I had what I call a jonesing dream. A jonesing dream is a nightmare where I am either for some reason in relapse mode and am literally hurting from withdrawal, which I haven't experienced in years, and having cravings that are maddening. In jonesing dreams I am always either in recovery and struggling not to use, fighting the urge and trying to resist, or I have already gone back out or never recovered and am struggling but unable to find drugs. In each case I wake up in a near panic with a sense of urgency to fix.
I haven't had a dream like this in a long time, and this morning, that sense of urgency to fix lasted about as long as it took me to come to understanding that it was a dream and I was in bed. As the dream faded, so did the desire to drug. That my Dear Reader is a miracle. It is a miracle that I was able to go back to sleep at all, even if it was only for serial napping, and it is a miracle that as I write this about seven hours later I have absolutely zero desire or sense of need for a drink or a drug.
I used to have these dreams when I used. I would wake up and fix. If I didn't have drugs, I would at least drink myself into numbness. If I had neither I would crave, scheme, search and such until I found something to take, whether that took minutes, hours or days. When I first began in recovery dreams like that would spin me off and I could barely function. It amped up the struggle and the need to fight to stay clean. I spent a lot of time calling friends for counsel and help during the days of early recovery when these dreams were common.
I began drinking and drugging at a young age and could have been easily diagnosed as addict and alcoholic before I turned 14 had I sought help or gotten caught more. I had short stretches of being clean or being sober, never both at the same time, as I went from one chemical to another to try to prove that I wasn't hooked on whatever thing I was laying aside. Never mind that my usage of other things simply increased whenever I would stop using something.
Even prison didn't stop me from drinking and drugging, although it did slow me down some. Chemicals are readily available and hooch can be made, but it was not my experience that it was easier to get. There are drive through liquor stores here. It doesn't get much easier than that. Anyway, I didn't get serious about recovery and stopping the drugs that I could never stay stopped on for long and without increasing drinking or other drugs and the drinking, which regardless of what other drugs I did or didn't do, I could never stay stopped when I stopped, until I was out of prison and on parole.
I got serious then because I was afraid that I would end up back in prison, and I would rather be dead. Eight days into my freedom my bondage drove me to foolish choices that could have sent me back inside. I sought help for real. I got off parole in 2009, and that was also the year that I had my first six months completely clean and sober, the longest stretch I'd had in my life since I was 13. I did go back out after 15 months, but today I have been clean and sober 6.5 years.
I am not saying that to brag. I am not saying that to say see what I did. No, what I did was use. I drank or drugged or both for 25 years of my life, no matter how much damage I did to my life (and the lives of others) or how miserable I became. That's what I did. I couldn't stop. Well, that's not true. Stopping was easy. I did it a thousand times. I couldn't stay stopped. I didn't do this. For me to be clean and sober today, for me not to be jonesing for hours after a dream like I had this morning, these things are both miracles. And the funny thing is that they are not even the best or biggest miracles and blessings in my life anymore. The miracle of recovery had to happen before the others, but it was the start of a life worth living, not the end.
Came to believe that a power greater than myself could restore me to sanity. Made a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of that power, God. My past is proof that I could not control my drive to seek my own pleasure, comfort and feelings of security or escape from feeling unable to get those things, no matter what that drive did to me or those I cared about. I could not manage my life or my drug and alcohol use. I believe, because of experience, that no human power could relieve me of my alcoholism and drug addiction, of my general addiction to self and all the bondage that causes. My recovery is testament to the truth that there is indeed a God, a God who not only can set us free and restore our lives but desires to do just that, and that He will do so if He is sought.
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