recovery

An Open-and-Shut Case of Something or Other

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

Although I have been told that I have “loud” facial expressions, my pleading eyebrows were easy to ignore this morning. I guess my eyebrows were not loud enough.

My eyebrows were requesting conversational assistance … no, they were pleading for a rescue, stet.

One of the great parts of a life in recovery is the fact that I have a network of people with whom I can share some of my day-to-day difficulties. My friends in recovery remind me that there is really only one thing I need to understand: I am my only problem in my life. Anything that I feel is a problem is almost one hundred percent of the time a repercussion from me reacting to a person or situation as if it was the problem. My reaction is the problem, not the person or situation.
Read More

Getting By

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

I never fooled myself into believing that I was indispensable, but did I have to prove it so often to the world at large?

* * * *
There is a phrase one hears in recovery circles: “Pulling a geographic.” While sharing their stories about the past and the inebriated life, many addicts and alcoholics learn that they have done similar things, like move across the country because they thought that a change would do them good.

One of the things that many of us did, many times, when we were trying to exert control over life was run from it. Move. Sometimes across town and sometimes cross-country. There was nothing so bad it couldn’t be fixed without filling out a change-of-address card.
Read More

Hope Springs Internal

Posted on by Mark Aldrich

Doctor’s office, circa a few years ago.

I was sober for over a year at the time, but my life was still far from a day spent with a unicorn spitting candy as it carried me on golden highways that I thought some people were trying to convince me that their (new, sober) life is like. I had asked to see a therapist, and bureaucracy provided me with a pretty good one.
Read More