Another day clean

The last few days I've been a bit herky jerkey, although I'm not sure why. Yesterday I was letting someone else's stress get to me and today, well, that's a whole other story. But the woman's meeting was awesome today.

One of our members took her 7 year chip. She's just coming out of a relationship fiasco as is one of my sponslings. Relationships are tough. When we suffer major losses such as a breakup or a close friend or parent's death, often the accompanying feelings go much deeper than just that loss -- we're grieving many, many losses in our lives.

One of my friends with many years sober whose husband just relapsed again said that she was feeling like "Maybe God has lost my file." I, too, know that feeling. You too probably know it. It keeps hitting the fan and you keep asking "Okay, God, what's the message here?" I call this "when the rubber hits the road" in recovery because this is where you either get into action, feel your feelings or get loaded.

I haven't been to as many meetings as I normally attend the past few weeks because I've been working more. In my recovery, though, I've found that I need three to four meetings a week to stay on point and I'm not feeling on point today, I'm feeling slightly irritated and discontent.

The topic at today's meeting was mainly relationships, but one of the daily meditations talked about integrity. The program has given me integrity because prior to coming into the rooms and despite my parents trying to teach me this trait, I had none. I remember many times when I was using (and I'm missing my mother this weekend because it's Easter, I guess) my mother arranged for me to meet her and my aunt for lunch. Often, I just didn't show up. Usually I was too hungover to get out of bed or I didn't want her to see me high. When she finally tracked me down a few days later she'd say "We missed you, dear." I would feel like a slug, which was a good reason, not that I needed one, to get loaded all over again.

Today if I say I'm going to do something, I generally do it. I can be depended on. That's a gift, to be this person I am today versus that wild woman I was for so many years. So while it's not a really great day for me today emotionally, all in all, I'm grateful that I found this program and I decided, and yes, it is a day-by-day decision, to stick around.