11 years sober🥳

My anniversary is next week Monday, May 15th 2012. I’m telling my story at an AA meeting in front of who knows how many people. It honestly doesn’t matter, because if I forget where I came from, I’m dead. I see these crazy videos of people on fentanyl nodded out in some bent over position and it freaks me the F out. It’s literally like looking at zombies. 🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒 It is so gut wrenching to think people are still stuck in that hell. And I have to remember if I don’t share the gift that’s been so freely given to me my misery can always be refunded. I have to remember first and foremost I have a disease that is still trying to kill me. So If I can help someone else and give back a fraction of what I’ve been given, it’s worth it to break my anonymity. 😽😻😹😺😸😽😻😹😺😸😽😻😸😺😹😻😽😹 I grew up in an Irish Catholic family. There was high intelligence on both sides, as well as mental illness, alcoholism, and being gay. I got all of it. It's a lot, and family drama is part of it. I blocked a lot of it out until I was 8, and that coincidentally was when my parents decided to get a divorce. 🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈 Some of my earliest memories are of hiding an alcohol bottle from my mom in the garage trash can and her being really angry and yelling "where is it?”. Also visiting her in hospitals and rehabs when she had attempted suicide and needed shock treatments for her depression. 😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿😿 She was my world, and I was a momma’s girl from the start. Luckily we had my older sister by 5 years who took care of my twin sister and myself. I do remember my sister calling my dad having to come get us when my mom had been driving drunk with us. What I can remember were a lot of fearful situations where I had to be on high alert. 🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉🦉 Luckily my dad had gotten sober in AA when we were babies, and was able to be the level headed leader my family needed to help my mom. Through God’s grace, my mom also started in AA when we were 7 and it saved her life where nothing else had really worked. The drugs they had for mental illness in the 80s when I was growing up were terrible, and she was often really fragile even after she was sober for another good 5 years. 🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂 I remember when we started going to AA and what a relief it was to start to see my mother get better and be surrounded with people who could really help. Her sponsor Joan Hatt, was an angel, and a really strong lady. Not too long after my parent’s sat us down and told us they were getting a divorce. I just remember being so shocked because I had never seen them fight. I don’t know why I remember it being a relief on some level. 🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️🏞️ Deep down I always had this level of anxiety and sensitivity from the earliest I could remember. I felt like I wasn’t given a protective skin like maybe the rest of the world got. I was always told to stop being so sensitive and overreacting. It was really strange too because my identical twin sister seemed to have it where I didn’t. It made me really tuned into the people around me and their reactions. That way I could know how to protect myself. 🌍🌎🌏🌍🌎🌏🌍🌎🌏🌍🌎🌏🌍🌎🌏🌍🌎🌏 The first place I really found some escape was in books. It stopped all the thinking and gave me peace to be able to escape somewhere. I read all night long pretty often when I could, especially in middle school when my anxiety really got bad. I started having panic attacks then as well, I just didn’t know that’s what they were at the time. Another source of love I so desperately needed was animals, where I felt so much unconditional love. 🐱🐶🐱🐶🐱🐶🐱🐇🐕🐇🐕🐇🐕🐇🐕🐇🐕🐇 I also really liked our catholic school. Which I know is really strange to hear. It felt like structure and love, something I never really had at home. It was predictable and there were adults who had some extra energy to spare. Both my parents worked in the medical profession, and now being a nurse myself I understand how completely physically and mentally draining it is. To have extra for your family can be difficult. They both worked full time, and we had a lot of babysitters, nannies, and afterschool care. 🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚🦚 When I was in catholic school for 8 years, I always had a really hard time understanding why kids could be so cruel to one another. I often wanted to hang out with the boys which wasn’t allowed, but would get most upset when they would pick on the so-called “dorky kids”. I remember defending them and getting the nickname, “sister Megan” which I hated. 🏀🥎🏐🏀🥎🏐🏀🥎🏐🏀🥎🏐🏀🥎🏐🏀🥎🏐 Sports were also really important because I found something I could be good at and get the attention and praise I longed for at home. I had enough of catholic school and went to a public high school. 