For the past 4 years, I have become restless at this time of year.* [My actually “birthday is March 6th. I just *feel* it coming on.] I know the pattern. I see it. I can’t stop it. No matter what my brain tells me, the old addiction demon starts hissing in my ear that I’ll never be “normal” and I will never be able to deal with stresses in a healthy way. When I start coming up on my the anniversary of getting clean, I start listening to them a little bit more. They get louder and I feel weaker.
I remember when I was in rehab and I would listen to people who had years behind them start talking about how hard it was around the time of their anniversary and how they tended to feel a lot weaker at that time of year. I was incredulous. “Are you crazy?!” I would think. “You have so much time behind you! Why would you even entertain the thought?” But now I understand better what they were talking about.
I pray I never live the life of a using woman again. I pray I never have to go through the hell that is addiction and the pain that is withdrawal again. And I pray for the strength that I need to get through this…again It isn’t at all that I want to use again and get addicted. But trust me, I do remember how much it helped at the beginning. The beginning was honeymoon of effectiveness. A case of being able to get it all done fast, effectively and with energy to spare. All that and the side effect of being stress-free. Magic in a pill bottle. And then it took more magic and was less effective. Before I knew it I was a strung out Mom with an addiction that was killing me.
In a month from now I will hit my 5 year “birthday.”
Coinciding with that is the stress over wondering where I am going with my writing career. (Agents? Publishers? I have yet to have one come knocking on my door.) All of my kids are sick. I will repeat that. ALL of my kids are sick. We have not had more than 3 days in a row of everyone in the house well since October. Even my husband is in bed sick. And the dog is still crapping on my floor.
If now is not a time when some medicinal aid sounds good, there isn’t one. I know better than to give in to that, but I cannot honestly say that it doesn’t sound very nice to give in. To just go to the blissful state that would render me numb. Of course, whereas these medicines would really help someone who isn’t an addict, it would send me right over the edge back into the downward spiral. I am not willing to go there.
I won’t do that to my husband.
I won’t do that to my kids.
I won’t do that to me.