The Last Chance Texaco

Archive for the ‘Courage’ Category

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 »

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.

I’ve been having this internal argument about smoking cessation with nicotine replacement therapy.  Namely, in quitting smoking I’m really quitting 2 different addictions; smoking addiction and nicotine addiction. I have picked up a cigarette only twice in the last 16 days, and that has been made rather easy by the fact that my nicotine addiction is still being fed by other means (Commit Lozenges).

The thing about NRT (nicotine replacement therapy) is that when the nicotine starts to wear off, my brain reads that feeling as a que to light up.  Since I haven’t been picking up cigarettes I’ve wondered if it wouldn’t be smarter to stop the NRT as well.  I know the physical withdrawal from nicotine is less than a week long.  Why not just be done with all of it.  I’m not that afraid of the discomfort at this point.

People who know better, people who study this sort of thing, though, all seem to agree that the key is to use NRT in high enough doses for long enough to achieve the best chance of success at giving up both. When people who knew something about getting off of drugs suggested how I might solve the problem I had the same battle.  There were some people who I believed in and some people who I didn’t.  Ultimately I had to be true to myself and embrace the path that spoke to my heart.  For now I’m going to continue doing what is supported by science, even though I have different ideas.

I’m less clear about other things.  I’m less clear about what to do with Joe, who is still not leaving his room unless he absolutely has to.  There is a slew of things I am frustrated or angry about, starting with his lack of participation in his own life and his failure to care for his dog.  Jake and I both got to clean up uriine yesterday because Pepper would rather pee in our bathrooms than let us know she needs to go out, and Joe can’t be counted on to make sure she’s going out.

Joe is still unwilling to be honest with those who are best equipped to help him, including his doctor and probation officer.  I believe he has convinced himself he is sick.  I don’t know that a 4 day relapse takes three weeks and counting to recover from.  Even if I add the flu that I had on top of it he is long overdue to be getting up and doing something.

The other day ne needed a ride to see his probation officer and he appeared to still be ill.  He asked if I would give him a ride and I agreed.  I took 3 hours off work so I could do that.  I drove him the 15 or so round-trip miles.  As we were pulling in to the parking lot he uttered the first words I’d heard him say that day.  “This is going to suck.”

“Yeah,” I replied. “This is going to suck.”  I though he meant it would suck because he was going to be honest with her.  When he came out of the probation office, he asked if I was going to work on Monday because he forgot to bring his money to pay her.

I asked him how it went when he told her what was going on, and he told me he didn’t; that he had no intention of doing that.

He hasn’t thanked me for spending billable hours to help him and he hasn’t been honest, and he complained that this meeting was going to suck because he doesn’t enjoy going to see this authority figure that he placed himself in the position of having to go see.  So I told him that I wasn’t available on Monday, that until he started being honest with his doctor and his P. O. and until he learned a little bit of gratitude that I didn’t think there was much hope that his life was ever going to be different.  I reminded him that when I got sober I had all the same obligations that he had, except that for a short time I didn’t even have a roof over my head or transportation, that it was December, and I had managed to get to where I needed to be by walking.  In the snow.

I am not going to ask him anymore if he needs anything.  In the last week I’ve spent $15 of my cash, $60 in my time off work, 20 miles or so on my car, “helping” him and on balance I don’t feel like I’ve helped him at all.  I feel like all I’ve done is allowed him to keep dong what he’s doing.  And now I’m resentful because for all those things I’ve given, I haven’t even been granted a simple “thank you.”  All I have gotten is the chance to clean dog piss off my bathroom floor twice.

If I could wake him up at 6 in the morning and lock him out of the house, and not let him back in till 6 PM I would do it.  I know the program tells me I need to love and help other addicts, but I don’t believe anything I’ve done has helped him.  I feel like I’ve been a door mat.

My sponsor is back from San Diego and I haven’t seen him since before I put Gracie down.  I’ve got some stuff to go over with him and I’m really looking forward to it.