🥇🥇🥇🥇🏆🏆🏆🥇🥇🥇🏆🏆🏆🥇🥇🥇🏆🏆 It was very shocking the first day in class I got offered weed and alcohol. I couldn’t believe it. I was pretty sheltered at catholic school, never even had a boyfriend. I remember also having dreams about making out with girls, and waking up and shaming myself saying “no that should be a boy." 🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆🙆 In the 80s no one talked about mental health, trauma, and being gay was really looked down upon. There was no way I would ever admit to that, it’s still difficult now growing up in that environment where it was such a shameful thing to be. 🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈 Once my mother was better, my older sister started having a lot of issues. I remember telling my mom she was sneaking out the window all the time, and she didn’t have the energy to deal with it. She was newly sober and still really depressed. I really felt my sister going downhill and had no idea how to stop it. She was expected to be an adult and I remember my mom even sending her to pick us up from school when she didn’t have a driver's license. 🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚗🚗🚗🚗🚙🚙🚙🚙🚙🚗🚗🚗🚗 We were that family, where everyone knew what a mess we were. A lot of times we’d get to school without breakfast and the school secretary would have to make us peanut butter and jelly. Or when we wore the wrong clothes to school on fridays and would have to sit in the office when everyone else went to church. ⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪⛪ All the other moms seemed to be so involved. And our mom was sending her newly sober strange friends from AA to pick us up from school. So it was such a relief to get to a large high school where everyone didn’t know us. 🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭🎭 It got worse in middle school, when my sister was on the front page of the paper for hitting someone with her car when she was drunk and leaving the scene. She got caught and thankfully the man survived. It was pretty traumatic to see the car in the garage where the man’s head broke the windshield. She had to go into a locked rehab program, and we’d visit on the weekends. It was like visiting my mom all over again, but not with my big sister who I idolized. 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️ Our dad had met someone, as well as our mom and we had new stepparent to add into the mix. I just remember feeling so depressed and my dad’s new house with his new wife who didn’t know how to deal with his “wild and emotional” children. She would get upset with us and lock herself in her bedroom for the weekends we would visit. 🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️🏝️ My twin sister and I were constantly fighting and it was really hard for outsiders as well as our family to deal with. We were so competitive and had all these feelings we didn’t know what to do with. Also having boundaries, manners, and understanding what was and was not acceptable behavior. We had to kind of figure things out for ourselves and I remember when my twin started to correct me for not saying please and thank you at the age of 12. I never remember being taught that before then. 👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪👪 Our new stepdad was also newly sober and home with us a lot when our mother was working. He thought he’d come in and tame these wild twins of our mother. That didn’t happen and at one point he threw a hair dryer at Katy’s head out of frustration leaving a mark in the door. Also ripping my shirt when I was trying to leave to go to the bookmobile. We expected to be rescued by our dad from our mom’s new husband who had trouble controlling his temper with us, and he told us he didn’t want to get involved. 😼😼😼😼😼😼😼🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀🙀 Luckily our mom came to her senses and ended the marriage finally realizing his true colors. He would ground us from our games in middle school when he got upset with us and our mom would allow it. It was terribly embarrassing to tell the coach we couldn’t play games. 💔💔💔💔💔❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹 Right before we went into high school they separated. I remember having nightmares for years about him coming back into our lives. He would take me alone on these fishing trips and tell me inappropriate things like I wish you were my wife at age 13. It was very difficult to know how to handle that or even realize how wrong that was. Our dad was also scared of him and his anger which would become explosive to him at times. 🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌛🌜🌜🌜🌜🌜🌜🌜🌜 On top of that was my mom talking badly about our dad and his new wife and expecting us to take sides. Packing our bags every other weekend to go to our dads is still a weird habit I have today where it feels strange to be in one place consistently without taking trips. ✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨ High school was a positive experience, just like catholic school had been. The structure, adults, and praise really built my self esteem and helped me feel like I matter. I scored really high on the entrance intelligence tests and was put in honors classes where I felt really smart. I got involved in sports and received a lot of praise getting on the varsity team my freshman year. I cared so much about school and sports and did really well. ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍 But it was when I went to my first party and had my first sip of alcohol where I finally got some relief. I loved how it made all the noise in my head stop, and not feel so afraid all the time. From the first time I drank I binge drank. The feeling in my body when the alcohol level started to dip down made me feel 10 times worse and I had to feed it to feel what I initially did. I became promiscuous when I drank and happened to make out with a guy who loved spreading gossip of what he did to “Mrs. Perfect.” 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️ I didn’t like the embarrassment or consequence of it, but there was no way I was going to stop doing it on the weekends. We were so lucky it was not a time when they put kids in jail, but would let them off with a warning. I grew up in a mid size town where the cops were nice and we were all white kids so there was that privilege although no one knew that word at the time. 🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾🧾 My dad had a list of all the crazy things we did and high school and it was either go to counseling or boarding school. I chose counseling. I don’t remember much but I didn’t like it. I had liked the counselor in middle school, but in high school with my drinking I didn’t like it as a punishment. My dad and stepmom sat in a session with me and told me I stood up and told the counselor, I’m not going to stop drinking and you can’t make me, and walked out. I guess my addiction was a little stronger than I even thought. They started giving me the “Acceptance is the Answer” story to read. It went over my head. I didn’t think I had a problem. 🎮🕹️👾🔫🎮🕹️👾🔫🎮🕹️👾🔫🎮🕹️👾🔫🎮🕹️ I managed to keep my grade up and do sports until I went to Orlando my senior year and tried Ecstacy and found the “rave scene.’ Instantly that’s all I wanted to do and the years I had spent traveling around the country on my weekends being recruited for college volleyball did not matter anymore. I instantly gave up my dreams to “party”. And that’s all that seemed important for the next 7 years. My drinking would progress into blackouts in college, and that was scary. 🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮🔮 I was also in the car two different times when my friends got DUI’s so it’s a miracle I didn’t get more hurt. I also started getting myself into situations in college where I was date raped. I can remember 4 different occasions, 2 where I was drugged by fraternity guys(Sigma Chi) and in a blackout at UCF, and 2 others where I was date raped. 💚💙💜💚💙💜💚💙💜💚💙💜💚💙💜💚💙💜 I was pretty naive and thought guys had good intentions. I didn’t know not to get myself into situations where I had physical difficulty getting away, or to watch my drink closely. Also because I had difficulty making close connections with women, I never had anyone to really watch my back. It was a relief when my twin came to my college my junior year and I had someone to watch me closer. 💗💓💞💗💓💞💗💓💞💗💓💞💗💓💞💗💓💞 I started having safer relationships with people I drank with and joined a business fraternity Alpha Kappa Psi, where people were more motivated by school and a good influence. My first two years I was part of the sorority/fraternity scene and it only fueled my alcoholism. I joined the fraternity and my nickname was ‘wild child’ for how I drank. I always binge drank, and usually had trouble controlling my behavior. ⛷️🏂🪂⛷️🏂🪂⛷️🏂🪂⛷️🏂🪂⛷️🏂🪂⛷️🏂🪂 I met a really nice guy in the fraternity who was getting his master’s in accounting. He was really sweet and liked me, but I went to the Bahamas and was drugged. The girl who still liked him saw what happened and reported back to him. I have no recollection. 🍄🍁🍂🍄🍁🍂🍄🍁🍂🍄🍁🍂🍄🍁🍂🍄🍁🍂 I went to the Bahamas with my friends who were dating guys from the Sigma Chi fraternity and they had bottles of GHB. My sweet boyfriend ended our relationship when I told him I couldn’t remember what happened. I really couldn’t and it was so frustrating not knowing what happened there. 🌻🏵️💮🌻🏵️💮🌻🏵️💮🌻🏵️💮🌻🏵️💮🌻🏵️💮 I also had my first female relationship, and healthy relationship with a man in that fraternity. I remember thinking I just needed a friend to date, because I was so scared after all my sexual assaults. The business fraternity and getting into my major really helped me get on track and I am so thankful. One weekend I went to see my best friend in Tampa. 💐🌹🥀💐🌹🥀🌹🥀🥀💐🌹🥀💐🌹🥀💐🌹🥀 We partied and a man who was a leader nationally in AKPsi told me he’d take me back to her house. He took me to his apartment in St Pete for a drink instead and wouldn’t let me leave. I must have said the word no a hundred times and to take me home. Afterwards he took a shower, cleaned himself up and had no concern for me. 😣😩😫😣😩😵😣😩😫😣😩😫😣😩😫😣😩😫 I told him on the way home he raped me and should remember that I said No and he wouldn’t listen. I had to tell my healthy relationship what happened. It was horrendous hurting him even though I was raped. It was someone he knew too, and we all had looked up to. The rapist called later to ask if my story had changed and I told him it hadn’t. He was scared but I never thought to call the cops because I knew him. 