Humility

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Straightening Out Physically

August 11, 2010 in Ephemera, Humility, Living in Recovery, promises by Chris | 5 comments

My body has been a challenge from the moment I got sober.  Things bother me that I would never have noticed before.  And I don’t know if it is that I’ve totally damaged myself from my years of crystal meth use or if I’m just some kind of unluckily predisposed to illness kind of being.

Early in recovery it was respiratory stuff; bronchitis, sinusitis, that sort of thing.  It didn’t help that I was still a smoker.  Getting through the first winter sober required several rounds of antibiotics.

The second winter sober required several rounds of antibiotics, too, but I guess they didn’t do much good if I ran around with pneumonia for 3 or 4 months, eventually needing a couple of major surgeries to get me better.  I don’t know how better I got.  I still have pain from the surgery.  I look at my back and side and I feel like Frankenstein.  And all that time, those 2 months of recovery, laying in bed, taking vicoden (as prescribed – but so what, that shit is hard to do when you’re “sober”) losing faith, losing hope, losing “conscious contact”.  All of that is normal, I’m told, for anyone in recovery going through what I went through.  But it’s been a year and some months later and I’m OK.  I don’t have the Burning Bush kind of Higher Power that baptized me into recovery.  It’s quieter now.  I have to look for it.  I miss the Burning Bush – but what I have now is OK.

I have convinced myself that my head is OK – but my body says otherwise.  A week ago last Saturday the skin on my leg became really sensitive, but there was no rash; nothing to indicate that something was wrong.  I thought maybe it was the length of my shorts rubbing that part of my leg or maybe my new detergent wan to blame.

Last Saturday I woke up with a full-on, huge case of shingles that was spreading before my eyes.  I went to the doctor immediately and I started taking medication to stop it within hours, which I guess is a good thing.  It continued to spread, in spite of the medication.  It seems to finally be calming down.

It makes me wonder, am I really the same as I was before I had half my lung hacked out?  Am I still so completely unaware of my mental and physical state that things like this happen.  I thought when I straightened out spiritually I was supposed to straighten out physically and mentally.

I thought I had been taking pretty good care of myself; three meals a day, going to bed at a decent hour, etc.  I thought that I was handling beautifully the pressure I’ve been under at work.  Then my body tells me what’s really going on.

I know that I must be recovering from my drug addiction because when I was using I might not have even seen a doctor.  This could have been much worse than it was.  Like that terrible relationship I almost got in to, I recognize when something is wrong now and I take action.  I put “first things first”.  The first thing to do when you can actually see the blisters forming is go to the damn doctor.  I guess that is what progress looks like.  One of the differences between me on drugs and me sober is that I see a doctor when I need to.

Maybe – just maybe – God is doing for me what I cannot or will not do for myself; slowing me down.

By the way, don’t get shingles if you don’t have to.  This hurts like a . . .

How deep is your love?

March 14, 2010 in Gratitude, Humility, Service by Chris | 8 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. Read the rest of this entry »

Fair Trade Economics – or Greed and Will Power and Luxury Sheets

August 22, 2009 in Greed, Honesty, Humility, Resentment by Chris | 5 comments

wifThere are natural limits on what I can compute on greed and will power alone, as I have said before, but greed and will power are my constant companions in the marketplace.  I may be able to set them aside to some degree with respect to my disease and, to a lesser extent, with other alcoholics/addicts, but the fact remains that greed and will power still color virtually everything I do.

Such was the case last night when my sponsor and I went to the Western Idaho State Fair, though I could not have known it at the time.

We went through the livestock exhibits where several of his grandchildren had won ribbons for various things; rabbits, geese, ducks, pygmy goats and the like.  We spent some time with his daughter, the most inspirational, funny, and kind person you could hope to meet and who, though she was born without legs, has never allowed herself to be limited by what other people think she should be able to do.  We ate funnel cakes and corn dogs and wandered the midway where we enjoyed the eye candy and not the rides. We looked at quilts and photographs and tatting in the exhibition hall.  And in another hall we came upon a booth selling 650 thread count egyptian cotton sheet sets – for $20.

Now, first let me let you in on a little secret.  There is this boy coming to visit; this boy I’ve never met but whose voice I love, and whose sense of humor I love, and who’s quirky perspective on all things I find are either endearing or happens to match my own.  This is a rare, rare boy, indeed and though I’ve “known” him through gay.com and facebook on and off for 8 years or so, we’ve never met.  Secondly, you remember that, with one rather short and doomed exception, I haven’t dated anyone seriously for 16 years.  Oh, I know there was the “felationship” with the “IFX” – the imaginary future ex-husband.  We’re not counting that at all.  That was merely an episode of loneliness and desperation – the kind that any serious addiction is bound to lead to.

