“I am not what happened to me,
I am what I choose to become.”
I celebrated my first day of sobriety at age 34. I was at work at my Dad’s Chevrolet dealership, feeling hungover, and fighting to maintain.
He called to say he’d swing by to pick me up to have lunch. I tried hard to backpedal out of it, but he was unusually firm about having lunch together.
As Dad drove across town I sat in the passenger seat making small talk, my heart pounded - my voice screamed thoughts in my head.
When he answered that we were going to my sister Lynne’s house for lunch, the pounding morphed into panic!!!
I knew I was being driven to an intervention.
Lynne was absent from the room as Dad and I entered her kitchen.
Which was a good thing. In that moment, I felt only anger and resentment towards her for interfering and probably orchestrating this whole thing.
Later I would come to realize, the very determined actions and love of my older sister saved my Life that day.
Dad left the room when my mom came in.
Mom, sweet Mom, her face was tear stained and her expression of sad concern seem to lay heavy on her rounded shoulders. She looked small to me.
Alone with her in the kitchen I awkwardly asked her if she was okay, if something was wrong. My heart pounded in my chest. I couldn’t find my breath.
As I looked at my mother standing in front of me, feeling her concern, her emotional pain, my panic began to subside…
She said she was worried about me, that she felt so sad that I was so unhappy.
Together we stood at the sink gazing out the window in silence.
For just a moment, I felt stabilized by focusing on the manicured hedge that grew along the back fence in my sisters yard.
I tried to hold my stance of resistance. I desperately fought to remain stoic yet I felt my heart finally melt in the arms of my mother’s hug.
I surrendered the hard resolve that kept me fighting -furiously treading above the cess pool I’d been sinking in to.
I agreed to get help, to try this support program at Mercy Hospital.
My Dad drove while my mom and I sat together in the back seat. Riding in the car with my parents, I relinquished my control. I felt exhausted yet relieved to stop running.
I felt afraid of what was to come and strangely calm as if I were being led to my own execution. Resigned, I accepted there was no use to try to scheme on a new way to escape.
*******************
Mom and I sat in a small room together on a couch - me at one end, she sitting close by- though separate.
The guy asked me first about my general information and then delved deeper with his questions.
“Why was I here? What was my habit of drinking? What drugs did I take, how often, how much?”
He clicked off question after question. With Mom as witness and support, I heard myself answer honestly, the truth as I knew it.
Though numb and distant, I heard my answers about my drinking and then the specifics of my cocaine use.
I was aware of my Mothers presence with me, of her tremendous love and non-judgement.
At one point, I had a strong need to protect her from hearing any more though I continued to answer his questions honestly, indifferent, almost robot-like.
I emptied myself of my terrible burden, of the heaviness that had been crushing my heart for years.
Finally the guy, Dan was his name, (funny how I remember little details like that) said he had to step out and would be right back.
As the door closed behind him, I heard my Mothers voice, horse with emotion, say my name.
“Jani?”
Deflated and spent I slowly raised my head to meet her eyes. Her tears were brimming and flowing steadily down her face.
All these years later I can still hear her voice. I can still feel the hope in the loving gift she spoke to me that day.
“Jani, I have always been proud of you honey.
But I have never been more proud of you…than I am today.”
**************
That was the beginning of my sobriety, the first day of my new Life, May 19th, 1988.
After 30 days in-patient treatment, I came home to Evergreen. I awoke fragile and uncertain of who I was or how my Life might look going forward.
I went to my first AA meeting outside treatment. It was upstairs in the old log building in Marshdale. It felt surreal really, sitting in an AA meeting in my own town in a building I’d driven by hundreds of times. Until now I had been unaware of the little circular welcome plaque of AA posted on the side of the building.
But that had changed, I’d changed.
If fact nothing in my Life was ever going to be the same!
With committed daily intention and a grateful heart, I’ve learned to celebrate the truth - of what it was like, what happened, and what it is like now!
Today…
I practice loving and accepting myself just as I AM. The more I do this, the more I can love and accept you, just as you are.
I live one day at a time, recognizing that Life - all of Life - exists in the present. The past is over, nothing can change there except my attachment to it. The future has yet to be created.
I’ve learned there is no separation between God and me!
All my answers, direction and well-being live in the present - where God is.
I take responsibility for myself, my thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
I recognize I am solely responsible for co-creating the Life I want and for changing (specifically letting go) anything contrary to my highest good.
I know i am given guides, mentors, and teachers to travel with me in Life, to support me to stay on my right path, and to remind me
I am loved, worthy, and enough!
I practice Trust - in myself and in the truth and wisdom of my intuitive voice. That voice of my spirit spark is the Divine messenger within me.
I continue to practice the AA principles daily in my Life.
Not in the consciousness of a newbie, a beginner on this journey,
but as a way of Life,
a way of Being.
I remind myself to live in gratitude.
I know All is Well!
Life is God’s greatest gift to this spiritual being having a human experience,
Each time I breathe in and breathe out,
I let it be so…