😥😢☹️😥😢☹️😟😥😢☹️😟😥😢☹️☹️😟😥😢 I moved in with that good guy after college. He had a bad car accident and was not able to work. I was not a nice girlfriend about it, and treated him pretty poorly. I was irritable a lot, and pretty cruel. I was never able to make my amends to him despite seeing him with his new wife because it could have caused more harm. He was a soothing balm and helped me restore my faith in men. 😏😌☺️😏😌☺️😏😌☺️😏😌☺️😏😌☺️😏😌☺️ After college I didn’t want the party to stop so I went to grad school thinking it wouldn’t. I remember being shocked that people were growing up and getting married. Where were the good times? I met a boyfriend who was an artist and smoked weed every day. I started smoking weed often and it became really important. 🫐🍇🥥🫐🥥🍇🫐🥥🍇🫐🥥🍇🫐🍇🥥🫐🍇🥥 I had my first teaching job and was smoking every night after work. I became addicted, and he also introduced me to cocaine and benzodiazepines. I was in my early 20s. I made really poor decisions like smuggling drugs for him out of Mexico when he sent me money, but did them all before I could send them back to him. He was really angry. 🧁🍭🍿🧁🍭🍿🧁🍭🍿🧁🍭🍿🧁🍭🍿🧁🍭🍿 When the drugs came into the mix, things became a lot more scary. My original addiction was to people. My twin specifically, but when she wasn’t around a boyfriend. I now needed this man to feel better, and he had an unlimited trust fund from his mom’s death. It was not a good mix. 🤨🧐🤨🧐🤨😒🤨🧐🤨😒🤨😒🤨🧐🤨🧐🤨🧐 We moved in together, and I found out he had a cutting problem. It scared me, and we broke up for 6 months where he found a psychiatrist to prescribe him more pills. The need for drugs brought me back to him. I was also hopelessly addicted to him. We were quite a pair. 🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒🤕🤒 I got a job in New Smyrna Beach as a guidance counselor, but he was out looking for cocaine the first time we went there. It was easy to look at him as the sicker one, and not focus on myself. He refused to leave the house, and just moving to a new town I met other friends. It made me angry he couldn’t even be social in our new town. So I drifted away. He was up all night smoking pot and doing drugs, and I had to work in the mornings. Eventually I told him that I wanted to break up, and later that day stayed out all night finding comfort elsewhere. 🌺🌷🌸🌺🌷🌸🌺🌷🌸🌺🌷🌸🌺🌷🌸🌺🌷🌸 He was in a rage when I came home, and held me down. I was really scared and called the cops. He left his stuff in the house and when I found his backpack I had no idea how many drugs he was on. It was filled with everything and he had even gotten into opiates which I didn’t know at the time. I didn’t have compassion for mental illness and probably was triggered by the behavior which was very similar to my moms growing up when she was newly sober and couldn’t get out of bed. 🏖️🌅🌊🏖️🌅🌊🏖️🌅🌊🏖️🌅🌊🏖️🌅🌊🏖️🌅🌊 His dad got involved and he had to move back home where his addiction got a lot worse. Six months later he died of an overdose, and it rocked me to my core. I became suicidal and thought it was my fault for having no compassion for all he was going through. ☔🌧️🌩️⛈️☔🌩️🌩️⛈️☔🌧️🌩️⛈️☔🌧️🌩️⛈️☔🌧️ I was smoking pot daily and had begun drinking during the week as well as weekends with my new boyfriend who had a drinking problem and liked to get physical when he got drunk. We moved in together, and it was not good. He taught me to drink pitchers and it was hard to keep a job. 🌬️🌀🌪️🌬️🌪️🌬️🌀🌪️🌬️🌀🌪️🌬️🌀🌪️🌬️🌀🌪️🌬️ At first it was hiding behind a door and having to call the cops, then he flipped the mattress when I was on it. Eventually it turned into him trying to break my wrist for telling him how to drive my car and putting my hands on the steering wheel. I knew I had to get away, but was so hooked on him emotionally I did not feel physically able. 🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌🌠🌌 I began to take jobs further away from Port Orange to put some distance between us thinking I could slowly break the attachment that way. It helped some, but I always went back. I did this for years and felt like I was going to die without him. One day I had to take the morning after pill and it caused me to have my first psychotic break. I thought Satan was coming after me, and things were crawling on the walls. It was terrifying. 👹👺🔥👹👺🔥👹👺🔥👹👺🔥👹👺🔥👹👺🔥 He was there to help me and tried to help me not get Baker Acted, eventually I did. They had me on massive amounts of antipsychotics, and nothing was touching me. Probably from the years of smoking pot, and drinking. I had gotten really bad asthma, and at one point thought i was dying and my dad was coming to rescue me in a helicopter on the roof. The nurses had put me in a solitary room without an inhaler and I probably needed oxygen. 👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀👮🧑‍✈️🧑‍🚀 It was really hard coming back from that. My twin was so helpful to help me back to sanity. I remember getting too close to people and making them uncomfortable. Katy would tell me what I was doing and help me read other people's body language. Eventually I got better but the drinking and medication made me gain a lot of weight that I’ve still had trouble getting off. I found a high paying job in sales when I was better. 👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯👯 It introduced me to a whole group of people that had access to cocaine. My addiction to this got pretty bad, and I started needing it every weekend to feel ok. I had my first and second girlfriends relationships that mostly centered around doing drugs and alcohol together. My addiction had gotten pretty bad where I was doing things I didn’t recognize to get more cocaine. I was up to being able to do an 8 ball by myself in a night. 