Hi my name is Lauri, I'm an addict. My clean date is 12.25.02 - coming up on 4 years! But it sort of feels like a lie because it took me so long to start really working the program honestly. I think I spent the first 18 months trying to save face. When I received my 18 month chip they asked me how I did it and I said "luck". I think that was the first completely honest thing I'd ever shared at a meeting. Not that it was easy staying clean. I went to alot of meetings - especially when I was stressed out, I stopped hanging w/ using buddies, I started socializing w/ women in the program, and my H.P. carried me A LONG WAY.
Ex: Right before I'd gotten clean I had hidden some paraphenalia, then right as I was getting clean I was moving so everything got packed up. After the dust settled I still had some boxes I hadn't unpacked yet and I hadn't come across it so I knew it was in the house. (One of the things I had done to try to manage my addiction was hide my stash from myself and it became a treasure hunt game for me to find it). I didn't search for it but I knew it was there. I talked to people in the program and planned on destroying it when I did come across it. One day a woman from the program was over and I went searching for a book, I didn't find the book because when I opened the first box that paraphenalia rolled out onto the floor. It was so hard to destroy this... there was so much resin in it I wouldn't have even had to scrape it to get high. If that woman wasn't there I don't think I would've returned to N.A. Hindesight is 20/20... H.P. at work there!
Anyway, it took me over a year to learn how to be honest enough with MYSELF to work the program. So do I shave 1.5 years off my clean date? But I love my clean date being Xmas. It IS such an enormous gift. To both me and my family.
Thanks!
Ex: Right before I'd gotten clean I had hidden some paraphenalia, then right as I was getting clean I was moving so everything got packed up. After the dust settled I still had some boxes I hadn't unpacked yet and I hadn't come across it so I knew it was in the house. (One of the things I had done to try to manage my addiction was hide my stash from myself and it became a treasure hunt game for me to find it). I didn't search for it but I knew it was there. I talked to people in the program and planned on destroying it when I did come across it. One day a woman from the program was over and I went searching for a book, I didn't find the book because when I opened the first box that paraphenalia rolled out onto the floor. It was so hard to destroy this... there was so much resin in it I wouldn't have even had to scrape it to get high. If that woman wasn't there I don't think I would've returned to N.A. Hindesight is 20/20... H.P. at work there!
Anyway, it took me over a year to learn how to be honest enough with MYSELF to work the program. So do I shave 1.5 years off my clean date? But I love my clean date being Xmas. It IS such an enormous gift. To both me and my family.
Thanks!
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Re: Hello... new here... do I change my clean date?
Sat, September 2, 2006 - 8:21 AMGoodness! Welcome. I was going to start out with this shaggy dog story about how we are all required to take a bus to a huge guilded tower where we are issued official clean and sober business attire and a "clean date" by counselors in white coats (..or, in Seattle, yellow rain slickers..). I'm gonna guess here. Where's your sponsor? A person with a little peace of mind on the inside and a sense of both humor and proportion on the outside that matches seriousness about the program can be a real asset. Part of the self-honesty is it's your clean date, no one else's. I had to 'revise mine by about 3 wks. when my head cleared enough to count..no hoo hoo. IMO, you didn't use. IMO your HP is likely the ONLY reason you didn't. Hmm. Sounds like Step 2 to me. The words, not the self-interpetation. This is a spiritually pragmatic program. I've found it works best if I stop analyzing it, my role in it , and tune out both my and my fellow addicts' neurotic brain chatter...laugh and forgive all the above ("We find we learn to laugh at ourselves..") and work the steps, while using some positive daily meditations. Be gentle and love yourself as the child of ...whatever it is for you...ODAT. -
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Re: Hello... new here... do I change my clean date?
Sat, September 2, 2006 - 10:48 AMwelcome lauri...your clean date technically is the day you stopped using physically. and yeah it is personal. so, if you feel you need to change it that's up to you...just realize if we waited to have mental, emotional or spiritual clean dates it could take some of us a lifetime...after all it;s progress not perfection on our path of personal growth.
we TRUDGE the road of happy destiny, not skip, dance or run. (AA's Vision for You)....
thanks for your sharing. -
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Re: Hello... new here... do I change my clean date?
Sun, September 3, 2006 - 5:41 PMI've just returned from a wknd work related convention and reread my post along with yours. I'm laughing at myself and feeling the love. Thanks so much.
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Re: Hello... new here... do I change my clean date?
Mon, September 25, 2006 - 5:20 PMLauri, I just joined today. I agreed with most people in recovery, the day after you quit is your first day of recovery. I don't celebrate june 5th, I celebrate June 6th, 1974. If I had to wait to have an anniversry subject to anothers opinion......... well, let's just say it would never happen! LOL.
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