by Fiona Stockard | Jan 28, 2015 | Addiction Articles, Recovery
What Do I Do If a Loved One Relapses?
Relapse is a part of recovery. It’s an unfortunate part, but a part nonetheless. It’s like the sky being blue, grass being green, or Taco Bell being the tastiest fast food. Addicts and alcoholics relapse. It’s that simple.
So, what happens when someone close to us relapses? It could be a family member, friend, roommate, significant other, sober support, or even a sponsor. What happens to us when they pick up that drink? What are our options?
This is a selfish way of looking at things, but an absolutely vital one to preserve our own sobriety! This goes double if you’re in early-sobriety when a loved one relapses.
What do we do? Find some of my (hard won) advice below. I hope it helps!
Limit Contact
This one’s kind of obvious, but limit your contact with a relapsing loved one! Now, this might be hard depending on who it is that decided to pick up a drink or drug. It’s one thing to limit contact with a friend, it’s a whole other thing to limit contact with a significant other!
If it’s at all possible, don’t spend as much time with them. See them only in social settings. Don’t hang out with them late into the night. Take these general precautions to protect your own sobriety!
These might sound harsh, but remember – it’s easier for a relapsing loved one to take us out, than it is for us to get them back into the rooms.
Don’t See Them Alone
This goes along with limiting contact. Don’t hang out with your relapsing loved one alone!
I know what you’re thinking. “But So and So loves me! He or she would never use around me. I’ll be fine!” Guess what? You’re probably right. 99% of the time you will be fine. It’s that 1% that makes seeing a relapsing loved one alone dangerous.
Remember, you’re dealing with the disease of addiction and alcoholism. It overwhelms us all. It doesn’t matter how much your loved one cares about you. If they’re drinking and drugging, all that love goes out the window. That’s just how it is.
Seek Professional Help
Seeking professional help can take a few different forms depending on who in your life relapsed.
Let’s say it’s your significant other. Well, then seeking professional help could include going to marriage therapy, going to couples therapy, joining a support group like Al-Anon, or simply placing your loved one in treatment.
Let’s say it’s a friend that relapsed. If that’s the case, seeking professional help could take the form of attending a support group, going to more twelve-step meetings, or even planning an intervention (with an interventionist, of course!).
Let’s say it’s a family member. In this case, maybe you should attend family therapy. Whatever form it takes, don’t be afraid to turn to the professionals. After all, there’s a reason they’re called professionals!
Encourage Them!
This might also be kind of common sense, but I see it get neglected a lot! Remember, your loved one is in a lot of emotional, mental, and spiritual pain. They’re drinking, using, and engaging in harmful and selfish behavior. They could use some kind words!
So, if someone close to you starts drinking or drugging, tell them some of the things your sponsor tells you. It’ll help more than you know.
Pray For Them
And here we’ve reached the most important thing (in my humble opinion anyway!) you can do for a loved one who’s relapsing. Pray for them! It’s that simple.
Alcoholism and addiction are diseases of powerlessness. Addicts and alcoholics are powerless over drugs and booze. They’re powerless to say no. They need something more powerful than they are to help.
That’s where a God of our own understanding enters the picture. This God is much more powerful than any drug or drink.
So, say a prayer for your loved one. It’s one of the simplest, and most powerful, things we can do!
by Sally Rosa | Jan 19, 2015 | Addiction Articles, Benefits of Sobriety
The Benefits of a Deadly Disease
Chances are that if you ask ten random people the benefits of being an alcoholic, they won’t be able to list any. Well guess what random people, you’re wrong!
It took me awhile to realize that being an alcoholic, in recovery of course, is actually a blessing. Think about it, we survived! We survived and we thrived! We survived, thrived, and now have pride!
Okay, lame rhyming attempts aside, it’s absolutely true that being an alcoholic is a blessing. Seriously, where else can you gain gratitude, humility, and a spiritual way of life? I can’t think of anywhere!
Take a trip with me, readers. Take a trip with me down a road by the name of “why being an alcoholic rocks!”
We Have the BEST Friends
Duh! I have the type of friends that I can call crying at three in the morning and they’ll stay up talking to me until sunrise. Where else do you find friends like that?
In the rooms of recovery, we’re in a life or death struggle with our disease. We’re all in the same boat, whether we have twenty days or twenty years. For this reason, and many, many more, the friendships that develop are extra special.
Not only do my friends and I share similar experiences, but we also share similar thinking! We share similar thoughts, neurotic or otherwise!
So yeah, being an alcoholic rocks because we have the best friends.
We Have Gratitude
I read these articles and watch these TV shows where they talk about how people need to have gratitude. Guess what? I have it in spades!