🌝🌞🌜🌝🌞🌜🌝🌞🌜🌝🌞🌜🌝🌞🌜🌝🌞🌜 It was around this time I was approached by a man who was asking for money in a parking lot who was really young and attractive. I had gotten used to being treated poorly by men at this point. My bar was pretty low. He came to my house downtown and wouldn’t leave. My twin had had enough of my addiction and poor choices and decided to go to the Czech Republic for 6 months to probably get away from me. She found she couldn’t do anything to help me anymore and it must have been so frustrating. I would be really mean to her when we would go out downtown and would be in a black out. I can remember very vividly one night when the bar was closing and I was already extremely drunk asking why did I need to drink more. The bar was closing and I was drinking Long Island Iced Teas like I was going to die. She didn’t understand the pain I felt when the alcohol would wear off and I would have to come down. She would always be the designated driver because she knew I was not able to control my drinking like she could. So once my sister had enough and left, I was heartbroken. I remember being very mad at her for leaving me because it felt like I really needed her and she was abandoning me. There was a moment where I remember wanting to show her how bad I could get to get back at her for leaving. The man I met was the perfect person for that. He started talking about how much he loved heroin all the time. He introduced me to two of his friends who had connections to get these and cocaine regularly. I never tried it with him, and he got arrested for stealing from a liquor store. I went back to grad school because I was unable to work, and had always been good at school. It came easy to me. Especially with classes I was interested in. I still loved to read the textbook I was interested in as well as journal articles about subjects I could use to write a good papers. I was even published in a diversity journal. I remember during the breaks from class having to go in the bathroom to do cocaine so I could focus. I was a horrible group partner, and no one wanted me to work with. I’m pretty sure they knew something wasn’t right. Once this boyfriend was in jail, one of his friends started asking me to hang out. He had a bad heroin problem and kept asking me to buy him some when he got sick. I had a crush on him, and felt bad because he looked so miserable. So I’d buy him drugs to feel better with my loan money. At one point I got tired of always buying it for him, and wanted to try it. He always looked so happy afterwards. He did it IV but I wanted no part of that. He said you could also snort it. So one day I did. It was the first time ever that everything was quiet in my head and my body wasn’t scared. I could actually breathe and wasn’t terrified as usual. It was amazing and I thought this must be how normal people feel and get stuff done. What I had felt with alcohol was very similar, but the heroin felt like the perfect key to quiet the storm. I started to do it with him regularly. I remember him saying if you didn’t want to get sick you couldn’t do it for more than 3 days. I couldn’t ever stop myself on that 3rd day, just like the alcohol and I started to get sick. I was introduced to sicker and sicker characters. It really was like being introduced to hell on earth. One day one of his friends came to town, her name was Megan too. I wanted him to like me the way he did her. I was pretty sure he didn’t because of all the weight I had gained from the psych meds and alcohol. I thought that we could bond and he would like me if I did the IV with him, she asked him to shoot me up. He didn’t want to but did anyway. It was the literal gateway to hell. Once my brain received that strong of a dose, it didn’t want less. It was awful the people and things I would do to get more. It was a literal out of body experience where I would watch myself in these crazy situations but couldn’t stop myself. I started hanging out in the hood with drug dealers with guns on their laps and really thought they were my friends. I even took one of my friends from college to this crack house to introduce her to my all black guy friends. They could only get me cocaine, and I wanted heroin too. I was delusional. At one point during A&M weekend II was cut off and told to go home. A friend introduced me to a house of drug dealer hispanic guys who lived on OBT near the strip clubs. I started going there to get my drugs because I didn’t need someone telling me no. They became my new suppliers. They didn’t care if I lived or died. I would get stuff from them earlier in the day and be back driving a few hours later another 45 minutes. I didn’t want to go, but I couldn't stop myself either. The drugs were in control. . My twin sister came back from the Czech Republic and we moved into a