I could go on and on, but I’m sure you get the picture.  I want this guy to like me, and I think he wants to like me, too, because last week we decided that going on the way we have been is pointless.  We should see if there is something more there.  We should conduct a chemistry experiment.  He bought a plane ticket.  He’ll be here on Friday.  I am excited, and happy and  I am in a low grade panic.

So I want him to be comfortable in my house and I most especially want him to be comfortable in my bed.  When I walked by the booth at the fair with the sheets all I could think was, “Oh my God!  That’s 250 higher thread count than I have now.  I MUST HAVE THESE!”

Now, I’m not an idiot.  I know perfectly well that you cannot sell 650 ct. Egyptian cotton sheet sets for $20.  I know that is not really possible.  And yet I bought a set.  And guess what.  Not only are they not 650 ct., but they AREN’T EVEN COTTON!!!!  The entire package is a LIE.  And I should have known this going in.  On some level I must have known it.  But greed and will power are funny things, and I can hardly blame myself for being suckered in because while I bought one set, my sponsor bought three!!

When I sat down to write this I was still so mad that I wanted to go back to the fair and taser the guy who sold me the 180 thread count microfiber sheets right square in the nuts.

But I feel better now.  I’ve taken a look at where I was wrong.  I’ve admitted to myself and to you that I made a decision based on selfishness and greed – and to some extent fear, and while I haven’t harmed anyone but myself, I am willing to live with the consequences of my action.

I’m also willing to go to Dillard’s later and buy some fantastic sheets, so maybe I haven’t changed that much after all.

Pathologies of Valuation

August 19, 2009 in Gratitude, Humility by Chris | 3 comments

I love to listen to NPR.  In fact my clock radio and my car radio have been tuned exclusively to NPR for decades.  Today’s episode of Science Friday really captured me though, which is weird because it was about economics.  Well, not economics exactly; neuroeconomics, a combination of neuroscience, economics, and psychology to study how people make decisions. It looks at the role of the brain when we evaluate decisions, categorize risks and rewards, and interact with each other.  You can listen to the episode here, and if you have a scientific bent it is really worth the listen.

The research they discuss is related to human decision making, specifically as making decisions relates to the economy.  The study of economics has always held that people people know what they want and are able to optimize their choices, based on their options, even when decisions are very complicated or ambiguous.  Neuroeconomics, on the other hand, suggests that “people have some normal limits on what they can compute on greed and on will-power.”  “People have an automatic tendency based on strong drives, at the motivational system, to choose actions that have been associated with good outcomes in the past and to avoid those that have had negative outcomes.  That is of course an adaptive thing to do. ”

As an addict, I know that contrary what economic theory would have us believe, my actual behavior has often been in conflict with what will actually achieve the best outcome.  Furthermore, though I am intellectually capable of understanding the probable results of a decision, that understanding, at times, is insufficient to cause me to choose differently.  I am quite incapable, at times, of recalling with sufficient force, the suffering and humiliation of even a week or a month ago.  In economic terms, each behavior has an outcome that can be valued.   I know, from my own experience that while I may appear completely normal at times, even for extended periods of time, I am sometimes quite incapable of choosing the right option or of placing the correct outcome on the correct behavior.  In effect, the disease of addiction is a pathology of valuation.

The disease resides in my mind; specifically in the part of my brain where decisions are made, and it causes me to make terrible decisions sometimes.  I’ve learned that I get better results when I ask for help, when I am open to suggestions from others and when I pause before acting.  This has been particularly helpful over the last month when I have been possessed with the idea that I can have a drink and be fine.

It seems crazy for me to even be saying that I’m symptomatic, but for awhile recently I have been.  The only thing that I’ve been able to really cling to is the empirical evidence of my own experience and the research of the good people at Harvard University, and of course the company and support of other addicts who have had experiences like mine.  I may think that I can drink now and then – and that is what it is to be an addict.  We think ridiculous things, and in the absence of a full knowledge of our condition and a higher power (even if it is only the group) we make what seems to be a rational decision to drink or use in spite of the fact that everyone else can see what a horrible choice it is.

I’m grateful that I don’t have to act on that thought today.  I’m grateful that I have enough evidence to combat it.  And I’m grateful that there are people around me who love me, with whom I can be truthful, and who support me while I wait for the little insane idea to pass.

