October 2009

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Thin Again

October 25, 2009 in Ephemera by Chris | 6 comments

I’ve always been a skinny person.  Before my addiction to crystal meth the most I ever in my life weighed was 180 pounds.  I’m also 6’4″ so while 180 isn’t exactly underweight it is only a 32″ waist.  Call it narcissism but it’s an aesthetic I really like on me.

Post crystal meth addiction I gained weight like I never have before.  When I got sober this time I came in at 170 lbs. and over the course of 90 days I put on 60 pounds.  That finally leveled off and I lost 15 of it, and I could have been content to continue weighing 215 pounds.  I would have rather that it was muscle weight and not all on my  stomach, but 215 wasn’t terrible.

After my surgery I packed on a whole new batch of weight.  I was all the way up to 245 at one point.  I went from being moderately active to absolutely sedentary.  I craved sugar all the time.  I have no self control, obviously, so I denied myself nothing.  I became so large that I couldn’t bend over to tie my shoes.  I had to cross my legs to do it.

While I was visiting my dad I got on his bathroom scale – 240 pounds.  I had one of those moments of clarity then that unless I did something about the problem it was only going to get worse.   Well, we alcoholics and addicts are people who are given to extremes, or so the tell me, so I guess I can accept the fact that I may be going slightly overboard in my pursuit of a skinny me again.

I figured out how many net calories I can consume per day to lose 2 pounds a week.  I track everything I eat.  Everything!  I have started exercising – walking mostly, but walking hard, for about an hour a day.  Every day I have come in well below my goal and I’ve lost 5 pounds.  I only need to lose 31 more pounds to no longer be classified as “overweight” – 35 or 40 to look cute in jeans again. Read the rest of this entry »

Day 5 (plus 1000)

October 16, 2009 in Courage, Ephemera, Gratitude, Perseverance by Chris | 5 comments

I can’t believe it. Day 1000 passed without my noticing it. I was in Las Vegas at the time visiting my mom and dad. I spent the day hanging out with them, my great-uncle and his new wife and daughter, my aunt and two of my cousins. Watched some football. Took a nap. I didn’t even notice that the un-official milestone had passed.

It’s so strange. In the first 90 days there wasn’t a day that passed without me knowing exactly how long it had been. Even as recently as day 500 I would as often as not be aware of the time. It is the addictive process in reverse. Being sober becomes your “normal.” Day by day another little piece of the old way of being falls away.

While I was in Las Vegas I went on one of the “thrill rides” at the top of the Stratosphere Hotel – the Big Shot. When you’re on the ride it seems longer than it really is. Much longer. Especially the falling part. For a good part of the time you are falling at the speed of gravity so you get this eerie weightless feeling; this amazing kind of ‘powerless.’

It’s probably not surprising that the first real using dream I’ve ever had in the last 1005 days was that night. That night and the next I actually had a hard time falling asleep. I couldn’t get past the part at the beginning of falling asleep that feels a little bit like falling. That all seems to have resolved itself though. Anyway – the ride is worth doing. Once. Take that off my bucket list now.

Exhausted . . . again. Naturally.

October 8, 2009 in Perseverance by Chris | 6 comments

They’re out. They’re back in. They’re out. They’re back in.

It’s exhausting. I’m afraid I have a growing prejudice against those that seem to want it but aren’t willing to ride out the discomfort in order to achieve long term sobriety. Not that I can claim anything like long term sobriety for myself yet, but at 3 months shy of three years clean, I think I may be on the right track. I have definitely endured the first difficult days and not had to go back.

The Cheerleader went out the night I thought he was doing so well. He claims to be back in. I haven’t talked to him. This is the third time he’s done this and I don’t really know how much I want to keep being hopeful for someone, only to be let down. Again.

The Farmer’s Daughter did a tour through a psych hospital after a couple of rounds of vodka and an attempted suicide by insulin. She is now at the Betty Ford Center. Truth be told, I’m jealous. I’d love to go back to treatment for three months. In many ways the 28 days I spent in treatment were the happiest days of my life. You can do an amazing amount of growing in treatment that is very difficult to do when “worldly clamors” distract you from full time healing.

Dr. Silkworth is rightly points out in a Grapevine article from January, 1947, that, “There is nothing “screwy about it at all. The patient didn’t follow directions.” Which makes me wonder if they are the kind of patients that were unable to follow the directions, or did they simply refuse to. And does it matter.

I cannot claim to have followed the directions perfectly, myself, and yet I seem, more or less, to be fine; to have recovered from the hopeless condition I found myself in three years ago. I may have missed the mark, but I’ve come close enough to score, and I intend to keep doing that. We addicts are human beings, just like other human beings, and we can protect ourselves intelligently from relapse.

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