Well, this morning 29 years ago, I woke up at my mother’s house, hung
over, from a day before of using everything I could get my hands on, Alcohol,
Pot, Biker speed, but on this morning I was once again out of all drugs due to
the binge the night before. I could never save anything for the next day.
I had just started a job, it was day
three. I had left the first two days early on a lie, because I had run out of
drugs and alcohol, and needed to go get more. I was in the habit of taking alcohol
disguised to work in a soft drink bottle, and would use drugs in the toilet. On
this morning though, I was out of drugs, and I was already late for work. Mum
was at the end of the bed trying to wake me up, because she was of the belief
that if I just could get a job, I would get back on my feet. I thought that
once, but not anymore. I didn’t know it yet, but addiction is cunning baffling
and powerful, and I broke every promise I ever made to myself to stop, cut
down, control my use.
On this morning though, I was at a special
sort of rock bottom. I didn’t know what it was called at the time, but I come
to understand that it was a spiritual rock bottom. I just knew I could not go
to work and lie to the bosses one more time. I had lied to leave work early to
get drugs. I had been lying for as long as I remember to cover up who I really was,
and what I was really doing. I for some reason this morning could not lie
again to these two middle aged European gents who owned this small factory,
that I had been hired as a Boilermaker.
So, as I lay in bed looking up at the familiar distressed look of
my mums face, I told her the truth. That I was using again, everything, that I
could not stop, and that I needed help. Help to her meant our family Doctor. So
as she jumped in the car and headed to the Surgery to book me in. I, jumped in
my dad’s car, (as mine had been repossessed by the Sherriff!) to go and try and
get on. I went to my friends (drug associates) house, to try and get a shot,
but they had nothing ( meaning only enough for them) usually I would haggle till
I got something, but the spiritual rock bottom had finally kicked in, and I had
little fight left. So I drove home, and of course pretended like nothing had happened
when mum returned.
We headed to the Doctors, and I told him the truth, for the first
time, no bullshit. What I was using, how much, exactly. He gave me a letter to
a place and said head straight there. As we were walking through reception, he
came out, with another letter, and said to go here. I have always wondered
about that. What would have happened if I went to the other place? Would I
still be here?
So we picked up some cloths, and then my mother drove me there. I
was angry all the way. I didn’t know it then, but I have since learnt I was
just raging to keep all my fear, pain and shame pushed down. But it got me
there. I remember walking into that Detox, feeling frightened of the unknown. I
knew I needed to be there. I had no idea what “there” was.
I just knew I needed to
stop using Drugs and Alcohol, and that I could not. I had already tried
everything I knew. When they asked me why I was there I was confused, because I
thought everyone would go to detox to stop. But I soon learnt people go there
for a variety of reasons. To get people of your back, husbands, wives, mums and
dads, police, bosses. People go there to escape, for a warm bed and some food,
to get their habit down. I am glad when I look back that I went to get well, to
get help to stop.
That day is a blur in treatment. I do know we were not allowed to
have contact with others outside, and those we were not allowed to talk to each
other. I found that one the hardest. When I was caught talking to another
client, the worker even asked me “What have you really got to offer this person
trying to get well?” I must say, at the time, I was frustrated, but I did think
they had a point, I felt I had nothing to offer someone that was trying to get
clean.
That night though, I was taken to my first N.A meeting, McKinnon
Monday night. I still remember it. The meeting was big. We walked down from the
detox. There were Harleys out the front and anybody who I had ever been was
there. Bikers, punks, new romantics, westie’s, Inner city all in black types (
Pre Hipsters!) even those normal looking folks, I even tried that. It felt strange
when I did, but I tried it all the same.
In the meeting, as people
stood up and shared, it was great to hear people talk out loud, what I always
kept locked inside. From the meeting though, the moment I remember the most was
the countdown. When I think back I would have stood up and said I was one day
clean. I know now the big deal that gets made when that happens, and maybe it
happened that night. I do not remember is the truth. But I do remember two
people coming up to me and saying things like hang in there. That they had been
through the same detox, and that they are now going to meetings, and staying
clean, working the Narcotics Anonymous Program.
When I walked back to the detox that night I know I felt hope,
that just maybe I can make it. Just maybe, I had found my tribe.I described it
to my mother months latter that I felt like I had found the place that I could
talk, and that people could understand me. As I tried to get some sleep I knew
I wanted to go to another meeting, even though it freaked me out. I am grateful
on that day, when I reached out for help, firstly there was a detox, and secondly
there was NA.
Now, 29 years later, I drove off towards a Detox and treatment centre,
one I have been working at on and off for many years. Today I facilitated a
Staff and Community meeting, that was all about connection, communication,
being real, and change and hope through genuine connection to self and others.
I have fought working here at different times in my life. I do not anymore. I
belong here, holding out my hand, as so many people held there’s out for me to
hold, in those moments, that even though you are afraid, you trust and reach
out.
Recently, I finally got to meet Pia Mellody, at the Meadows. The
Treatment Centre that South Pacific Private is based on. It was everything I
could have hoped for. Over two days, I spent 2 1/2 hours that I will never
forget. I have taught Pia’s Model, and lived my recovery by it for over 25
years now. It gave me back my connection with my soul. Hearing her talk about
this model, in answering questions I have harbored for many years, was like nectar
from the Gods. I have always been impressed with this model, by its salvation
at depth that it offers the suffering Codependant, with all our secondary symptoms.
I will be going back for training with Pia latter this year. This will be a
week that will last a lifetime.
