Drug Rehab Options Blog

Yesterday was an awful day, nothing felt good, not even this board.
I decided to drink and I went to the store to buy some wine and I went there and stood there looking over the many choices for what seemed like eternity. I walked out with coffee and some chocolate. Then I remembered I had this very tiny bottle of champagne at home from awhile ago and drank it. It was awful, tasted horrible, I didn't get drunk nor did I have any inclination to buy more.
Though this doesn't mean I can control my drinking.
I have done this before (rarely). I guess I am back to Day 1, but it doesn't feel like it. I know what many will say, but I just didn't want to feel as though I'm being deceptive as long as I am still on here.

Thanks,

LD

posted also in the Narcotics 12 step forumLast night I was at a meeting and my hubby called. It was my dad....he slipped away into eternity while watching the Viking game with my mom.... tomorrow I will fly back to San Diego to help my mom.

Please pray I make wise choices and and super vigilant about my recovery!!!!! I really thought I was going to skate into my year of clean time 1/20/09 easily. This will not be easy. I want to come home and give you guys all a good report. I do not even have my laptop, as it is in the shop.....

My Dad Howard was not ill, I had an awesome 2 weeks w/ he and my Mom....I still cannot believe he is gone....he was just 75 and may have had a stroke or thrown a clot into his lung. He was not in pain, only winded my mom said.....then he closed his eyes and was gone.

I loved him so much. He helped form my silly personality, always a jokester he was.....he was kind and a God fearing man. He did an awesome job as a Dad and a husband. He worked at Rohr Industries for 45 years as a tool and die worker. He and my mom were married for 52 yrs. He loved Jesus and the verse I have in my avator is the verse he read as a boy and received Christ as he Savior.

Thanks guys. Sheila

I love you and miss you Daddy and will see you in a little while....love Sam

(he always called me Sam cuz he wanted to name me Samatha and my mom named me Sheila) lol

Howard E. G. 8/29/33-1/4/09

Last night I was at a meeting and my hubby called. It was my dad....he slipped away into eternity while watching the Viking game with my mom.... tomorrow I will fly back to San Diego to help my mom.

Please pray I make wise choices and and super vigilant about my recovery!!!!! I really thought I was going to skate into my year of clean time 1/20/09 easily. This will not be easy. I want to come home and give you guys all a good report. I do not even have my laptop, as it is in the shop.....

My Dad Howard was not ill, I had an awesome 2 weeks w/ he and my Mom....I still cannot believe he is gone....he was just 75 and may have had a stroke or thrown a clot into his lung. He was not in pain, only winded my mom said.....then he closed his eyes and was gone.

I loved him so much. He helped form my silly personality, always a jokester he was.....he was kind and a God fearing man. He did an awesome job as a Dad and a husband. He worked at Rohr Industries for 45 years as a tool and die worker. He and my mom were married for 52 yrs.

Thanks guys. Sheila

I love you and miss you Daddy and will see you in a little while....love Sam

(he always called me Sam cuz he wanted to name me Samatha and my mom named me Sheila) lol

Howard E. G. 8/29/33-1/4/09

hi all....just checking in. I'm moving through sobriety still (in the 50's)

I'm taking a moment right now, to rededicate this day to the Light of the higher power, to reaffirm my intention to live and be clean today. just for today.

I have to work hard at recovery. I am in the "foundation" part of recovery. These moments are beautiful; like the high school days were the foundation for my early adult life.

sometimes there are moments that don't feel good. I can be with those moments today. I can feel those uncomfortable feelings today instead of running away from them in the bottle, drug, food, etc.

sometimes the moment feels good. and I can let go of those moments today, instead of clinging to them in fear that i wont feel good again for a long time.

sometimes I get complacent. and it is for times like those, that i need to work hard at my "self constructed rehab center", my recovery, from the moment i wake until my last waking breath.

Last night i went to a new meeting and i felt some discomfort. I new that was a good thing as I was sitting there, even though I felt alone. it is this lonliness that i must walk through today, among other things like fear and anger too.

Take care, and here is a poem i wrote this week:

Quote:

Someday

(by Jerry Kitchen)


it makes me sad
that I have to die someday
it also makes me
want to live with purpose

it makes me wonder
what of my beginning
and of my failings
and selfishness
and petty-ness

it makes me sad
that I have to die someday
it makes me want to change
it makes me also
want to be filled with Light
far from the darkness
of my thoughts and actions
of my past

it brings me hope
as I believe more each day
that I can be
more simple and free
that I can fly
in eternity
and also love
in an instant
and this erases
the lines of pain and hate
that lie in my face of
history in my eyes
so that I can see,
see the Light
when all is dark

---

I am a 32 year old male from the north Texas area. I am an alcoholic. I have active in my addiction for 12 years? Maybe longer.

I have 4 children ranging in ages from 5 months to 13 years. I am totally functioning. I own my own successful business, I am very involved in my kids extra circular activities. I go 90 miles an hour every day, and I start drinking at the crack of dawn every morning.