I’m grateful I’m alive. I’m grateful I’m able to help other women. I’m grateful I’m able to let other women help me. I’m grateful my parents answer the phone when I call. I’m grateful I can hold a job. I’m grateful I can grow at a job. I’m grateful.
Remember, though, gratitude is an action word. It’s easy for me to forget about gratitude and get caught up in life. When that happens, I need to start reaching out to new women. Then I’m knocked right back on the gratitude train!
We Have Perspective
You know what happens when I get cut off in traffic, am late for work, get yelled at, spill salad dressing on my shirt, and go home to find the cat threw up on my bed? I smile and thank God I’m sober.
Think about it, we’re sober today. How amazing is that! Alcoholics and addicts are hardwired and programmed to drink and drug. Today we’re not drinking and drugging. Today we’re living by spiritual principles. Toady we’re helping others.
That’s nothing short of a miracle. And that knowledge, my friends, is called perspective. So I had a bad day? Guess what, it’s better than any day I had a bottle to my lips or a needle in my arm. End of story.
We Have God in Our Lives
As if all of the above weren’t enough, being sober also let’s us have God in our lives. Now this is the biggest blessing of them all. This is how I’m able to experience all those other blessings. This is how I’m able to look the world in the eye and exclaim “Bring it on!”
See, normies have no need for God. Well, that’s not true. Most of them need God pretty badly! But they don’t always see it that way.
Us addicts and alcoholics, though, we know the score. We know that without some form of Higher Power, we’re toast. How cool is that?
We’re basically forced into letting God into our lives. Then we find out that having God in our lives is the best thing that could ever happen. She, he, it, them, whatever you want to call your Higher Power, is a source of inspiration, comfort, hope, and, above all else, love.
Am I missing anything? Let us know on social media!!
by Fiona Stockard | Dec 24, 2014 | Addiction Articles, Sobriety For Women
The Stages of Sobriety
Although I sometimes forget this important fact, I didn’t get better overnight! It took me exactly how long it took me to grow into a woman of grace and dignity. It took me six years.
Now don’t get me wrong, the obsession to drink and use drugs was lifted as soon as I did the work. I got a sponsor within my first few weeks sober. I started working the steps. I had a spiritual awakening and haven’t obsessed over chemicals in a long time. Emotional sobriety, though? That’s a whole other story.
I was a mess of character defects, insecurities, and selfish behaviors for my first year sober. Slowly, they began to fade away as I did more work on myself. I prayed, meditated, helped others, went to therapy, and completed therapy assignments. Through this process, I began to get better in all areas of my life.
So, how do women in early-recovery move from scared girls to women of grace and dignity? The answer is time, self-reflection, and fearless work on ourselves.
To help make sense of this process, I’ve outlined the different stages of sobriety. I hope you all find them helpful! Learn from my mistakes and lessons, so you don’t have to make the same ones!
In Treatment
This is the first step to a new life. We’re freshly sober and probably out of our minds with fear, resentment, ego, insecurity, and a hundred other worries.
Rehab is a place to physically separate us from drugs and alcohol. It’s a safe environment for us to reawaken to the world. It’s a home away from home. If those examples sound kind of corny, well, deal with it! They’re 100% true!
Not only does being in treatment keep us physically safe from booze and drugs, it also allows us to learn about ourselves. Treatment is a time for reflection and realization. It’s a safe place to face the demons that kept us drinking and drugging for years.
Of course, facing these demons isn’t enough. We have to overcome them. We’re introduced to the tools we use to accomplish this in rehab. We’re introduced to spiritual principles like honesty, faith, service, and communication in rehab.
Early-Sobriety
I define early-sobriety as the time after rehab to three years. That’s a pretty long stretch of time! The important thing to remember is that the physical time doesn’t matter. Rather than quantity, we’re aiming for quality!
Early-sobriety is where the rubber meets the road. It’s where we reenter the world and put those spiritual principles into practice. It’s also where I made most of my mistakes.
I did a ton of stupid things in early-sobriety. I got involved with boys and took the focus off my Higher Power. I went to the casino and started compulsively gambling. I had more jobs than I can count on one hand, and maybe more than I can count on both hands. I practiced dishonesty instead of honesty.
There were a couple of things I did right though! I went to an all women’s halfway house. I was dating when I shouldn’t have, but I also had strong women surrounding me.
I was 100% honest with my sponsor. I told her everything good and bad I was doing. She chewed me out regularly and I deserved it!
Finally, even though my focus was often taken off my spiritual growth, I continued to work the steps. Within six months I’d completed them and began to reach out to others. Yeah, I was still full of character defects, but I was trying my best to help others.