How to Make a Motorcycle

July 12, 2009 in Faith, Humility, Spirituality by Chris | 6 comments

When I was 12 I lived around the corner from Kris. He was the most naturally athletic kid I’ve ever met. He was fantastic looking.  He had 3 older brothers and they all had ‘toys’ – motorized toys.  Dirt bikes and snowmobiles and ATVs.  He was fearless and he was cool and I was intensely jealous of him, not that I would ever have admitted it.  I was too busy trying to be his friend.

When Kris was finished with it I took over his newspaper route.  When he stopped mowing our neighbor’s lawns to take over mowing the lawn of the church we lived next to, I started mowing them.  He shoveled half the sidewalks in our neighborhood with a snow blower.  I shoveled the rest of them by hand.  I bought HASH jeans and listened to Elton John to be more like him.

The summer between 6th and 7th grades my father rented a rototiller to till our garden and afterward he offered me the use of it, along with the vacant lot he owned next door to our house.  I took it and tilled the hard, dry patch.  I removed huge lava rock.  I turned in compost.  I plowed the patch into rows and I planted corn and squash.  All summer long I hoed and weeded and watered and waited.  Every day I tended my little farm.  By the end of summer I was selling corn, three ears for a dollar, out of a wheelbarrow in my neighborhood.

Honda CB125 SSBy the end of the summer I bought myself my first dirt bike, a little 125cc Honda.  It didn’t really matter that it was Kris’s old dirt bike.  It was new to me.  It was MY motorcycle.  I EARNED it, and I loved it.  The fact that Kris had a brand new bike didn’t even enter into my consciousness.  I have always been, I think justifiably, proud of that accomplishment.

If I am completely honest, though, I have to admit that I did not create that motorcycle on my own.  My effort was absolutely necessary, but my effort alone didn’t put money in the bank to buy that bike.  At the beginning I was given the tools  to accomplish that.  I was given a little patch of land and I was given the use of the tiller.  What I did with it was entirely up to me.

Even beyond my effort and the tools there was an underlying force I had to cooperate with, the force that germinates seeds and produces fruit; a force that can be described, but when examined to it’s origin is mysterious and miraculous.  In the end, while my effort was essential, it had very little to do with what was produced.  My input had less to do with the result than any other input and yet I feel justified in being proud of my input and I enjoyed the product like it was mine alone.  How much more might I have enjoyed it if I had humbly acknowledged that what I got was the product of a gift; if I had been more grateful?

I mention that because with all the difficulty I’ve put myself through over belief and faith, I have really been living in the insane idea that the important ingredient in my recovery is what I have put into it.  I have ignored the tools that were given to me and denied the power that makes it work.  It is as ridiculous of me to believe that I got myself sober and keep myself sober as it is for me to believe that I got that dirt bike on my own.

So, while I still don’t have any kind of “conception” of a Higher Power, I acknowledge that some power seems to exist; I don’t know what it is but I can describe how I experience it.  I also acknowledge that the tools are a gift; that in the final analysis, while my effort is essential, and while I think I am justifiably proud of what I put in to it, there are other forces at work that are also essential to my continued recovery.  My recovery would not be possible without the gift of the program and without whatever power it is that saves addicts like me from the hopeless condition I lived in before I got sober.  I am still proud of the effort I’ve put into it.  But I didn’t do it on my own.

It’ll be just like starting over.

May 28, 2009 in Hope, Humility by Chris | 8 comments

Nobody told me that, and honestly, I’m not sure I would have been able to hear them if they did, but man-o-man it is an important thing to realize.  That’s  my experience anyway.

You see, this isn’t my first rodeo.  I had over 2 years sobriety on another occasion and I suffered a major illness.  I had meningitis.  I spent several days in the hospital on serious painkillers.  I went home with more of them, and when they weren’t really cutting it for me anymore I reached out for the chemical that was always my first love – crystal meth.  I persued that relapse for another 4 years.

This time the pain has been much worse.  The surgery I had was pretty invasive.  It’s been 21 days already and I still can’t drive or lift anything.  One more week they tell me.  And this time coming down from the painkillers was much worse.  I was not prepared in any way for what was going to follow; the feelings of wothlessness, hopelessness, loneliness, and helplessness.

Somehow in this experience I remembered that everything I was feeling was what I was feeling at the very begining of my sobriety.

Never mind the physical pain, that’s how emotionally painful this has been; exactly like the very beginning of my recovery.

This time, except for the fact that I’ve been grounded and couldn’t go out looking for help, I did the same things I did when I first got sober.  I called people and asked for help.  I have made a ton of friends in 12 step recovery, and a very special handful of those people have kept my phone turned on, kept food in my fridge, helped me with laundry, come over to be with me as I relearn to master skills like walking around the block.  I’ve been lucky enough to have a dozen people show up at my house to bring me a meeting because they knew I couldn’t get out to or sit through one.