house in a rough neighborhood near a trailer park on Bonneville Dr. I was significantly worse and she started finding spoons and needles all over the house under cushions. I wasn’t well enough to hide it. We were sharing a car and she was still in grad school. She couldn’t concentrate with me bringing my druggie friends over. One of them moved in and she had no say in it. She had enough and moved out. Since we shared a car it started making things more difficult. She told her new roommates how bad I was and the rest of my extended family as well. She didn’t know what to do to help me and was really frustrated. My dad started having dreams about me dying and having to go to my funeral with my twin sister. This luckily was before fentanyl, or I surely would have been dead already. I came over to get the car and her new roommates had heard stories about me. My sister wouldn’t let me in so I knocked on the window and tried to get in to get my keys. She called the cops on me. They arrested me for trespassing, but I started to have a panic/asthma attack and they took me to the hospital instead. I left through the side door and went home. I had stopped thinking about things like paying my insurance and my license was suspended and they removed my tag. I started stealing my twins license. One day without a tag, I had grad school class. I thought since I lived 3 blocks from campus I could make it to the parking garage and back in. I got pulled over when coming on to campus by the stadium. I gave them Katy’s Id, but the car was in my name. The cops from the apartment I had gotten out of showed up. They said oh we know her. The jig was up and I was arrested. When I got to jail I was legitimately scared of myself and what I would do next. I asked my mom to leave me there, I thought how long could it possibly take to get out on a minor charge when the judge in the jail had dropped it being my first offense. I would have gotten sick and was given withdrawal medicine for 7 days. I knew a lot of the women there from OBT. I went to an AA meeting in the jail and started crying when I read I was powerless and my life was unmanageable. That's how I felt wanting to stop but not being able to. I was hearing God pretty clearly that I was close to death and wouldn’t be getting many more chances. It was strange when you're so close to death, how clear God’s voice can be. We had always been close even during the addiction, I would bring my sick friend to church with drugs in my pocket bribing him to go with me and we could get high after. My twin got the pastor of this church to pray for me and give me a life recovery bible and I still read it everyday. I feel its power when I open it and it’s literally a life line. I moved over to the recovery wing of the jail to start going to meetings and get help. On the 8th day when I started to get really sick from withdrawal I called my mom to get me out. She had offered right when I got in. The part that makes me sick is that my dogs were in the house for multiple days without anyone coming to get them because no one knew. It’s somewhat fuzzy but I was convinced I had to get better but continued to relapse multiple times. I would tell my big sister to take my needles and drugs so I couldn’t go back. And I would still be doing it in a weak moment. I had to change my phone number about 7 times because each time I relapsed I’d give my drug dealer my phone number and he’d start calling. Eventually my mom had enough and told me I had to go to rehab or be out on the streets. Coincidentally she had gotten hopeless that I would ever stop as well. When I saw that in her eyes that she gave up, it was a definite bottom. She had always fought for me but now my mom and my sisters gave up hope for me. It really scared me. I went to detox, and then rehab. It was not ideal, but I stuck it out for 45 days. They gave me the discipline and tools I needed to stay sober. They had me pray and read the bible every morning, and I still do that every day. When I stopped drinking and using drugs my mood swings improved dramatically. I also found out that my mental health issues have more to do with depression and anxiety. I do take mental health medications, but more as a preventative. I have not had any other issues with seeing things and really do feel that had a lot to do with what I had done to my brain with years of alcohol and drugs. I also was smoking weed every day for at least 5 years and it is a hallucinogenic combined with the huge surge of hormones with the morning after pill which I’ve always been really sensitive to. When I got out of rehab, I went to a meeting and got assigned a sponsor at 7 months. She got me into service right away and it was what I needed to get involved and not just take from the meetings. I started chairing and gained some confidence. I found young people to hang out with and do fun things late at night like I was used to. I was 29 when I first started coming in 2009, and relapsed until 2012. It just took that long for me to give up my way and try something different. I had to really get my ego out of the way and stop acting like I knew everything because I had all these master’s degrees. I sure as shit didn’t know