Well, last winter I had the experience of my sponsor being on pain killers, several, for many months. I had the experience of being lied to by someone I trusted and then being betrayed as the relationship exploded. This in itself was traumatic. And caused a lot of pain and confusion. And anger. Real, righteous, and transfered.
I was called on my anger and tried to stop behaving in the way that I was behaving. Okay. That had some unexpected results. Because I was using anger as a shield against pretty much everything. But I did not recognise it as anger. Because in my life experience anger only looked like throwing things and punching walls and screaming with popping veins. Anger did not look like taking someone else's inventory, being judgemental, or being depressed to the point of suicidal thoughts. So when I stopped acting out on my anger I turned it on myself. My behaviour spiraled down to being exactly as it was before I gort sober except that I was still sober. That was a hellish experience. Living with all the pain that caused me to drink in the first place and not actually drinking. And not having names for any of the things that were painful. All I knew was anger or indifference. And I could not find a way to be indifferent about my own pain.
And the causes were buried so deep that it took months of pain to get them bubbled to the surface. I went back into therapy which helped some but really just pulled a lot of stuff up and then left me struggling for a week to live with what had been brought to the surface. It turns out that I should have been calling the crisi line but I had no reference for what a crisis looked like. It had never been okay before to even experience these feelings. That they were of crisis proportions was not something I could grasp. All I knew was that I was in a lot of pain. I asked for help, did what I knew to do, cried, prayed, complained. Things moved slowly. I had to be told that it wasn't as bad as it had been. Which was true. I felt like the Goddess had allowed me to be put in that place and was somehow twistedly amused by the situation. It took a lot of ranting to her to work through that.
Huh. I was even transfereing my abuse issues to the Divine. I truly felt cast adrift by all.
During this time I had more sponsors than I have had during the whole of 20 years sober. In a 3-4 month span. Which only added to the feeling of being abandoned. Eventually, I found a sponsor whom I still have 3-4 months now. Not that that was a rosy relationship at first. I was clingy. Cause I felt abandoned while dealing with actual abandonment issues that I'd never looked at or seen before. And my new sponsor would not allow clingyness. Which was a good thing truth be told. The old sponsor relationship had been far too codependent and the relationship with the rest of her sponsees debilitating.
Becasue when I told her I was getting another sponsor and that I was concerned about her use of painkillers none of her other sponsees would talk to me and they had been the only people I'd been talking to for some years. Not a good place to be. I thought I had two choices. Whcih turn out to be one really. Drink or die.
I did neither. I put one foot in front of the other every day and walked my path consciously aware of my pain. And slowly, slowly things began to change. I have had two really good positive weeks now. The longest stretch since May. Might not last but I'll have these good days to remember if/when it gets painful again.
Oh, and I'm doing this without medication since my liver will not support the use of such drugs day after day. My therapist was a little dismayed by that. But he's dealing with it.
I have the support of so many people. People who call each other and to tell them I might need to talk, who talk to me when I call, who listen to me cry and don't need to hear what I'm saying through my tears. They can just be there on the other end of the phone, in the next chair, with a hug or an encouraging word. Or the frustration of someone who is afraid for me because they can see my pain.
And even the Goddess who may not grant me my wishes but does help me find the strength to do the things I do not think I can do.
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