The Danger Zone
The danger zone is my nickname for the period between three years and double-digit sobriety. I call it the danger zone because it seems like a lot of women relapse during this time.
I’m currently six and a half years sober. So, I’m smack in the middle of the danger zone! After making the same mistakes over and over during early-sobriety, I’ve started to really grow as a woman of grace and dignity.
I’m in the danger zone, but I’m doing well. I don’t enter romantic relationships, or any relationships for that matter, which aren’t healthy. I pray, meditate, and practice God-centered sponsorship. I stopped gambling! I put others’ needs before my own.
Through doing these simple (but not easy!) steps, I’m protected from drinking and selfish behavior. Of course, if I stop doing them, if I stop practicing these principles in all my affairs, I’m going to drink.
It’s that simple. If I stay balanced, I’ll stay healthy and sober. If I lose balance, I’ll end up drunk and selfish.
Long-Term Sobriety
I think of long-term sobriety as having over ten years. It’s funny, though, I’ve heard countless old-timers refer to themselves as newcomers. Now that’s humility!
I’m not at this stage yet, so I’m not sure what it’s like. I bet it’s probably similar to where I’m at now. That’s one of the many wonderful things about recovery – if I do the same things at twenty years that I did at twenty days, I’ll stay sober.
One thing I’ve heard many people with long-term sobriety say is how simple their lives have become. While, in some ways, my life is simpler at six plus years sober, it’s also more complicated. I have more responsibility, accountability, and daily tasks than I did in early-sobriety.
I image I’ll have even more at fifteen or twenty years. I think old-timers are talking about their emotional health when they say their lives are simple. I hope that’s it anyway!
Want to know how to get to long-term sobriety? It’s simple, really. Find an old-timer and ask them how they did it. The answer won’t disappoint you, I promise!
by Fiona Stockard | Nov 21, 2014 | 12 Steps, Addiction Articles
Written By: Fiona Stockard
The Big Book Broken Down – Part Twelve
Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who help each other to recover from alcohol and drug addiction. It was founded in June of 1935, just celebrated its seventy-ninth anniversary, and boasts over two million members.
AA’s central text is the Big Book. With a sponsor and a Big Book, AA members work the twelve steps, and “recover from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body” (title page).
Today, I’ll be breaking down a section of the chapter Working With Others.
Working With Others
This chapter makes clear that the desire to get sober must come from within. We can’t make a family member, friend, or sponsee want to quit drinking. If they don’t want to, we simply have to move on.
Working With Others reads, “To spend too much time on any one situation is to deny some other alcoholic an opportunity to live and be happy” (p 96).
That’s much easier said than done! Fortunately, we have prayer and meditation on our side. We have spiritual tools that allow us to deal with any situation.
When working with a new sponsee, it’s important to remember that we’re offering spiritual guidance only. To that end, this chapter says, “…that he is not trying to impose upon you for money, connections, or shelter. Permit that and you only harm him” (p 96).
I’m not a bank and I’m not a homeless shelter (although being both those things would be pretty rad!). I’m an alcoholic who has found a spiritual solution to the disease of alcoholism. That’s all I can offer a woman seeking help.
Working With Others goes on to list some of the ways that helping others can be inconvenient. Remember, life isn’t always sunshine and rainbows! The chapter talks about how working with a sponsee may mean losing sleep, interrupting personal activities and work, having to go to hospitals and jails, and my phone ringing at all hours.
That seems like a lot of negative consequences all from helping someone out! Guess what? They’re all worth it. Anyone who has seen light and life return to a sponsee’s eyes will tell you the same.
Is sponsorship sometimes a hassle? Absolutely. Do I really want to pick up the phone during the last five minutes of Scandal? Not even a little bit. But I do it anyway. I sponsor women because it’s the best feeling in the world to help someone else and expect nothing in return. It’s the closest I get to meeting God.
Working With Others then returns to the idea there are certain things we shouldn’t help newcomers with. It says,
“He clamors for this or that, claiming he cannot master alcohol until his material needs are cared for. Nonsense…we simply do not stop drinking so long as we place dependence upon other people ahead of dependence on God” (p 98).
Ain’t that the truth! I thought I needed to have a good job to get sober. I got that job and continued to drink. I thought I needed a cute guy to get sober. I got a cute guy and would drink in the bathroom after he fell asleep.
I needed God to get sober. That was it. End of story. Working With Others points this out, too. The chapter reads, “For the type of alcoholic who is able and willing to get well, little charity, in the ordinary sense of the word, is needed or wanted” (p 98).
That’s been my experience. When I was finally ready and willing to get sober, there wasn’t much I needed. I had a roof over my head and food in my stomach. Oh, and I had God in my life. Guess what? I got, and stayed, sober!