how to be sober, and had to be humble and beat up enough to listen to someone else. To know how bad my way was working out and to trust someone else enough to do the steps. My first 5th step was incredibly helpful as removing a lot of the shame and burden. Also showing me my patterns that I kept repeating that kept me relapsing. I also had to have enough pain to be motivated to do the steps to get out of it. I kept having to start over with new sponsors for trust issues with women, and not trusting anyone in an authority position after not being able to trust my parents growing up. I did multiple 5th steps and they helped peel back all the layers. It wasn’t till I was 4 years sober I found a sponsor that wouldn’t let me give up till I was through all the steps. The major changes to my peace of mind and life didn’t happen till after I did the 8th amends step. Until I was willing to go to any length and humble myself to have these major talks I didn’t get all the way better. I was running from a bear who I let become so scary. I had to realize that I just had to face it and do uncomfortable things to get better. The amends with my dad was a huge one. Just sitting down with him and facing a big part of what had been driving my anger and resentment was huge. We got closer and I got to see he was just another flawed human like myself. I did multiple amends to my sisters and mom. I still have to do them, as I still have defects that need to be removed. My job is to stay honest and continue to look at myself and grow my relationship with my higher power. I found that I still have adrenaline issues and expect God to be big and booming. Its usually a still small voice that I have to acknowledge, connect with, and ask to hear. Sometimes it’s just gut feelings and knowing. That sensitivity turns out to be a gift most days. I understand a lot of what people are feeling from this gift, and it helps me be in tune with others and my own feelings. I have to continue to go to meetings to hear what I was like and give hope to the newcomer. They give me hope as well because in that new sobriety is where it’s so obvious God is working. The changes that couldn’t be accomplished by just ourselves are so obvious to see especially to those around us. It’s really miraculous to watch and be part of. I’ve sponsored women and it’s been an incredible experience. A lot of people die, but in their deaths it reminds me to go on and how lucky I am. Sobriety is really a gift that has to be treasured. I’ve known a lot of people who had really strong programs they still died and no one knows why. It’s like alcoholism and addiction, why do I have it what’s the reason I have it and my twin doesn’t. It’s just something I had to let go of and accept I’ll never know. Same with my good friends who have died, why them and not me. Why do I get to stay sober and they tried so hard and don’t. If feels not fair at times to have to do a lot of spiritual work daily to just be ok. But when I step back I can see even that is a gift, so many people don’t need God. They don’t know the peace and love. It’s incredible to experience whenever I choose to ask for it. A literal energy accessible to anyone who asks and wants it bad enough. The first time I made contact was like that. I had to get really angry and really want it. It was in college I was like your so big and bad, master of the universe, show yourself. I saw a bright flash of light, if you don’t believe me just try it….see what happens. It’s the best high you’ve ever had or could ever have. And it’s free and accessible whenever we ask. How crazy is that. . It’s a cunning, baffling, and powerful disease and it wants us to forget it. I have recovered to a certain extent. I feel my brain and body are really healthy like they were before all the drugs and alcohol. Now I have tools to use to get out of myself. If I’m really upset it’s usually because I’m thinking of myself too much and being selfish. It’s really not all that complicated. How long do I want to be in fear, and how long does it take me to see that God has been there all the time and I just have to choose to trust him/her. It’s really super obvious all the ways I’ve been taken care of and saved from myself. Really in miraculous ways where there is no doubt God is everything, but I still have to choose that to be at peace. Everyone talks about the pause when agitated. That's when you gotta do the asking. It’s really the best part of the book and the instructions of how we are to handle our upset feelings. Praying 86-88 daily is soo good because it reminds us what to watch out for. When I first came in I’d have these huge swings of emotions and really needed the pause because I had a lot of muscle memory concerning alcohol and drugs. When your so used to it being the only solution it’s hard to pause and remember there’s a better one. God and asking him for things that you need to get past it. Sometimes just feeling the bad emotion and realizing that it will pass. It’s like a wave that needs to be ridden and a lot of the time there’s something that it’s trying to tell you. If I can just relax enough to let it tell me what I need to know the pain will stop once I acknowledge it and