On Wednesdays, when I work half the day from home and then have half the day to do homework, I also love to watch the Today Show.  Call it a quirk.  Last Wednesday they had a guest, Judith Sills, talking about her new book, “Getting Naked Again: Dating, Romance, Sex, and Love When You’ve Been Divorced, Widowed, Dumped, or Distracted.”  Considering my present circumstance it sounded perfect.

On my way home from work tonight I stopped by Barnes & Noble to pick it up and found it on one of the octagons.  Right next to “Moments of Clarity.”

I’m hoping to find myself in this book, too.

So why shouldn’t I juggle too?  I’ve been juggling already.  Figuring out how to live sober has been really, really tricky. I don’t even think that, on balance, I’m very good at it.  I’ve complained about the big chunks of my life that really aren’t working, that I struggle with, that I’m apparently unwilling to fix, but I’ve also come to believe that I have a natural failure level.  No matter how high the bar is set, I come in X percent below it.  So if I want to achieve more, perhaps I should just raise the bar high enough to reach the real goals – Ideal – Failure Rate = Achievable Goal  Maybe that’s just an insane idea, too.  Who knows.

On some level though I know that when I really push myself, I achieve more. Read the rest of this entry »

I seem to have to try things over and over before I actually incorporate the experience into knowledge.  One of the things I learned in treatment was that trying new things increases my optimism.

I put new brake pads on my scooter yesterday. I’ve never seen a brake pad in my life. After that I did 3 loads of laundry and ironed.

Little by slowly, right?

This post was originally published Feb. 10, 2008 and was taken down pending adjudication of another case. Now that has been done and I am restoring the post.

To choose what is difficult all one’s days, as if it were easy, that is faith.
W. H. Auden

They tell me I seemed relaxed; that I did not seem bothered or distressed by the situation. On some level they are right. The outcome was in God’s hands. I was there to play the role He meant for me to play. I was meant to be accountable. Accountable is not a role I have played often. In fact, as I was having breakfast with my father yesterday morning I observed that this is probably the first thing in my life that I have taken accountability for without being forced by some external power. Going to court to account for my probation violation was all mine. Accountability – justice – is, after all, the essence of the 9th step and I did say that I am willing to go to any length for victory over addiction.

My violation was significant. They call it absconding from supervision. Of all possible violations this is the one they frown on most. They like those of us who are supervised to stay supervised. Most people who abscond from supervision compound the problem by also picking up new charges against them. Most people who abscond from supervision continue living the way they lived before. Most people who violate their probation and are sent to prison will tell you that the reason they are in prison is “they violated me”.

After the prosecution argued for imposition of the sentence underlying the original criminal conviction for which I am on probation, after my attorney argued on my behalf and after I addressed the court, the judge said very frankly that when he walked in to the courtroom he had intended to impose my sentence.

If anything, anything at all, had been any different, I would be in prison today. If I had not been sober for over a year. If I had been charged with any new crimes. If I hadn’t completed an in-patient treatment program. If I didn’t have the support of friends and family demonstrated by over a dozen letters and the presence in the courtroom of 8 people – 8 people! who took time off work to show that I matter to them (my sponsor, my sponsor’s sponsor, my roommate, a former employer, 2 friends, my aunt and most importantly my dad, who came up from Las Vegas to support me). If I hadn’t been able to demonstrate my commitment to 12 step recovery with attendance cards. If I didn’t have a job (even at McDonald’s). If when I posted bond to get out of jail I had done anything besides go directly to an AA meeting. If I hadn’t taken the 12 steps and if I hadn’t placed this at the top of my 9th step amends work. If I hadn’t been the one to initiate the process. . . if any one of these things had been different -and if I had anything less than a great attorney who believes in me- I would be in prison today.

I shouldn’t be surprised to receive a 9th step promise while making a 9th step amends, but I am dumbfounded by the degree to which God has been taking care of me all year. On my own I am not smart enough to conceive of such a perfect storm of good fortune. The only thing I did -the only thing- was that I became willing to place my trust and reliance upon God, a God of my own understanding, an infinite and loving God of all possibilities and to humbly do as I believe that God would have me do, and God has done for me what I could never do for myself.