Shared from AA’s Big Book; beginning of part II, not numbered but before page 181 in the 4th edition.

“They stopped in time”.

How powerful is that to think and speak about?

I never really related to the readings in the beginning of Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book but the image above is me to the ‘T’.

I relate because those who knew me from the beginning of my drinking career to the bitter end didn’t think I had a drinking problem. I always compared my drinking to others and say “well at least I’m not like them” or “I’m not a maintenance drinker so I am just young and having fun and letting loose.”

The trajectory of my drinking and marijuana usage was a highway to nowhere good… Even sober, if I picked up a drink or drug again, the fire inside me would ignite and I would be done for. Because simply put, when I drink, I end up driving, and then I wreck my $40,000.00 car(s). God has been with me all this time protecting me but it took rock bottom, well, my rock bottom to finally say step 1: I am powerless over alcohol. My life has been unmanageable… for quite some time.

I feel as though I hit my stride with AA and treatment and college and my relationship and my family/home life. I don’t obsess as much over not being able to be “normal” anymore, I don’t care what my peers think of me as I continue on this sober journey. I do care what my sober peers think of me in regard to my sobriety solely because they help me keep sober; their experience, strength, and hope keeps me sober.

I mostly resonated with the last paragraph which states, “been saved years from infinite suffering…we didn’t wait to hit bottom because, thank God, we could see the bottom. Actually, the bottom came up and hit us…”

I feel this greatly because although I feel like my four days in jail was my bottom, but I know subconsciously that my bottom is yet to come. The power of yet’s. Yet’s are like potential energy in physics; they can start at any time but remain still until force acts upon it. This is not to say I am planning to go out to drink again, because logically and spiritually that would be dumb. But I can’t predict which hardship in my life might actually bring me out of recovery and back to where I left off. I pray that God grants me another sober day, but now at a week shy of nine months sober, I don’t have the compulsion or drive to drink/smoke but circumstances could one day shake that feeling.

That’s probably why the motto in meetings is “one day at a time” not “one lifetime at a time” because if I thought I couldn’t get fucked up for the rest of my life, I’d either start drinking or kill myself! But saying, “I can’t drink today or even for this hour” buys me some insurance so to speak as far as sobriety goes. Little bits on insurance and hours at a time sober have helped me work through my personal issues and my low self esteem.

I am currently on step 4 in AA which is “make a fearless and searching inventory of ourselves.” So basically you write down every wrong you’ve done and in the next step, you tell someone about it. I’ve been on step 4 for almost six months now and I am just now getting around to talking to the shitty committee (my brain) all of the toxic and bad things I’ve done and putting actual pen to paper.

There’s actually something to be said about blogging somewhat anonymously. 98.9% of you folks who read my posts have no idea who I am; I’ve shared things with you all that I wouldn’t tell my best lady friend if I had one. It gives me the ability to speak my mind like I would in my own diary and with hope that it reaches and touches you in a way that helps you on your journey. Or if you’ve been a Precarious Aquarian for the past five years you can read my posts and laugh/cry over the craziness that has happened in my life. And last but not least, you can say to yourself, “At least I am not Dani!”

…

It’s currently 10:16pm on a Friday night. I’ve been home all day which has been kind of nice, actually. Old Dani would be singing karaoke right now trying to bring home a hot date lmao. But I started my onboarding training on Monday the 6th for my new job. I have worked 22.5 hours this pay period and start my shadowing shift on Monday night 9pm-8am.

This week plus part of next week is midterms. I am passing all my classes minus one. But with my mental health issues with changing my medicine regimen from bipolar meds to bipolar schizoaffective meds but moods are wishy washy. I feel better with this Zyprexa but the side effects have gotten better the past week or so, but I’m constipated, my vision is fuzzy, and I have the shakes super bad unless I take hydroxyzine with all my other meds. The main concern is the fuzzy vision it looks like I’m looking through a microscope too close and all I see is a black dot in the center of my vision field. My eyes were just fine before I took zyprexa so I know that is causing this side effect.

I have my pcp appointment on Wednesday at 1pm to follow up about the med changes so I’ll leave it up to the doctor because I am dealing with it thus far but mostly because I mentally feel great; I have a generally positive affect, I am clear headed, no hallucinations, mostly no delusions. Most importantly I’m sleeping better and can stay awake the whole day without a nap! Now that I am starting this new job that is night shift, I’ll need my energy to do tasks and stay awake.

I had to drop my biology class today since Monday was the last day to drop classes without penalty. I thought Kyle would be mad at me but he saw my due diligence in all my other classes while going to meetings and treatment and doctor’s appointments for my mental health. He told me he was proud of me but now I feel ashamed and like I let him down. He told me he would pay for me to retake the course in summer or fall so I could earn my degree. I’m planning on passing my other four classes, but in order for me to have passed biology, I would have needed 40 hours per week dedicated to that class alone and it wasn’t feasible.

I’m trying not to dwell on the negative but now I can’t graduate this quarter which sucks.

Til next time.

Dani