Thank You SMART Recovery -
Hello Everyone,
When I began trying to get clean, I never expected to be where I am today. For as long as I have known, drugs and alcohol were a normal coping mechanism for anyone in my town. As a teenager you may sometimes see the world as a harmless, carefree playpen for you to explore. By the time I reached my 20's I began a career in professional sports. For 15 years I abused my body with pills and alcohol. How I even played for so long still has me baffled to this day.
Everything my whole life had always come second to my needs, which seemed to only be a good time all the time. Looking back at it all I can see how my alcoholism and drug abuse slowly progressed. Where I grew up it was normal. No one ever talked about drugs or alcohol because no one ever wanted to face the truth. So they began to make heavy drinking and drug use the standard normality. In my opinion, my journey with alcoholism started because of a communities ignorance to what alcoholism actually was. It is not their fault, as I believe it was just passed from generation to generation without any thought whatsoever. Maybe it can be changed someday.
So I was raised in this community where alcohol and drugs were as common as cheese is on a pizza. I became a succesful athlete which only accelarated and magnified my problems. As the problems piled on I tried to mask them and, like my community, say that it was normal behaviour. I did not want to admit to having a problem. I just kept reinforcing in my mind that what I was doing was ok and that my actions while drunk were "not that bad". I met a girl, who at the time shared in my crazy alcohol filled lifestyle and fell in love and got married. Our marriage was a roller coaster of drinking and fighting and love. We loved each other so much but would treat each other terribly when drinking. We could see each others problem but we always went back to the bottle. as we neared our thirties she slowed her drinking down and I merely had less drinking days but with more alcohol and added pills into the mix more. I could be sober for a week or two and then drink 2 weeks worth of alcohol in a night and wake up with my wife despising me and no recollection of the evening. This stage went on for 2 years or so and was wearing my wife thin.
The last 3 years of my "issues" involved alcohol, sleeping pills and pain meds. A very serious combination. Alcohol would cause me terrible hangovers so I would take some painkillers during the day. I would lie to my wife about drinking alone and taking them so I would have guilt. To curb that I would take ambien... these little suckers became my kryptonite. I would pop a couple at night and drink. Pass out and wake up with missed calls and texts from my wife. (We lived apart for periods of time for work purposes). She would worry day and night that one day I just wouldn't wake up. That the person that was supposed to protect her and keep her safe would just cease to exist. Then one night, I finally pushed her to her limits. I woke up to a familiar site. Her not in bed and a massive hangover and blank space in my head. When I found out what had happened I did not believe it. She even videoed me... This was what changed me. Seeing myself in that state sickened me to my core. From that day I told her I would never touch a substance again. She had heard it before. I told her to leave me the moment I used something to alter my state ever again.
I sought out help, which is a lot more difficult than one might think, and began my road to recovery.
My wife stayed distant but as I started telling her about why I felt I needed drugs she started to see something. She saw that I was damaged and was trying to fix something with the wrong tools. As I began with my life saving therapist, I started to understand things. I learned that it is ok to need help. My whole life I had this misconstrued vision of what being a man was. I thought that needing help would make me weak and in turn not a man. Boy was I wrong. Being able to face my problems and accept that I needed help was the hardest thing I have done but also the most uplifting. To know that I could share my struggles with my wife and wouldn't be judged gave me so much hope and it was like a huge weight was lifted off of me.
After this initial experience I still felt like I was different. Why do I have these problems? Why am I so incapable of knowing my limit? etc etc. My therapist recommended SMART Recovery. I think I spent 2 - 3 hours a day minimum on here. I was so compelled by everyones stories. They were just like mine. A community of support. It on more than one occasion brought tears to my eyes. I would read and read story after story about hardship and pain. But with these stories came hope, and success. I found that writing a journal on here, along with doing the exercises and a few online meetings, helped me understand why I was doing what I was. I was getting sober to better my life. I wanted to start a family, I wanted to rebuild relationships with my family and most of all I wanted to be happy with who I was. Self love was missing from my life. I thought I was getting sober for my wife when I first started but as things pregressed the real reason shined through. I was doing this for myself. Once I forgave myself and started to love myself everything in my life became brighter. My relationship with my wife became stronger than ever. My brain was clear and more efficient. I felt like a whole new person. It is amazing what can happen to your person as a whole when you put a little work into it. I would continue to work at it...
Fast forward 427 days... Present time
As I sit and write this my 1 month old daughter lays beside my in her panda onesie sleeping soundly and most adorable. I still can't believe she is real. If you were to tell me one year ago that this is where our life would be, I would have laughed at you. I have been sober for over a year, my wife and I have built a trusting and loving relationship. I am more in love with her than ever before. She stuck with me through it all. She is the strongest woman I know and I will never be able to thank her enough for enduring what she did. The harder the battle the sweeter the victory I suppose.
I will always have to walk the path of addiction and forever be wary of its dangers, but I will never walk it alone.
I want to thank every single person that has shared on this website. I honestly would have never made it past that opening 6 weeks without you all. This site and its members are part of the reason I am sitting where I am today. I have never been happier, more humble or more thankful than I am today. All because you said that silence wasn't an option anymore. From the bottom of my heart thank you because without out all of you I would have nothing.
