I can say with much assurance that life is far more cheerful than it was in my post last week. The therapy session did go marvelously well, and the stressors at work have seemingly dissipated. It's very odd how life can seemingly progress from chaos to serenity within a matter of days. I've also finished all the papers that I have due this semester in graduate school, and the rest of the semester looks to be cheerful. My most likely scenario is two A's and one B, with a W for the class I dropped.
One of the things that comes to mind most for me from last week was the desperation that I felt in the wee hours of Friday morning. I was stressed to the point of being suicidal, which is certainly an odd thing for me. I had already done the appropriate things -- calling people, talking about what I was feeling, etc, all in addition to praying. What happened for me, however, at the 3:00 A.M. hour was a prayer of utter hopelessness, of surrender. "God, I need you, now. I need your intervention now, for my own means of dealing with this have been utter desolation." I awoke the next morning with a tremendous hope about life, and this was solidified in what was one of the most powerful therapy sessions I have ever had.
Life has been pretty hunky dorey since then. I was more than a bit sleep deprived earlier this week due to 18 hours spent on a graduate paper, but nothing has changed the hopefulness that was given me on Friday. I have a great deal of gratitude for my Higher Power doing for me what I could not do for myself.
One of the things that also strikes me this week is how utterly conniving sex addiction is. I have been struggling for quite some time to move some behaviors from my middle circle into my inner circle. In the beginning of my journey of sobriety these behaviors caused me little grief, for they were a far cry from the life of behaviors I was abandoning. These behaviors never endangered my intimate relationship nor caused me particular grief. They never hurt my soul, nor endangered my serenity in the past. I was also advised by my sponsor in the beginning to quit that which brought utter unmanageability and powerlessness and shame into my life, and leave those that are not patently obviously addictive for a future point.
The problem is -- I have reached that future point. A year and a half into sobriety, two years into the program, these behaviors that were somehow acceptable in early sobriety I now find to be a barrier to my spiritual growth. Furthermore, I see them as a barrier to my growth and devotion to the woman I love. These are not things that I wish to carry with me into a married relationship.
I find myself in meetings, saying that I am a year and a half "sober", while secretly feeling in my soul that I'm not -- because I feel as if the addiction still has this hold on me. I feel like a hypocrite to my sponsees because of this. What kind of model of sobriety am I if I still struggle like this?
One good thing that happened to me today was that I spoke with my sponsor for a good while today, and I will be meeting with her for lunch this Monday. Due to my relocation my time spent with her has been less than what either of us would like. Furthermore we talked about how limited our contact has been over the past few months with the drama that has been going on for her in her place of employment and her massive amounts of overtime required. What we came to was an understanding that we need to set a specific time in our combined schedules that, no matter what, we talk on the phone, at least for 30 minutes. This is what I need in my life right now. I need her guidance, her gentleness, her insight.
As for the AA sponsor that I've been exploring for here in my new location -- I'm not sure it's going to work out. He just doesn't seem like a good fit for me. So yet again, I'm on the lookout. The reality of the matter is that the right person WILL materialize at the right time, when that person is needed, and I am ready.
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3 comments:
I was struck by this comment: "I feel like a hypocrite to my sponsees because of this. What kind of model of sobriety am I if I still struggle like this?"
You don't have to be perfect to be a model. You are struggling, they are struggling -- you're all walking the same path, you're just a bit further down the road, guiding them -- you don't have to have reached some mythical endpoint to show them guidance and progress.
Two things:
1. I've just begun reading Eat, Pray, Love and the author tells a story about how she was resistent to petitioning God for what she wanted in life. Her friend, whose connection with the Divine (or whatever you choose to call it) she marveled at reminded her that she is part of the universe, and that she had every right to participate in the creation of her life by voicing her wants and desires to God. So she did, and she had an experience similar to the one you describe.
I'm just at the beginning of exploring spirituality for myself, and thank you for your post. It proivded me another reminder of what spirituality can be.
2. You've been memed!
I think the terrible thing about our disease is that it convinces us that we haven't made much progress when in reality we have grown by leaps and bounds. When we get through that "down" period, we get "up" periods (I'm sure that you know what I'm talking about) where we can see some significant progress. There are times we are weak and blind, and therefore, have to make sure that we don't isolate. I think one of the things of making sure we interact with others when we're down is it can show us how much we've grown....it can take us back to where we were so we can again say, "Wow...I was really in a bad place..."
Like your site...will be back. I struggle with so many of the same issues as you.
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