Month: June 2006

I have just returned from an Al-Anon for Alcoholics meeting in a nearby town. It’s what is called a “double winner” meeting, meaning that it’s both programs rolled into one, and it can be pretty brutal for me. The sharing that goes on heads right for the jugular and there are no rehabbers around to distract the message. A woman qualified and her story was very similar to mine: because of how I was raised, and exposed to unsafe and unhealthy situations along the way, I sought out people throughout my life that would be able to duplicate many of those experiences. Regardless of the depth of the relationship (friend, lover, employer, etc…) I always volunteered to be the victim, knowing that this position would insure attention, and what I told myself was love. This pattern continued throughout adulthood, culminating in a scenario of violence and dark sexuality wherein I allowed myself to be emotionally sucked dry. For some reason I realized that it wasn’t right for me, that I wasn’t receiving the kind of attention I wanted (pain, punishment, and a justification of my inner shame) and so I split from that scene. Two years later AA found me and gave me the gift of sobriety.

My sponsor is having me work on some very difficult and frightening 9th Step work around some of these issues and I think it’s beginning to freak me out. I’m not doing this work alone, thank the gods. My therapist is helping me with most of it, but the eventual amends will be on my plate. No, I am not going back into that dark fold and confronting those who would hurt me again, but I am trying to understand the depth of the emotional scars I have worn for many years, and over which I acted out sexually, drank myself into oblivion, hurt others and denied any true intimacy or trust with my fellows.

So I think I’m at a point in my sober journey where feelings are coming back. I’m really not sure what to do with them all the time except, of course, ignore them, but that is the old way of life. Right now it’s hard enough to just feel them. I’ll know what to do with them when I am ready to know. All I want to do right now is hide in my office and not deal. Luckily it’s almost time for bed, so I can wait another few hours, hit the sack, dream what I dream, and tomorrow see my sponsor and talk to him about these new growth spurts.

I remember when I was a little boy and I’d have these horrible cramps in my legs during the night. My mother would come in with a hot-water-bottle and lay it across the top of my shins. The growing pains would magically vanish and I would fall back into the slumbers of a childhood, rapidly edging away towards adolescence and adulthood. Would that I had that panacea now…

Johnnyboy

I’m very sorry, dear readers, for not posting more regularly, or at all, in the past 2 weeks or so. I have been busy, caught up in the troubles of others, and trying to figure out some things on my own…which is never smart. Thankfully I gave that idea up for dead and picked up the phone. I won’t say that I’m all better, but life is a little clearer than it was when I last posted my angry and unmanageable missive.

I am in the middle of summer semester, and the math class is going very well. I am looking forward to finishing up my philosophy tutorial with the 20th century. I need a break from the philosophical world.

My sponsee doesn’t call me, which isn’t my problem.

I call my sponsor, which helps me greatly.

I came home from Greece with what I thought was a sinus infection. 2 days ago the doctor checked me out and proclaimed me healthier than I have been in years, and the clogged right eustachian tube was probably the result of air travel. He recomended some over-the-counter nose squirts and Clariten D, in case it was a seasonal allergy. The results were overnight. I can now hear perfectly, my nose has stopped running, and the sinus pressure is gone. There are some side effects, however.

It seems that once I got sober, even the slightest of OTC drugs really changes my body chemistry. The Clariten D, for example, kept me up all night (or maybe it was the nose squirts), so that this morning at 5AM, I finally gave up, put on my clothes, and went downstairs. Thankfully I do not live alone and was able to ask someone to run interference for me until I could get a little sleep. I changed my therapist appointment to tomorrow, climbed back in bed, and tossed and turned for another 2 1/2 hours until whatever it was wore off. I managed to grab a handful of sleep before 11AM, and now I feel pretty good. If I can stay awake until 11PM I’ll be in good shape and sleep soundly through the night, and no more Clariten or squirts!

I’m having my haircut this afternoon with a new cutter at the place where I usually go. My regular snippette is big with child and has cut down her work week to 3 days from 5, so she is too busy for me to get an appointment. I’m having a man cut my hair, which is fine, but for some reason I have always preferred women. Maybe I’ll try something new instead of my usual close-cropped look, or maybe that’s the residual OTC pharms talking.

My heart soars with gratitude when I think of how fortunate I am to be here now, instead of somewhere else, unable to be of help to those around me and unwilling to turn over the obstacles in my path to my Higher Power to build with as It sees fit.

Asking for help is one of the greatest gifts I have been given.

Johnnyboy