stop running. AA has given me my family and brought us all from the brink of death. It’s an incredible program that really works. Seeing it work at first my mom who is an amazing woman who I look up to in so many ways. She is no longer that fragile woman, but a force to be reckoned with. She became a nurse practitioner and I rarely see her sit still in bed now. My dad is more in touch with his feelings and involved emotionally with us, not just solving crises. My nephew has never seen me on drugs or alcohol, and thinks I’m the best thing ever. He is someone I always want to protect from seeing this side of life, but I want there to be a strong program for it if he ever needs it. My twin and I have a great relationship where I’ve been able to be supportive to her and her family when she needs help. I’m thoughtful, loving, peaceful, compassionate, and driven to help others. The biggest gift is a peace that surpasses all understanding, and that and my higher power are my greatest assets today. I am given peace and joy in the eye of a hurricane now. Those don’t stop just because we get sober. There are still a lot of sick people in the world, some days it’s still me, but we who have recovered are the light and miracles too. We only get to keep that by giving it away. Despite being scared to tell my story in front of everyone I do it anyway for a program and 12 steps that have given me my soul and life back. I found unconditional love in the rooms, a family, source of inspiration, and peace in the rooms even still. We don’t have to do this perfectly, as long as we get up and keep trying is all we have to do. I always feel this sigh of relief when I come into the rooms and hear how others are really doing. I feel the presence of God in a meeting, and I leave with hope again. That really is a miracle to have access to something so powerful and freeing. Most of the world does not have all these gifts we do. The price of admission is our lives, but how lucky are we to have each other and these 12 steps inspired from the good book. I am soooo grateful always and the best way to show that is through my action of sharing my story so others will not feel alone and know there’s another way. There really is and it’s sooo much better. Everything I was looking for from drugs and alcohol I found from my higher power. Also from people in the rooms, God works through others. Not just in the rooms. Whenever I put a question to the universe, my answers will come. It’s usually through other humans. I just have to get out there to find them and help others. It’s so easy in this age of smartphones and media to just consume all day. I want to give back and share my story because it really is so needed right now. My heart breaks for people who don’t know there is a better way. But it takes what it takes. I wasn’t willing till I had enough. What enough is for other people is not my business to know. I know I can help, but at a certain point it’s up to them. When my family accepted they did everything they could and I might die it was the wake up call I needed. I felt that bond be severed energetically and it scared the hell out of me. I really hope people have felt some kind of love from this world and know there’s so much more that’s available. It’s in nature, and all around us. My mind was so clouded by addiction and mental illness I never noticed the things I do today. The bird babies in Spring waddling around with their innocence, the way the seasons change and the leaves turn a bright green when they’re fresh and new. The way the lakes get full and then empty again. Life is so much change, but there is always hope. That’s the part that’s hard for others to feel at times, and lead to people taking their lives or giving up in their addiction. It doesn’t have to be this hard, you can ask for help and let someone in. You can let God in to help you, if you don’t feel it, ask others for prayer. Even if you don’t believe. People are human and will fail us, God feels like he does too at times. I’ve seen such crazy terrible suffering working at the hospital. It’s such an awful but transformative thing that happens that the pain causes changes in our makeup that is for our long term good. We become more compassionate. I would not have understood mental illness and the loneliness of it until I went through it myself or something similar. It opens our hearts and makes us better people. I don’t have all the answers, but I know there’s hope if we keep trying. I remember relapsing for those 2 years. I’d get 6 months, 3 months, a week. I never knew when it would end. I thought maybe picking up the chip is the problem and focusing on the time. It was. It’s just today, today I have to try, yesterday and it’s shame doesn’t matter, tomorrow’s not promised. There is peace in our breath, and God is within us. We just have to stop long enough to experience that. Try guided meditations, find some way for the chaos to stop even if it’s just for a few moments. Go for a walk, eat a sandwich and take a nap. I was told that in early sobriety. Sometimes it’s just not taking action and just waiting in the uncomfortable stillness. My prayers are for you, and your peace. God is just a breath away.