Hope in the Darkness

“One day, you will find a home, and it won’t be a place, it will be a person. And you will be loved in spite of all the baggage and boxes you bring with you.”-Courtney Peppernell

There were people in my life who gave me kindness and wisdom. They shed a little light on the darkness. Some people judged and shamed me and took what little light I may have gained away. As an addict, I don't ever remember being proud of the label. I didn't wake up in the morning and say, "let me see how bad I can fuck this day up." I don't know many people who do.

Addiction is not a goal or a trophy for which you are training. It is a plague that seems to follow you forever, no matter what stage of life you are in. You are always aware that it is inside you, waiting to see when your weakness will win. Once it takes hold of you, It is a life sentence. It stays with you forever. You can silence it, but it never leaves you.

That is enough to make my stomach turn right now—the very thought of that truth. Another truth is that most people become addicted to substances because they are looking for an escape. Escape from some inner war of self-destruction we are sure we deserve. That moment when you get high, your hurt and shame are a little easier to carry. It is just temporary, though, and comes back ten-fold. That is why the addict is always chasing more.

For those of you who think we are taking the easy way out, it would help if you stopped reading this now. Your mind is not open enough to understand the unimaginable pain we live with every day and how much harder we have made the rest of our lives. Thank you for stopping by, though.

As I was saying, we already have no self-respect, self-love, and we overload ourselves with guilt and shame. When we are judged and made to be social outcasts, it is like shoving the next hit in our face.

Most rehabilitation centers do not work. You go for 30 days, dry out, and learn some chants. Or you meet better drug dealers than you had before. Your supporters and family may seem excited about the idea. More than likely, your relapse is on its way. That does not mean there is no hope. I'm getting to that. I want to take those who have never been in the trenches but try to understand it to those I have visited.

I have had periods of sobriety—long stretches of progress and also regression. Usually riding the fence halfway in recovery and halfway on the other side in addiction.

Recovery is hard. If you have ever begun the journey, you could never possibly understand the marathon of life it takes every single day to wake up and not let anybody down, including yourself. Words like rehab, recovery, addict all have a stigma to them that says "I'm fucked up and have problems," fucked up problems that should seem obvious enough that we don't have to state them. People want you to turn your life around; it's easy for them to overlook the simple fact that recovery is hard.

We have compromised our physical and mental health. Damaged and lost most of our significant relationships. We have no self-esteem, we are social outcasts, and it hinders our ability to have a job, house, etc. We find ourselves to be unacceptable and an outcast because the world sees us as such. The thing about recovery is that it's a journey with wrong turns and mazes bumps; no single road leads right to it. We usually have to travel down many of them double back, go the same route again, and see that same fork. But eventually, we will get it right. You can get it right. It is not without hope.

Although many circumstances influence a decision to change, there is an internal factor. That is when a person is ready to change, they will begin to change. I am a creature of habit. I wouldn't say I like change and upsetting the balance in my life. I get plagued with doubt when I change something. Familiar is safe even if it is destructive.

The main thing a person needs is support. It is hard for some to know the proper role in that. How do they handle the bumps in the road? Maintain peace of mind? You can expect anxiety, uncertainty expectation, disappointment, resentment, and emotional turmoil if you are a supporter. Does the question remain when we see the desired stable life?

There are always challenges as life unfolds. You can be filled with the hope of a better life one minute; then, the self-doubt creeps back in. Thoughts of being unreliable, deceitful, thoughtless. It always led to the same dark place in my mind: depression and anxiety.

Time to withdraw from everyone. They don't understand me anyway. Evasive silence, mood swings, hearing the person inside me tell myself how ugly and worthless I am. I am not deserving of their love or their understanding. A lost cause, I sink deeper into myself, and my guilt will hold me there. My shame will keep me from asking anyone to try. To try to love me. Why am I so unloveable?

I remain in constant turmoil with myself and the questions I have. Questions never get answered. Why has nobody been able to love me? Why can nobody hug me and tell me that I'm okay? Why can't I feel okay without a substance to say to me I am? I am left on my struggling to find an identity. A new attitude, behavior, all while holding my breath, waiting for someone to sum up their opinion of me and my failures. That is all it takes to send me spiraling back into the darkness. If you can't see more in me, how can I?

“Heal me long expected love, heal me that I may continue, renew, release, let me begin again without this fault that bears me down.”- Thorton Wilder (The angel that traveled the water)