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Posted: January 5, 2016, 1:19 AM
Hi! I am a 26 year old man in recovery. The day I decided my life needed an overhaul was 4-20-15, and I tell people in twelve-step programs that the following day is my Sobriety date. If the wording of that sentence seems odd, perhaps it will make more sense as my story unfolds. Please excuse the length. This is not just the story of my recovery, it is my analysis of 12-step based recovery- what it's good at, and where there is room for improvement.
I grew up in a wonderful middle class Christian family of non-drinkers and non-drug users. 3 of my 4 grandparents had died of alcoholism before I was born. At age 15 I felt very insecure and socially isolated. On Valentines day of 2005 I smoked marijuana for the first time, and I instantly felt my insecurities disappear, and I felt accepted by my peers. I proceeded to smoke marijuana every day, many times a day, much more so than any of my peers, thereafter. I walked around with a smile on my face all the time, and people perceived me as a happier, friendlier person, and I even got my first girlfriend because of that. I found that my focus was improved and that my classwork was far more interesting on marijuana. It seemed that marijuana was truly the solution. After 6 months or so I was no longer satisfied with marijuana, however. Marijuana had become the way I always felt, and I wanted to change the way felt again. So I tried xanax. My fears and insecurities on xanax completely evaporated, to a dangerous level, and it made me willing to try any drug that came my way: cocaine, alcohol, opiate painkillers, hallucinogens, you name it. I started stealing 2 bottles of wine almost every day and drinking myself to sleep. My schoolwork and behavior started to suffer, and I got suspended, and my parents took me to my first 12 step meeting, which was a young-peoples "alternative peer group". I heard them talk about their Higher Power and how they were making improvements in their lives in the meeting, and then after the meeting would watch them chain smoke cigarettes, chug energy drinks, and talk about how they had dropped out of school and didn't seem to have any plans on going back. I looked at them as hypocrites in denial who had simply replaced one addiction for a series of others and a life of less-than-mediocrity. I did not want what they had. I somehow managed to graduate high school with a relatively high GPA as a result of how well I'd done prior to senior year. I started going to college, and my drug use escalated. My parents got tired of my lies, and sent to my first 12-step based rehab at age 18. At this point I realized I could not successfully continue to live the way I'd been living. If I had just kept to the marijuana, maybe I'd have been alright, but with all the other drugs, managing my life was becoming impossible. The rehab convinced me that for an addict, the only solution is complete abstinence from all mind-altering substances- that if I were to take any mind-altering substance, it would completely ruin whatever progress I'd made, and send me right back into cycle I'd been in. As a result, when I left rehab, I was scared to use, and I moved to Arizona, into a halfway house. I went to AA/NA every day. I got a sponsor and worked the steps, up to 9. I started to chair meetings. I gave a speaker meeting, sharing my testimony. I became very good at using the recovery lingo. I went back to college, and got a job tutoring algebra. At the superficial level, my life was going great. But at around 5 months sober I read an article about Bill Wilson using LSD after he got sober during the 50s, and how he thought it could be of benefit to some people. I recalled my experience with LSD, which I had used in combination with other drugs, and wondered what it would be like with my new frame-of-mind. Perhaps it would even help me "grow and enlarge my spiritual life", and become more "God conscious". I didn't know where to get and LSD in Arizona, but I knew how to get a similar drug called LSA. It didn't do very much for me other than give me the giggles, but I immediately felt a sense that something had changed: I could no longer be 100% honest with people in the program, or with my halfway-house manager, unless I admitted to "relapsing". If I told the truth to my halfway-house manager, I would be kicked out, and homeless, because I didn't have a job (my parents were paying for me to live there). I couldn't tell the truth in meetings either, because many of them were in contact with my halfway house manager (it was a small town). I kept going to meetings for a few weeks, but felt very disconnected because I felt shame about what I'd done. I knew that people in the rooms would not approve. Once again, fear, insecurity, and social isolation crept into my life. The compulsion the change the way I felt- which was distinctly different from the curiosity that motivated my decision to take LSA- eventually overwhelmed me, and I did truly relapse on marijuana, which eventually escalated to crystal meth, the town's drug of choice. When I was caught, I moved back to Houston. For the next 5 years, I was in and out rehabs and