my mom and I love it.

One of the things I’ve gotten out of doing step work and of being part of the fellowship is a better ability to love others. It has helped me learn to be a good son, a good nephew and a good friend. Not perfect. Not by a long shot. But much, much better. I learned to love myself and to love other people because the people in the program showed me how and because I had the opportunity to take a careful and unflinching look at myself and to be loved by others in the process.

Another Case of Cannot

February 25, 2010 in Death, Fear by Chris | 5 comments

Deep down at the bottom of happy, joyous and free lies fear; fear that if I were ever to throw my sobriety away I might never get it back. It seems the older we get, the more times we relapse, the harder it is to come back and fully embrace recovery. I suspect that, as with a drug, I would want getting sober again to feel like the first time. I would want to feel the magic, and I don’t know how one could.

The other thing I’ve noticed is that, as a class, those of us in 12 Step programs die with incredible regularity.

My friend Terry was once sober for 11 years, but I didn’t know him then. During the 3 years I’ve known him, Terry has rarely been able to put together more than 60 days at a time. Terry is really smart and there are times in his life when he has been really successful. But that was a long time ago, too. Since I’ve known him, Terry has been intermittently homeless and unemployed.

He kept grabbing for a feeling from being sober that he never could quite grasp. He was possessed by his ideas of what being sober was supposed to feel like. The last time I saw Terry, a couple of weeks ago, he told me that he didn’t think he was going to make it. The sum of my experience with Terry led me to believe that meant that he was planning on drinking. Same story. Different day. So I thought nothing of it.

Terry’s ex-wife found him on the 19th, three days after he shot himself. His funeral was one of the saddest things I have ever experienced. It broke my heart. And it scared the hell out of me.

Travel Kicks My Ass

February 15, 2010 in Gratitude, Spirituality by Chris | 4 comments

I arrived home Saturday night, slept most of the day on Sunday and I’m still tired. Overall I had a wonderful time though. There was a little tension with one of my travel companions who I found to be astonishingly self-centered, but I’m sure I played a part in that. Managed, in the end, to discuss all that openly and reach some compromise and peace.

I called my sponsor from the corner of Haight and Ashbury in San Francisco Read the rest of this entry »

Adventures in Sobriety

February 9, 2010 in Gratitude, promises by Chris | 4 comments

I never would have thought I’d have an opportunity like this again. The end of my drug use, and even for the most part the first 3 years I’ve been sober, have been pretty uninteresting and I have actually become pretty resistant to change. Variation kind of freaks me out. I feel so secure in my little rut. This week though, I’ve had to travel to the Central Valley of California to a huge farm show for work, something outside of my usual comfort zone, and I’ve been happily expanding my vistas.

It turned out that the city we are staying in is 3 short hours from Yosemite Valley – my favorite place on earth – and somewhere I didn’t think I’d have the opportunity to see in the foreseeable future. But as I was planning the trip I happened to notice how close it was and that we had an unscheduled 10 hours. How could I resist. I also decided that considering how hard we’re working and the fact that I won’t have a real day off at home in well over a week that the least the company could do is buy me lunch. At one of my favorite restaurants. At the Ahwahnee Hotel. Four courses of glorious, glorious food in the most beautiful dining room with the most extraordinary view in America. Read the rest of this entry »

Nothing That Three Million Dollars Won’t Fix

February 5, 2010 in Brotherly Love, Resentment, Shortcomings by Chris | 5 comments

I think I hate being in therapy. I mean, they make you look at yourself! And who wants to do that? I thought I’d done well enough having gotten through the 4th step and, after all, I’m still sober. I guess that isn’t entirely true. After an hour and a half with Anita yesterday I realized that I still have a bunch of work to do on a resentment I didn’t think I harbored any longer. A resentment toward my mother. Oh my God! Can’t we just put that behind us already? It’s bad enough that I feel like I’ve lost all the passion in my life, and lost it long ago, but to have this still be the thing that is blocking me is beyond the pale. Read the rest of this entry »

A Spiritual Foundation

January 22, 2010 in Spirituality by Chris | 5 comments

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the value of anonymity. I’m not altogether convinced that there really is such a thing; not in the absolute sense. It exists in greater and lesser degrees and we see famous people straddle the line all the time. In 12 step recovery we have secret code words and phrases that one can recognize easily as being part of this particular path, and in interviews those people will give themselves away by saying, “I had to admit I was powerless,” or “It’s just a one day at a time thing.” Some notable people do it successfully. Some don’t. It seems the ones who don’t almost invariably end up being train wrecks again. Read the rest of this entry »

Three

January 15, 2010 in Uncategorized by Chris | 9 comments

But one voice got through, caught her up by surprise
It said, “Don’t hold us back we’re the story you tell,”
And no sooner than spoken, a spell had been broken
And the voices before her were trumpets and tympani
Violins, basses and woodwinds and cellos, singing

“We’re so glad that you finally made it here
You thought nobody cared, but we did, we could tell
And now you’ll dance through your days while the orchestra plays
And oh, you’re aging well.”

It doesn’t really seem possible, does it? I would never have guessed that three years later I would still be sober. It doesn’t seem like it has been that long, and yet the life I had before seems like a lifetime ago. On balance, it doesn’t even seem like I’ve done that much to stay sober. I’ve done some work, sure. I’ve done as much work as anybody. But I didn’t put as much effort into getting sober as I put into scoring drugs. Getting high and staying high took tons of effort. Staying sober didn’t take that much effort. Read the rest of this entry »

This Page is Intentionally Left Blank and Other Self Contradictory Stuff

January 7, 2010 in Perseverance by Chris | 6 comments

It should have become clear to me a long time ago. Perhaps it was and I simply hadn’t the willingness to do something about it, but it is clear now that I can benefit from therapy. I don’t think I’ll make any significant gains in becoming happy without professional help. So in addition to starting medication, I’ve started counseling. Read the rest of this entry »

Unmixed Attention

January 3, 2010 in Early Recovery From Crystal Meth Addiction, Spirituality by Chris | 3 comments

“Absolute unmixed attention is prayer.” -Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace

I realized a long time ago that I can trace the decline of my spiritual health, and a decline in the quality and quantity of my writing, to the date I got a television. For a good year and a half, writing was a form of prayer to me. In writing I set aside time to examine myself and my experience closely and to open myself up to learn.

Television kind of shuts that down for me. It is much like a drug in that way. Television makes me a little bit numb.

I think it’s time to turn the TV off; time to read more and time to write more.

I Don’t Want to Pray for Him.

December 28, 2009 in Courage, Resentment by Chris | 9 comments

I am beyond furious and my sponsor is out of town. It happened again. I finally got last week’s paycheck cashed on Wednesday and today this week’s check bounced. Obviously, in spite of what my employer says, I need to find a new job. Read the rest of this entry »

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