I am so grateful to be sober today. I’m grateful for a nice weekend celebrating Father’s Day, for rest, for a fresh week, for AA, a clean apartment, books and my sponsees. I’m grateful to have opportunities, for growth and for communication.
Gooood morning my friends (: As always, I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and you are feeling ready for the fresh week ahead.
I woke up this morning with all of my anxiety and a little bit of sadness in my throat. Since my last post I’ve been better about getting my head on straight, journal in the morning, prayers in a God box and of course I’m not magically cured. But little by little I’m feeling better and little and little I know I’ll start to understand. I think being in your 20s is hard and being in your 20s and being sober is even harder. But I also have all these tools that other 24-year-olds don’t and that is a blessing.
I’m just still trying to figure myself out - where is the line between wanting to work hard and being a workaholic. I love where I come from, but I also love where I currently live. I love rock music and country music and Disney, but every day can’t be a rock country Disney show. There’s a lot of duplicity in my life and I’m trying to remind myself that is okay, when I so naturally tell my sponsees and friends it’s okay. You can like two opposing things at the same time and that doesn’t mean you have to figure out who you are, you can be both happy and sad at the same time, you can feel nostalgia for the place you came from but also feel pride in where you are now. Duplicity is not a bad thing.
But the anxiety and sadness in my throat has nothing to do with any of the above. There are lots of exciting things on the horizon, Tim and I have put in a lot of work to grow and expand together. And I feel like we are being fought every step of the way. We found this beautiful apartment that we both really want to move into (writing this hurts every superstitious bone in my body, someone cross their fingers we get approved because we’d have our very own pirate balcony!!) and we are met with all of the reasons someone else thinks we shouldn’t live there. We talk about the future and what that might look like in the next few years (including but not limited to a marriage) and we are met with “oh God” and “please don’t” and yah know what, I’m just hurt.
I’m tired of hearing all of the reasons why it’s okay for all of the other people to say those things. I’m tired of twisting my brain to find all of the spiritual and AA ways to be okay with and accept and move forward all of those things. I’m tired of trying to discover my part and take accountability and doing all of the things that I am supposed to do and continue being hurt.
I don’t know what the resolution is or if there even is one, but I did not get sober to be a punching back and excuses and accountability are two different things. So, I’ll deal with the anxiety in my throat the best way I know how and they won’t deal with anything, and it will inevitably fall onto me to “fix it” and for right now I don’t want to. I want to be happy about what’s on the horizon and I want the people who are happy for me to celebrate with us. And for right now, that is okay.
Xx
Jane
I put on Sex and The City this weekend and was reminded how I was in the 20-30's. Too much, I was too much. alcohol, cigarettes, hamster wheel of poor choices and bad behaviors. And now, when somebody offers a drink, mostly out of polite intentions, I can think about all the days I have had without that too much stuff. Sobriety is mostly a big opportunity to live a different life. I wish you well in your journey.
I understand when someone feels they’ve put a lot of work into something and it’s not appreciated or completely understood. I also understand that lump of anxiety in my throat. That lump of worry and anxiety started the day I had my first daughter. For some people in our lives, it’s easier to celebrate things because if there’s a negative outcome that stems from a choice, it won’t effect them as much as it would effect somebody else. Sometimes, the only thing we can do is put things in God’s hands and pray that what’s meant to be in your path, will be. And, to pray to all of the guardian angels in heaven for them to keep those we love safe.