I have thought for a while that stopping using is hard, but it’s
the easiest part of recovery. It’s the staying stopped that is the hardest.
Doing whatever it takes in your recovery to not pick up, and work the program
instead. I am grateful for all those early recovering addicts that answered the
phone, spoke to me after meetings, and invited me to coffee shops. I am grateful
to Peter G and Michael B and Steve for being my early sponsors, and for Mark A
for being my Co-sponsor for over 20 years. Grateful to friends like Alan H ,
Croc, who has been ringing me for support for 25 years. Bonds that now can
never be broken.
I am grateful to all my friends that have sat in Men’s groups with
me, Dave R, Roger B , Peter J.
Parramatta Coda Meeting. Brookvale Men’s NA, Trevor, Simon, Black Phil, Vanilla
Phil, Kev, Hookey, Pete G and H, Marco, Simon, Tom C and Lance. All who have
sat in those chairs, all that are not still with us.
Also, I am grateful for the
Dinosaurs, past and present, Wayne H, Aeroplane Bob (RIP) , Derek, Mario, Greg
H, Carol, Anna , Warragamba Pete, Paul and Gary and Lucinda. Kevin from Heaven,
Tony W, Mark and Kay S. Big Lindsay, Damien, Tim B. My partner in Crime Morry!
Piano Tony and Tony G to name a few, that keep walking that ground up ahead,
showing me that true recovery is for life.
I know I will have forgotten people, forgive me please.
Next its mentors, met and unmet. John Falcon, Shaman, June Lake,
Spiritual Grandmother, Lorraine Wood, Visionary and Steward of Recovery for
many, Wes Taylor, teacher and friend, Rex McCann and Vivian Hutchinson, Magicians.
Gary Williams, spiritual Father. Earl Cass, Group work master. Michael Le Page,
Supervisor extraordinaire.
Pia Mellody-Saviour, Patrick Carnes, Robert Bly, John Bradshaw,
and my friend John Lee. Bob Earl, Terry Gorski, Michael Meade, James Hillman,
Dan Millman, Deepak Chopra, the list is long .
Bessel Van Der Kolk, Stephen Porges, Dan Siegel, Dr Alan Shore,
Alex Katehakis, Claudia Black, Peter Levine , Pat Odgen and Ed Tronick. Masters
one and all.
To all my colleagues past and present at SPP and beyond, that work
at the coalface with grace of the human spirit . What a privilege it has been
to be beside you. I have learnt so much. Thankyou to Dr Teoh, Dr Gutkin and Bill
and Lorraine Wood for the opportunity to serve at such a wonderful place of
healing.
Lastly, my family. My
mother, Joan, and my beautiful wife Jen and sons Marshall and Maverick. I am
grateful that my father passed on , seeing me in long term recovery. Without
the gift of recovery, these gifts I would never have received.
Now I am certain I have forgotten more and more people, and will
feel awful after I press send, but I am perfectly imperfect, and have at my centre
the 12 steps, and can keep taking inventory, and make amends when I need to.
I have been grateful to have been around long enough, and had
accessed great sponsors who led me through the steps, and to have then
experienced the Spiritual Awakening which Step 12 talks about, that we get as a
Result of working the steps.
I understand that awakening better now. To me it simply means I am
alive, aware, conscious and in my reality, having access to my Body, My thinking
, beliefs and values, to be able to feel, and be aware of my actions.
Not killing myself anymore,
not numbing myself, distracting myself
into submission. Recovery and the 12 Steps lead us into relationship with a God
of our own choosing, of our own Understanding. In talking with Pia, one of the
beautiful messages she shared with me was her belief around the results of
growing yourself up in recovery, and developing a Functional Adult, that it is
actually connecting yourself with your own soul, and therefore the God within.
It has been my experience in recovery, that as I worked the Steps
in this program, that I got the sanity needed to pray only for the knowledge of
Gods will and the power to carry that out. The sanity to know that just running
on your own will might get you what you want, but sometimes getting what you want,
means having to now deal with the consequences of something that we did not
really need. Growing up, maturing in recovery, gives us access to that mature
understanding of delaying gratification as M. Scott Peck talks about, and
choosing our needs over just our wants. I cannot say I live by this all the
time, but I am grateful that I am not ignorant of this anymore. Carl Jung’s quote,
“”We have to make the unconscious conscious, otherwise it will direct our life
and we will call it fate” has stayed with me for a long time.
It’s the becoming aware, therefore being conscious , that Pia tells us in the Developmental Immaturity
Model is so essential for our success.
The program itself has given me the tools to on a daily basis
bring what’s in the shadows in my life, out into the light. Sometimes it has
taken me a lot longer than I have thought. Sometimes I have prayed, even though
I feel as though I am an atheist or agnostic. There is a lot to be said for “faking
it till you make it , and acting as if!”
So , today, 29 years clean, I have work to do, programs to write,
staff to speak to, and more importantly, new people to meet, who have just walked
into treatment today, reaching their hand out for the first time. Out of desperation.
The pain of remaining the same, finally getting more unbearable than the fear
of change. I remember that feeling well.
I am so grateful that we addicts and codependants do not have to suffer alone
anymore.
The first tape I ever heard in recovery was by a fellow called
Dean G. I have never met him, but I will never forget him. That tape got me
through many a hard night. He said when he first got to recovery he felt as
though he was being dragged behind a bus, and now years later, he feels as
though he has learnt to smile while he is being dragged.
I must say in 29 years, I have been dragged some, but I have done a
lot more smiling, even in hard times, than I did when I was lost in the
Darkness of active addiction.
