Using...

If you don’t heal, you will use...and I do.  All the time.  Sometimes I wonder if I have really gotten any recovery at all.  I mean, I do not use tobacco, alcohol or drugs anymore.  Haven’t for a really long time.  But there are a myriad of ways to abuse oneself.  And since these other ways are way more socially acceptable, I think they flew under the radar for a long time.  But I see them all now.  I see all the ways I use.  Which means, by definition, I haven’t healed sufficiently to stop the using.

Sigh.

I am trying.  And I am healing.  I am also still using things to make me feel better and I think, things to make me feel worse.  My old sponsor said to me, “You might not ever be happy unless you have someone in your life to abuse you...”  And I was horribly offended and almost hung up on her.  But what she said turned out to be really quite true.

And even though I left the abusive asshole boyfriend she was referring to, I have not stopped finding new ways to abuse myself.  And for the life of me, I cannot figure out why.  

I do not hate me anymore.  I do not want to die.  I do not want to destroy myself or my life.  I do lots of recovery related things to improve my life.  I take care of my body for the most part.  And I live within reasonable means.  But I still abuse me and sometimes, although less so than before, seek out others to propagate what can only be called abuse.

So how exactly does one heal?  All the way?   So that your desire to not use is gone, eradicated?  Is this even possible?  I mean, I do believe the Dali Lama doesn’t use?  I am sure there are some other Christian people that have evolved past the use and abuse cycle.  But when I look around, the rest of us are just out here using and abusing our lives away.

Oh I am sure there are a lot of you reading this right now, thinking, “NOT ME! I don’t do that!”  But I bet if you give me permission and an opportunity I could find at least three things you are using and abusing on the daily.  We all do.  It has become the human condition.  We use to decrease or amplify feeling in life.  Life just as it is, is either too much and we need to use something to turn life and all its clamoring down, or life is just too boring and dreary and we need to use something or someone to turn up the heat and interest.

Maybe my perspective is skewed because of my alcoholism.  Maybe I see addiction where it isn’t.  Or maybe, no one else sees addiction because they don’t want to.  Where the fuck is that line? I mean, I guess it doesn’t matter, I am not in charge of you, or your life, or your abuse or not, I have only to worry about myself.  But when thoughts like this occupy your mind and heart and head and life, it is somewhat alienating to be around and with others.  I mean, what can we really talk about? All I see is use and abuse, and a great number of you out there, do not want to look at that at all!

It is an odd thing to be this far along in sobriety and see how much I still use and abuse substances and people.  It is sobering for sure.  And I am stymied as to how to stop it.  How do I stop reaching for things to make me feel more or less? How the fuck do I do that?  What does my life look like without addiction showing up in whatever form it is taking today?

I do not want to belong to 42 different 12 step programs.  Seems like the one, practiced on all these areas of my life should be enough for me.  But perhaps I am just not working the one very well or enough.  Perhaps I am destined to keep trying and failing.

I tell myself things like, “it isn’t that bad!” Or “everyone else does this!”  Or “I need something to add an edge or take an edge off.”  And then when I look around and see others acting out in all the ways, I want to also and use their use and abuse and some sort of permission for me to use the more socially acceptable things I am currently using.

I am going to have to sit with this one for awhile.  I am going to have to really think about what I want and what I don’t.  And what I am willing to address and what I am not.  Do I want to be healthy in all the ways or do I want to act out in the ways I am still using and live in that perpetual cycle of stopping and starting?

The choice is mine.  Once you see how you abuse yourself and others, you can’t unsee it.  It is just there, like a police dog who caught your scent and now waits for you every time you leave your house.  Right behind you all the time, dogging your every footfall.  It is almost like you can hear the dog panting, “using, using, using, using...”

I see it all so very clearly.  But right now in this moment, I have absolutely no idea how to change, and I am not even really sure that I want to.  The pleasure I get from using the things I currently use is still working for me on some level.  I guess this blog is just to own that I do it, and I see it and I can see how and why it is problematic in my life.  And in my very addicty nature, of course, I don’t really want to do anything about it until it threatens to take me down for the count.  

But I guess I am working this through and working on this, because I am not in danger of it taking me out or down and I am looking at it.  I am owning it.  I am receptive to healing in this area of my life.  I am not sure I will ever be use free.  But I can tell you that I see very clearly what I am doing and why.  And perhaps that is the first step.  Surrender.  I see it.  I am not denying it.  Alcohol recovery began for me when I realized that I no longer had a choice with booze.  I saw that the booze controlled everything I said and did.  And I surrendered to that idea and my whole life changed.  Perhaps  I am on the cusp of something like that again?

I am going to have to let you know!

Again, still...