halfway houses. I eventually became hopeless, becoming increasingly convinced that I was either "too smart to get sober" (I managed to graduate college Magna c** Laude and go to graduate school and become a teaching fellow at the local university despite addiction to opiates, alcohol, and amphetamines), or "constitutionally incapable of being honest with myself." I started overdosing on opiates every 4-5 months, and was convinced I would die soon. My family was too. Last April, I took several bottles of over-the-counter Robitussin (a dissociative hallucinogen at high doses), and overdosed. I remember, with great pain even today, being in the hospital, hallucinating, with severe abdominal pain, being told that they were running blood tests because they thought my kidneys and liver might be failing.Overdosing when you are unconscious and unaware and feeling blissful is one thing, but overdosing when you're not only conscious but hallucinating and in severe pain is altogether different. It was then that I decided, if I lived, that I never wanted to be that terrified again. I always gone to very nice rehabs before, but my parents had long ago decided sending me to rehab was a waste of money. I checked myself into a very cheap 12-step based rehab program on April 18th. I was given detox meds for 2 days, which is way I claim the 21st as my DOS. The housing and food were awful, but the program itself was, perhaps, a "God-send". The greatest gift I was given by this program was that I was not told that I just needed to "keep it simple", that maybe I was just "too smart for the program". Instead, as soon as it was recognized that I was an analytical person, I was introduced to the neurological research behind addictionology. I was given a thorough, sensible, and logical explanation of the relationship between compulsion in terms the glutamate pathways connecting the mesolimbic dopamine circuit to the prefrontal cortex. For the first time, I was given answers that TRULY satisfied me about why I wanted to change the way I felt, what would happen if I kept changing the way I felt by abusing the dopamine circuit, and what would happen if I stopped changing the way I felt by the same means. For the first time, I was able to say that I was grateful for what I'd learned in recovery, and really mean it. Nevertheless, the program I was in adopted the same "there are addicts and there are non addicts and never the twain shall meet", "once an addict always an addict" mentality I was accustomed to. In the beginning, this did not bother me, as I truly had a desire to be rid of the obsession. When I completed the program, I started going back to AA, got a sponsor, and started working the steps. Despite my analytical nature, I was desperate and willing, and I started praying every morning for God to help me make the right decisions. It became clear in my fourth and fifth step that I was certainly not constitutionally incapable of being honest with myself. I shared the roots of my insecurities had been plaguing me throughout my life, which I discovered had me feel socially isolated, and for the first time I was able to look the world in the eye. I came to the understanding that everyone has reasons to feel insecure, but that each person only feels as insecure as they allow those reasons to make them feel. With the help of my sponsor, I was able to discern how those insecurities had manifested as character defects throughout my life. I was always willing to pray the prayers, like the 7th step prayer, to have God remove the character defects. I made amends with those I had harmed over the years, and truly began to feel a sense that I was growing up and taking responsibility for my life. I always gave credit for the results of my actions to the God I prayed to in the morning. Around 4 and a half months sober, I "completed" the steps, (though of course, 10-12 are ongoing, and I still have several financial amend to fulfill). I began to feel very confident in my sobriety. I had not only gotten sober, but I had changed my diet and exercise, and had lost 40 pounds (and proceed to lose 20 more). I began to become very interested in socializing- though not especially with people in the program, many of whom I had difficulty relating with outside of meetings. At the end of September, I was contacted by an old friend with whom I used to take "magic mushrooms". I realized that most people in the program would say he was "not really a friend" but just an associate with whom I used to use. He asked if I wanted to take some mushrooms. At first, I said no- I had no interest in changing the way that I felt. What he told me struck me powerfully. He told me that taking mushrooms is not about changing the way you feel, it is about feeling who you are at a deeper level. I felt confident that even if I used mushrooms once, with my previous experience in mind having made a similar "mistake", I would not then proceed to relapse out of shame. I would either enjoy the experience, and be grateful for the experience, and continue to live life as I had been living, or I would not enjoy it, and be grateful for the experience, and continue to live life as I had been living. I decided to take the mushrooms. What I experienced was difficult to describe- it was like a several hour long moment-of-clarity. I felt increased empathy for my fellow humans, and for animals, I felt the importance of my ideologies melt away. I felt simultaneous joy and sadness- not for myself, but for all of the experiences being had by my fellow humans. I felt connected to all of them at the fundamental level of emotion. Most importantly, I felt.