Sponsorship

You are currently browsing the archive for the Sponsorship category.

Service and Self Sacrifice

July 17, 2010 in Death, Service, Sponsorship by Chris | 3 comments

I was just looking at a friend’s Facebook page, admiring a picture of her and someone’s baby, when I noticed a quote on the sidebar; something about love from Dostoevsky’s, “The Brothers Karamazov”.  Having just come from a meeting where the topic was Love and knowing how way leads to way I followed the trail of that quote as it has been used in several sermons.

The Dostoevsky story is the story of Father Zossima, the wise, self-effacing, good-humored orthodox monk that many people come to for spiritual direction. One day, a woman comes to talk with him. She has a big problem, she says.  She has lost her faith and therefore her reason to live. If Zossima cannot give her a reason to believe again, she says, she will kill herself.

The monk tells her to go home, and every day, do something concrete to love the people around her. If she does this, he assures her, she will find, slowly but surely, that she won’t be able to help but believe.  Love in action, he says, will change the way she sees the world.

The old woman isn’t especially impressed.  Basically she says, “That’s it?  That’s all you have?  I’m supposed to love the people around me?  I already do that.”

And to this Zossima responds with a line which has become famous: “Ah”, he says, “love in practice is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams. It may very well kill you”

Doing what is good for another can be really hard. Sometimes, it’s hard to know what would be good for someone as distinct from what would make us feel good.  And actually doing it is often very hard.  In recovery we know that to love other people until they can love themselves requires “work and self sacrifice” – and it is a requirement.  It is the foundation stone of recovery. Read the rest of this entry »

Accountability

April 7, 2009 in early recovery from smoking, Resentment, Roommates, Sponsorship by Chris | 4 comments

I suppose I could place some of the blame on the fact that I hadn’t had any nicotine.  This is day 18 without cigarettes.  At 3PM I still hadn’t had a lozenge.  It was not model behavior either, but nothing else was breaking in.  So when the dog crap had sat on the dining room floor since at least 7:30AM, when I got up, and the dog owner had made no attempt to remedy the problem, I grabbed a paper towel and threw the shit in his bedroom at him.

He silently got up and cleaned the crap up and retired to his room. (Time for a lozenge, I thought.  Clearly I’m not my charming self.)

I also had my monthly visit with my probation officer today.  I knew she had stopped by the house while I was at the vet last Sunday because Joe told me.  What he told me was that she had asked him if he was on drugs.  So when I went to visit Officer. J. B. today the first thing she said to me was, “So, I met your roommate.”  This woman has the authority to place me in jail for as long as a year without even taking me in front of a judge.  There is no way I am going to lie to or withhold information from her, particularly to save someone else’s skin.   After I told her exactly what has been going on, she asked me why I hadn’t called Joe’s probation officer.  I don’t really have a good answer for that, except that I had hoped that Joe would do the right thing and handle it himself.  I told her that keeping my street clean meant for sure telling her what is going on in my house.  What she chooses to do with that is not my responsibility.  I am accountable to her.

She said she was accountable, too, and that the law requires her to call Joe’s probation officer, which she did, while I was still sitting there.

She was very clear with me about what kind of people could be at my house and what kind of behavior she expects from me.  She was very clear about what kind of environment I am to be in, whether it is in my control or not.   I am not willing to go to jail because someone else won’t behave the way he agreed to behave and I will not live with dog shit on the floor because someone else won’t behave the way he agreed to behave.

I feel stupid for having moved.  And really, how arrogant am I to think that being around me could be a good influence on anyone?

Of course after I threw the dog shit I called my sponsor and had quite a chat.  I started by telling him what I’d done.  (He replied, “Good.”)  And after the probation office visit I called, as he suggested I do, and told him what was up.

It’s clear I’ve been an asshole, but I don’t believe, and my sponsor doesn’t believe, I’ve harmed anyone.  Rather I’m the one being harmed, and I placed myself in this position.

It’s time to figure out how to place myself out of it.

Smoke Free Day 16 and Other Matters of Living in Recovery

April 5, 2009 in Courage, early recovery from smoking, Resentment, Roommates, Service, Sponsorship, Willingness by Chris | 6 comments

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.

get userping