Sunday, May 24th, 2009
A week ago today, I celebrated a year of sobriety for the second time around. Friday, I had a slip-up of old behaviours. Today, I thought about how this year has been different my last year of sobriety. On Saturday, after I really thought hard about what I had done and how many people it affected when I was being selfish, I had a lot of emotions come up. I’m working on a fourth step with my AA sponsor, and I recently joined a youth AA group. My sponsor there is having me work on something called a trauma report. I have to write two of them, and one is on my rape. I have to go into detail about everything that led up to it and afterwords. So after my slip-up on Friday, I was pretty emotional. Then again, I think I needed it. I have been working on my fourth step and trauma reports for the last two weeks, and managed to squeeze a measly couple of tears out. I felt like something was so wrong with me, because I was feeling all these emotions and I couldn’t let it out.
Saturday intensified all the same feelings time a million. My youth AA sponsor was sharing in a meeting on Saturday and was talking about how something was a “blessing in disguise,” and I remember wishing I had that same outlook. Now that the initial waves of emotions are pretty much over, and I had one on ones with more than ten girls, I feel a little better. I still get in my head and I still get down, but that’s when I have to give it to God.
So back to my first question. I thought all weekend about how I was doing the same crap I was doing when I was getting high. Today, I asked myself how this year (08-09) was any different from my last one year birthday (06-07). At first I couldn’t answer myself. Then again, I wasn’t really holding much of a conversation, I was more concentrated on beating myself up. But now that I look a little closer, I can answer that question. Today I’m willing. Today I’m honest. I was NONE of those things in 06-07. I had to weigh the good and the bad of what happened Friday night with my slip-up. The bad: it happened, I let it happen, and I didn’t do anything to stop it. I let in to my instant gratification. The good: I told my youth AA sponsor the next day first thing, I made amends to everyone that was there, I took suggestions, I felt my feelings, and eventually didn’t let my feelings control me. In 06-07, I would have held on to all of those feelings and not shared them with one person. I probably would’ve self-injured as well.
I got through Friday and Saturday. It’s not Sunday, and I’m still alive. I went to bed happy last night. After I threw myself a pity party, I got out of my head and went to my sober party and danced like a crazy woman. And I had fun. That’s the most important part. So today, I went to church and I heard the preacher say some of the most inspiring words I’ve ever heard in a church that it might as well have been in the big book.
Look forward with hope, and not backward with regret.
Wow. It’s so funny how we use our selective listening, and when you really tune into everything that a person is saying, you can apply it to everyday life. If not, save it for later. Today I realized that I have to have hope and faith in order to grow and make progress. If I hang on to my regret, shame, guilt, resentment, anger, whatever then I have no room to grow. I’m literally blocking myself from the sunshine of the spirit. Today I choose progress not perfection and I live my life the way I should. Someone told me during one of my 1-on-1s that everyone makes mistakes and that doesn’t make people that love you love you any less. She also told me that I had to give myself some time to heal and time to feel, but after that time is up, I just need to move on.
So ultimately, God will always be there for me even when I do manage to completely screw things up. People will still love me for who I am, and those in recovery won’t judge me because they know where I’m coming from. In the end, it’s all good. 
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Tags: AA, change, crying, emotions, feelings, fourth step, guilt, honest, honesty, old behaviors, regret, remorse, rensentment, shame, sobriety, suggestions, tears, trauma report, willing, willingness