Little by little and day by day I’ve been getting better and stronger.  Little by little the pain is going away.  But in great and wonderful ways I have regained hope that when I remain willing to do what must be done to recover, that I will continue to recover.  When I am willing to be honest with the people that love me about what is going on with me and humble enough to receive their help, things get better, and they get better fast.

I wish I had known, as I was checking in to the hospital, what the emotional price was going to be.  I wish I had known that it would be just like starting over.  I don’t know.  Maybe someone has said it in a meeting before and I just didn’t hear it or get it.  So that’s what I wanted to share: life can be really hard and there are things that come down the pike that are going to make you feel like you felt right before or right after you got sober.  What has really helped me was remembering the things that I did back then and DOING THAT.  Asking for help and recieving help and talking about my fears and my hopelessness and listening to other people share how grateful they have been for my help in the past and how happy they are to be able to help me has returned me to a state of faith and hope.

Keeping Down Jell-O

March 19, 2009 in Acceptance, Brotherly Love, Faith, Gratitude, Humility, Integrity, Service by Chris | 6 comments

I don’t know that I’ve ever been so sick and not been hospitalized.  Without health insurance and without any savings I elected to just ride it out, which, in retrospect, was probably a bad idea.  I haven’t had solid food since Monday, but I am finally keeping fluids down and the exhausting cycle of fevers and chills seems to have (I hope) ended.  Hopefully later today or tomorrow I’ll be able to do some laundry. Clean my room.  Wash my sheets. I’ve puked so much over the last 3 days and I hate puking.  Just hate it. I’ll be so grateful to have this be over.  At the moment I’m keeping down Jell-O,  One of the pups I live with works in a restaurant and came home with a half gallon of it.

That pup knocked on my door this afternoon to express some concern over the well-being of our other roomie, who is clearly (at best) over-medicated.  We just got done having a little chat with him about taking medications that aren’t prescribed to him.  He refuses to see that as a relapse.  The best thing for me to do now is nothing, although if it gets any worse I feel I have an obligation to tell his parents.  If I got to have things my way I’d give him ECT.  Moo ha ha ha ha ha!!!  It’s really a good thing I’m not in charge.

The only real bright spot of my week has been the funeral I attended this evening.  I know that sounds weird.  It was for a woman whom I had only ever heard be referred to as “The Dragon Lady.”  I went to high school with her son, whom I haven’t seen in 20 years.  Scott was the first person I knew who was ‘out’ and okay with it.  I had great admiration for him then.

I came across Scott on facebook and he generously accepted my friend request, so I got to learn a little about his life now; his long-time companion David and their daughter, Maggie, named for Scott’s mother.

One of the reasons I went was to affirm my beleief in the power of love to heal relationships; between my family and me, or between Scott and his mother.  Another reason I went was simply to honor Scott.  My being there was merely a small act of gratitude for showing me that coming out is okay, and more recently showing me that people like us can have meaningful and lasting relationships.

I almost did not go.  I barely had enough strength to shower and try to make some clothes match.  I tried to tell myself that it could be seen as an intrusion.  In the end, the thought crossed my mind that, for whatever reason, today may be the only day I ever get to see Scott and to meet his family.  Not any more reasons to drag them out of Sherman Oaks.  So in the end I went.

And I was surprised by how warmly and how lovingly I was greeted.  I was surprised not to see any of the other people we went to school with, whom he is still in touch with, there.  I was so happy to have a tiny opportunity to simply be there for a distant friend.   And right now it has me thinking about my own health condition, and about the condition of my roommate.  How there is nothing anyone can do for me to make me better faster, and how much I appreciate it that some people just show up for me – ask if I can keep down Jell-O or if I’d like some chicken soup.  And there is nothing I can do for my roommate.  Nothing.

Except be there should he decide to reach out for help.

Hurting/Growing

March 4, 2009 in Acceptance, Humility by Chris | 14 comments

When I don’t post for awhile it usually means I’m hurting, and not growing.  When I’m hurting and writing I’m finally in the process of growing.  I haven’t posted in awhile and I’ve been hurting for awhile and I’ve been incredibly blocked about getting to the answer.  Even when I got to the answer I found myself without the strength to live up to the ideal.

OGL may as well stand for “One Great Lesson.”  I spent a day trying to figure out how to start the conversation where I say that it isn’t what I’m looking for and never found the right way in.  Instead I put him on a plane for home with both of us carrying the weight of what was unsaid, and I felt like I had been a complete failure as a human being. Read the rest of this entry »

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