AA

I dragged along one of my friends to my first AA meeting.  By this time, I'd begun to share with a few of my closest of friends.  The non-judgemental ones.  Added in the rest of my small group members Responses were surprisingly supportive.  In fact, my honesty seemed to create a certain respect and understanding with those I told.  Though none of them had resorted to illegal drug use, my frustrations as a stay-at-home mom were well known to them.  Coping skills come in a multitude of forms - many of us not embracing the healthiest of them.

My good friend was not in need of giving up alcohol - she was a closet smoker.  And like my street drug usage, she felt the same shame.  She'd been secretly attending a 12 step progam - Smoker's Anonymous - but had not yet been able to gain the strength to put the sticks down.  She said she'd be more than honored to attend my first meeting with me.

I still remember walking into that goverment building basement where the meeting was held.  Friday night girls meeting.  I didn't know what to expect.  Were they all a bunch of losers?  A bunch of liars and criminals and washed out drunks?  Would I find any commonality there?

To this day, I call them my party gals.  My wild child(s).  They were of varying ages, but mostly younger.  Little rebels.  Crazy, rockin' hair and clothes.  Some of them open lesbians.  They spoke honestly.  They said FUCK.  They were living life as I'd hoped to live one day- boldly.  Without excuses.  Caring, open and loving....but a daringness to be who they were.  They even had a group that went down to the local bar and grill after the meeting - to drink soda and order up appetizers!  I was stunned people could be that "on the edge" and have fun - but without a drink or drug!

I'm not sure I'd seen that on my first night there....but that is my memory of them.   How awesome for that to have been my first introduction to AA.

It was November, so the meeting centered around the 11th step - prayer and meditation.  I raised my hand to introduce myself and share.  Listening to others do the same, I wasn't sure how I'd introduce myself to them.  I wasn't an alcoholic.  What was I?  Why was I here?

"Hi, I'm Lauren.  I'm an meth amphetamine addict and am choosing not to drink right now."  Guess that covers it.

I told them a short version of what I felt in my heart.  I could see God's work and presence in my life.  Even when I was resisting Him - He's always been there.  when I'd been most resistant in my past, it's been the people that He's placed in my life that have helped me open my eyes.(as I squeezed my friend's hand).  Even to the extent of Mary (my supplier); of course He didn't will my meth use, but I know that befriending her specifically helped me to see.  The spiraling down of my usage, the dynamics of our friendship through her neediness, and my feelings of commonality with her, were the BILLBOARD I needed to help me see/understand.  I was sure then that there had been numerous times that He'd knocked on my door, perhaps even LEANED on the doorbell!  With my own busy-ness going on in my head, however, and the denial of all my negative feelings, I was able to block out the incessant nuisance at the front door.

I'd been able to recount a number of miracles that I was sure had occured over the past month:

• just 4 days after turning up empty handed, the topic in our small group being temptation.  Reading words about secrets harming you and needing to open up to someone you can be accountable to.
• The group being held at our house - comfort in a very uncomfortable situation
• Jeanette's monopolization of the meeting with my very own story.  Needing that monopolization to identify it in myself.
• Dana's seemingly intuitive action of lining up the chain on the cross
• My brother's family visiting for the first time in over 4 years THAT very WEEK - and this timing allowing me to be able to see the commonality between us.  How we cater to our spouses and deny feelings of unhappiness.
• The doc just happening to have Sherry's card when we were discussing his fears of my relapsing.
• Sherry just happening to be exactly the person I'd been looking for.  That strange immediate connection and genuine mutual fondness.  The immediate feeling of support and forgiveness even though she was harping on the same theme of giving up alcohol.
• Fleet just happening to be flexible enough with his schedule that he could allow my busy husband a later appointment.  And that even though he was a recovering alcohol/drug addict, (a failed soul in Jim's eyes) was someone who was intelligent enough - yet frank and warm enough - to capture not only Jim's "doctor" side, but my own needs as well.
• In the short amount of time that I'd met Sherry and took the evaluation - going from an attitude of NO FUCKING WAY would I give up alcohol when it wasn't the problem to acknowledging that it was a problem NOW and being able to actually visualize what my life would look like without it in the future.
• That, by opening up to a dear friend, she could surprisingly open up about her own issues with addiction and attend my very first AA meeting with me, giving me support in a scary "first" situation, while giving continued support back to her with her own issues.
• That that first meeting was full of these bold rebels, speaking with garingly harsh reality.  Exactly what I admired in a person.  And people from all walks of life.  One of them was a female doctor.  
• In the meditation book that I'd picked up from Central Services just the other day, there was a page folded down when I'd brought it home. "An element of recovery", it said, "is learning that we deserve success, the good things that come to us, and also that pain is a reality.  We have the strength to deal with that pain without medicating, and it will pass."  What I most needed to hear in starting out this journey: I was worthy of uncompromising happiness and that all pain was temporary.
• On the day that I first recognized my anger with Jim, at the time for making me feel like I HAD to give up alcohol, the meditation book read, "Because society would rather we always wore a pretty face, women have been trained to cut off anger."  Yes!  Affirmation!
• In my first full day of complete sobriety, both clean AND sober - feeling the acceptance and sadness of it all, the reading on that day read, "Life has got to be LIVED - that's all there is to it.  In recovery, I would say the advantage is that you take time more calmly.  You know that, this too shall pass."  Affirmation that I had a full life to live - with all of its joy and sorrows.  That the pain I'd go through to get there would be over soon.
• That despite Jim's worst fears of betrayal from his most beloved, he'd overcome his disgust in having a street drug abuser as his wife, his feelings that I was the problem, and performed a complete 180 to be supportive and go into treatment with me.

There was no doubt in my mind that all of this was divine.  How could it not be?  All this in such a short time?  All those variables coming together at one time.  Like I said, He may knock many a time in our lives - surely He had in mine.  But I needed all of this TOGETHER - like the sledgehammer to the side of my head - in order for me to answer the door.

Perhaps its also a miracle I did.

Some never do.