“We should go the meeting on Sunday to celebrate your 90 days.” Says my wife from the passenger seat as we are driving along. I think how nice it is that she remembers, I realise it’s important to her.
“Is Sunday 90 days?” I ask.
“The 13th right?”
“Yep, but some of the months have 31 days.”
“March 31, April 30, May 31. It’s on the 11th” She says counting her knuckles. “That’s today. Happy birthday baby.”
“Thanks sweetheart. I knew the 90 days was coming around, but didn’t really intend to celebrate. I just feel like it didn’t help in the past. I think my AA message of sober 20 years, but relapsed on weed and Lucy for a few years, but didn’t go back to alcohol or heroin is a stronger message. I would celebrate my 21 years sober in November.”
“You mean December?”
“Oh, yeah. I got confused with my belly button birthday. I might celebrate my 1 year clean. If it’s appropriate, I’m not against it. God can decide.”
“Happy 90 days baby.”
“Thank you baby. Let’s celebrate.”
“What should we do?”
“Let’s get wasted.” I say in jest.
“I was thinking about that.” She replies.
Her humour is very dry, so I take her seriously. “I think those days are behind me baby. I just don’t have it in me anymore.” I reflect on my state of mind. There is no blood boiling, no excitement at the thought, the only thing that comes to mind is the negative consequences of such an adventure. It’s a surreal experience.
“Not you silly, just me. I’ve been in Australia almost 18 months now and I think I’m ready to have a vitamin day again, but just on my own. To celebrate, but also to move on from my old life to my new.”
“That’s a good idea baby, but I don’t know where to get them from. I don’t really want to go shopping on the dark web.”
“I don’t want you to either. It’s fine. It will happen or it won’t”
I love the way non-addicts think about drugs.
It’s been a challenging but satisfying month. We moved house, picked up a puppy, and then my 13 year old ran away from her mums house. She joined us after couch surfing friends for a week. It coincided with some decisions I had to make around my 16-year-old son’s care. He is severely disabled and lives with his mum. We go and care for him on weekends at her house while she is away, but didn’t want to do that anymore for various reasons. I was torn between guilt and integrity, and wasn’t always sure which one was which. I decided to write a novella about the situation and hope that would give me some better context.
I was procrastinating with my 8th step. Now I have had a spiritual awakening and been restored to sanity I feel I have a bit more time with the steps and can trust my intuition around procrastinating. I continue to find that when I procrastinate a step, it’s because that step is happening. I wrote about 6000 words of the novella over a few days, but I was fearful that it was slipping into resentment. It was becoming what a horrible person my ex was, and while that had to be part of the process, I felt like it was becoming the process. I had a break and looked at my 8th step again. Her name was there and I started writing all the horrible things I had done to her in our 20 year relationship. It just flowed like river and was done in 5 minutes. I would write them here, but they are just too personal to her and would harm her even more. One day when water has passed under the bridge I will write the truth of our relationship.
If she was a crazy bitch her relationship with me hadn’t helped. I could see the guilt I had and could see the resentment this caused me and the harm it caused my new wife. I had brought in baggage to my new relationship and was still holding on to it. Staying with her in my exes house every other week regardless of the circumstances and seeming necessity was hurting everyone. I resisted jumping to step 9 straight away. They are 2 steps for a good reason, but it was clear we couldn’t continue to stay at her house anymore.
I got very busy with work for a week with 2 shipping containers arriving, and then was able to look at step 9. My step 9 to her was: Help her financially (as per the law requires me) and have no emotional contact with her. Help her to let me go. An apology wasn’t appropriate, that was just digging up the past. I had already apologised for my drug use and that making me unavailable for the kids. The less I spoke to her the better for the foreseeable future.
I got back into my writing and decided that my novella called Early Years would end when I was 18 and had left home. It was the first 45K words of my personal story 4th Step. I had finally finished proof-reading and editing it up until the point where I packed my Kombi van and left Melbourne without telling anyone. I wrote the last paragraph:
I was free. I had got out of Melbourne. It was getting dark and the road ahead was dark, but such potential for light. I didn’t know what adventures awaited me, but there was sex and drugs and freedom. I had my new home, my Kombi Van. I was an adult. I had escaped.
And saved it in my novels folder. I leant back on my chair and felt a wave of peace come over me. I felt such accomplishment and the past seemed to fall off me. It was the hardest thing I had ever written and proof reading it was just as hard. But I also don’t think I had ever felt such relief in finishing writing something.
I had promised my wife to send it to her kindle to read so reached down to the drawer to get the charger for her. I noticed an old wallet I no longer used and wondered what was in it. I opened it up and there was a little bag with an LSD trip in it. That’s weird, I thought. And then I noticed no desire. That’s weird, I thought. I held it up and looked at the tiny coloured paper through the plastic. The lack of excitement or nervousness or any of the plethora of chemicals that used to run through my body at the mere thought of taking Lucy, let alone looking at, was astonishing. I looked at this tiny blotter and all I could think of was the confusion of the come up and how it would interfere with the rest of my week. It was exactly what I believed the Big Book would do for me, but experiencing it was something else.
I knew exactly what to do with it. God works in mysterious ways. I went upstairs to my wife who was still in Bed. “Ricky baby, I’ve got a present for you.” She rolled over, eyes half closed. I dangled the bag in front of her. As her eyes focussed they widened. “Vitamins!” She exclaimed and took it from me.
“Put it somewhere the puppy can’t get to it.”
Red Pill Recovery 