I have known that I am an alcoholic for years. When I was 25 years old I quit for 4 months. I was a regular at AA meetings, had a sponsor, even went into an inpatient rehab facility. I just thought that I was better than the "system." That I didn't need it. I could be that guy who didn't go to meetings, work a program, and be sober.

Obviously, it didn't work, because here I am again. I need help. I need to be pointed in a direction. I have a 5 month old little girl. My wife is so exahusted with me, and rightfully so. I can't imagine having to live with me...I don't live with myself, I am drunk all the time. When I sober up long enough to feel bad at what a jerk I was the night/day before....I take another drink and all that guilt is gone.

Being sober scares me. The feelings that I have when I am sober make my skin crawl. The anxiety, the guilt. It's just so much to overcome without a program. I have actually stopped drinking more often than ever the last 2 or 3 months. I took 4 or 5 days of soberity with me on a few occassions. It was a white knuckled sober. Every second of the soberity seemed like an eternity. I need to be working a program.

I am not the type of person to just walk into a meeting without knowing anyone there. I guess I am stubborn. And I admit that, I am broken down. I don't want to give any more excuses. I just want to start the journey to a better place. My wife deserves it, my daughter and sons deserve it...and most importantly, I deserve it.

Can anyone guide me here?

PAUSE

WhatÂ’s a minute worth to you? Is it enough time to text a friend? Enough time to race to class after sleeping thru the alarm (again)? Or is it long enough to separate a smart call from a risky move?

It only takes a minute to change your life.

That’s a one minute pause, 60 seconds to stop, think and consider the impact of your actions. A pause is a delay, a breather, a suspended reaction. A pause is about finding the time to get the facts, and using those facts—not impulses- to help make decisions, when emotions are running high and a minute can feel like an instant or an eternity, a moment of clarity you create for yourself.


PAUSE wonÂ’t tell you what to do. PAUSE will provide you with information about your mind, body, and relationships and empower you to make your own best decisions. When you can rely on accurate info and make choices youÂ’re comfortable with, youÂ’re in the driverÂ’s seat. PAUSE is not about judgment. PAUSE is about staying informed and in control. ItÂ’s about the confidence you gain when you know the facts and yourself. PAUSE is also about seeking help when you need it.

Pause is a collaboration of the Kaiser Family Foundation, FOX, and My Space

MySpace.com - Pause - 19 - Female - Los Angeles, California - www.myspace.com/pause

Rick Warren (REMEMBER HE WROTE "PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE")
You will enjoy the new insights that Rick Warren has, with his wife now having cancer and him having "wealth" from the book sales. This is an absolutely incredible short interview with Rick Warren,

"Purpose Driven Life " author and pastor of Saddleback Church in California


In the interview by Paul Bradshaw with Rick Warren, Rick said:

People ask me, What is the purpose of life? And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were not made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven.

One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body-- but not the end of me.

I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity.

We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one.

The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort.

God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy.

We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer.

I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore.

Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life.

No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on.

And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for.

You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems.

If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness,"which is my problem, my issues, my pain." But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her.

It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.

You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life.

Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy.

It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease.

So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72

First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases.
Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church.

Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation.

Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.

We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity?

Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)?

When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better. God didn't put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do.
That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.

Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
Every moment, THANK GOD.

Soon it will be a week without any alcohol, which to some may not seem like a lot while to others it may seem like an eternity.

The eye twitches, which I recently discovered were an alcohol withdrawal symptom, were as bad as ever yesterday. It was certainly an annoyance and a challenge, but I told myself that drinking would have even worse consequences.

I went to try and visit an old friend who has been sober nearly two years now. Unfortunately, she wasn't at her work so I did not get to sit down and talk to her yet. We have a lot in common professionally and drinking-wise so I think it would be helpful to reach out to her.

I know that I will need a support group to do this as it is not something to do alone.

My thoughts on Hell.............................

I have had this conversation with a few of my sponsees. The question is always brought up.............."Do you believe in Hell?'

My Higher Power, for me, is a forgiving God. He forgives all for their sins. We are all God's children and I can not believe he passes judgement on any of us.

I dont believe he is standing at the gates to heaven and casting his vote weather you are accepted into heaven or not.
That is not what the God of my understanding is, for me anyway.

I believe, that when a person commits a crime of sexual attack, death, cannabilism, molestation, etc etc..............that person is not in their right mind.
Sick, mentally disturbed, drug/alcohol induced etc etc.

I certainly am not saying it is right. But, in Gods eye, being one of his own children, I am not sure he would make the decisions to send them to Hell for eternity.

I was molested at a very young age. Through working the steps and a great sponsor............I have been able to forgive the man who did this to me.
The act that was done to me............ Is unforgiving!!
I understand that he was a sick man. I must forgive this man or live in emotional Hell. for the rest of my life. So why wouldn't God do the same?


Just curious your thought on "HELL".