Trouble

Time to be rigorously honest. I’ve been wanting to write an update for a few days now, but have been unsure how to express what I’m feeling and thinking. It’s difficult for me to say how I’m feeling without sounding like I’m whining. I hate whiners and so don’t want to contribute to the whine quotient in the universe. But the fact is simply this…I’m in trouble. Big time.

I don’t want to drink or drug. But for the first time in a long while, I simply don’t care most of the time if I live or die. And the rest of the time? I lust for death as though he were as attractive as Brad Pitt. That life worth living that I have found such comfort in? Not really seeing that right now. Damn sure not feeling it.

Now don’t get me wrong, I know that not everything I think nor everything I feel is necessarily true. But it’s still how I feel. And I don’t know what to do about it. I’ve done everything I can think of. I have struggled to continued to do my best to do the next right thing. I have prayed and prayed and prayed some more. I have thrown myself into helping others, which by the way has provided the only relief I have found and helped greatly. But minutes after I am done…it all comes back. The second I get still, get quiet, I break down. I fall apart. I am broken inside.

For the first time in about nine months I uttered the phrase that’s what I get for hoping today. I felt such gratitude not long ago for having hope. When I did my personal inventory originally, hope was one of my top three fears. That fear was removed. God gave me hope. Getting clean and sober gave me hope. And I still have some of that today, right now as I write this. But there is one thing I have become utterly hopeless concerning. And the weight of that one thing is about to drown me. I don’t remember ever hurting this bad because in the past if I ever even began to feel a hint of this range of inner pain I did everything I could to kill it, numb it, distract myself from it. Ah…the sweet bliss of oblivion calls. No, I don’t have a desire to drink or use. But to not feel this way? Damn skippy. Something has to change and soon. I can’t take much more of this. I am ready to die. I would rather die than to continue to live and feel this way. And if I’m ready to die…I feel my resolve to die sober fading.

So what is it keeping me sober today? Helping other alcoholics and addicts. Since that has become my drug of choice, the only way I know to change the way I feel without killing myself I have to stay clean. Why? Because I can’t help anyone else if I surrender to the beast again. Today it is enough. Tomorrow? Probably. A week from now? If nothing else changes I seriously doubt it. God help me. I can’t do this anymore. I can’t go on like this. The misery I had before was about to kill me, but I came to believe that if I got sober and clean I would find relief. I would be freed from my misery. But this misery has nothing to do with anything like that. There’s nothing I can do to change anything. There is nothing I can quit or do. There’s no change or relief in sight no matter how much I do the right thing or what I try.

I have been told that if I focus on the problem the problem will get bigger and if I focus on the solution the solution will get better. Sounds true. The problem is you can’t focus on the solution if you have no idea what the solution is. I have asked people, sought advice, done all the research I can think of. I simply have no idea what the solution is or what to do. No one else seems to either. If it’s in the 164, I can’t find it. I’ll keep looking…for a while. But I can only hurt for so long before I have to do something different.