Ten days ago I posted that I could not finish my “1943 Rations for Lent” project because I would be away from home.
The full story is that I was away from home attending a rehabilitation clinic for alcoholics and other addicts. It was time to make a stand.
I have spent ten days in the company of fellow sufferers from the disease of alcohol and drug addiction, and I am very grateful for the experience. It was not cheap, but it was worth it.
There were at any one time 15-17 of us at the clinic and the first sound I heard when I walked into the communal area was laughter. It was a happy place, even though some sessions were extremely fraught.
The treatment consisted of a couple of one to one sessions and many group sessions where individual and general issues and recovery plans were thrashed out. Having your life story and reasons for addiction discussed openly by your peers is very therapeutic. Nobody was judged; everyone was helped.
There were also a couple of yoga and mindfulness sessions that I found somewhat painful, my body not being very bendy nowadays, but I discovered meditation and its benefits.
Anyway, I am home again today with my beloved and devoted wife and dog and a plan for the future to beat the demon within me. I am not cured. There is no cure. There is no such thing as an “ex-alcoholic”, merely a recovering one.
So it’s not “back to normal”. Far from it, as will be seen.
General Whiskers' semi-historical wanderings 
God Bless ya man!
Happy Easter…or just Post….
You are in control…
Carry On.
cj:)
Thanks for the support. Early days…
Keep at it, Paul.
At work I used to come across a lot of smokers trying to stay off cigarettes, and one of them said to me that if he relapsed, he didn’t look at it as a failure, but instead looked at how long he had managed to be a non-smoker and that helped him in what he called “the next round”. The thing was, he said, was that he was “still in the fight”.
Keep fighting, mate. 🙂
Thanks Chris.
I have successfully stopped drinking for weeks or months in the past, but this is the first time I have used professional help.
Just calculated today is number 467 since I had any booze. I am a fan of that phrase “not today”. Who knows what tomorrow holds but right now “Not today” is working fine. 467 times in a row. So keep hanging in.
Thanks Geoff.
Someone came up with a nice concept at yesterday’s AA meeting.
“There are only three days in the calendar that matter – yesterday, today and tomorrow. You can do nothing about yesterday except learn from it. You can do nothing with tomorrow until it arrives. So live today as well as you can.”