- I was not numb. At the end of the day, I thanked God for the results of my actions, with my gratitude than I had felt any other time I'd prayed the same prayer. I did not proceed to relapse. I continued to live life just as I had been living it, with on caveat- I did not tell anyone in the program I'd used mushrooms. The reason for this is simple. Most of them would consider it a "relapse" and advise me to figure out where I "went wrong" working the steps and perhaps to increase my meeting attendance. But I did not "go wrong" working the steps, and I do not need to increase my meeting attendance. I have taken mushrooms several times since then. It is never motivated by a desire to "change the way I feel". I simply consider it to be a way of facilitating the appreciation of and gratitude for God's creation. I have now been in recovery for over 8 months, and the question of "whether or not I am sober" is seems trivial to me. The questions I ask my self are:Am I being honest with myself? Am I being open-minded? Am I doing the right thing? The Big Book says that the three indispensable spiritual principles to recovery are honesty, open-mindedness, and willingness. It's been a winding journey for me to arrive where I am today. The 12 steps helped me grow up emotionally. They helped me not to take myself so seriously. They helped me to become "right sized" in relation to the world: neither falsely insecure, nor puffed up by false pride. They gave me to framework to repair the bridges I had burned over the years. I am eternally grateful to my sponsor, to Bill, to God, and to my fellows in the rooms for these miracles. Just as there is always room for individual improvement, however, there is room for improvement in the 12 step groups. These are areas that I believe could be improved: Less emphasis could placed on the supposed differences between addicts and "normies" The truth is that all people suffer or have suffered from some fears and insecurities. The only difference is the degree and extent to which they affect a given person. Addicts have the entire human condition in common with "normies", the difference is the way in which they have behaved in response to it. Even at neurological level, every person uses the brain system implicated in the addictive process, the only difference is the extent to which this brain system is pathological- and this is not a dichotomy but rather a continuum. Some people in 12 step groups become so accustomed the way in which discussions take place among 12-steppers that their sense of "separateness" from the rest of the world actually increases rather than decreases, and they find it difficult to form relationships with the people they think of as "normies". The principle of open-mindedness seems to be superficial among most 12-steppers. The most prevalent subtextual version of open-mindedness in the rooms is, "be open-minded, as long as your mind eventually agrees with us, or else you can't recover." What Bill had in mind was getting Atheists/agnostics to be open-minded to the idea that a higher power/God can restore them to sanity, and to taking suggestions from sponsors. Bill himself was open-minded enough to try LSD and conclude that it had potential for some people, but most AA members were not. The attitude they took was, "The original way, or no way." Many if not most AA members are not open-minded enough to consider that someone can take a substance like mushrooms or LSD on occasion without compromising their sobriety. This can drive some people away, especially as society becomes increasingly aware of these substances' potential to alter consciousness. Some meetings, in which people are more educated, could benefit honest discussion about the limits of the Big Book and areas in which modern scientific research fills the explanatory gaps. It shouldn't be taboo to share solutions that don't come straight out the Big Book. This would appeal to a great number of people who, like I was for so many years, are driven away by the notion that the 12 step programs are just for dummies. If you read my entire story, I appreciate your attention and time, which are valuable to you, and would value your input. As always, I am grateful to God for the results of my actions, and I hope that at least one person hears his voice through my words. This post has been edited by Eternal_Sophism on January 5, 2016, 1:20 AM | ||
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Posted: April 11, 2016, 10:26 PM
For me I could never get past the first step. I could not accept the idea that no person could help me with my addiction, but that I needed to give management of my life over to others.
Argued with sponsors over this. Finally gave up. | ||
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