Gonna Get a Butt Kicking

[madison1101]

I just got home from a trip to my daughter's, in Michigan. This is going to be long, but bear with me. As most of you know, I am in IOP at a treatment facility. I planned this trip for months. Pennsylvania, where I live, has really strict alcohol laws, and beer, wine and liquor are NOT available in regular stores, just specialty stores. Michigan and Ohio have alcohol in every stinking store. You can't swing a dead cat in the 7-11s there without hitting a bottle of alcohol.

I knew this going into my trip, and promised my sponsor and my IOP group that I would attend meetings in Michigan, and meant it at the time. BUT, I did not go to one stinking meeting while I was away.

I stayed sober. I did not drink. I looked, priced, drooled, and even contemplated buying a bottle, but did not.

I had to help my daughter the first few days I was there, as she is very pregnant and her husband had surgery, and my granddaughter is 22 months old. When I finally had a chance to breath, I checked the AA meeting schedule there, and the closest meetings had already taken place over the weekend. Then, I thought about it, and I realized that I really did not want to go through the hassles of telling my daughter and son-in-law that I needed to get to a meeting.

This is honestly not about my pride. It is about my daughter's ignorance and lack of empathy and compassion. She is a devout Christian, but she suffers terribly from a critical spirit, and she has no clue about addictions or alcoholism in terms of the disease concept. She views them as weaknesses and has the deluded belief that a good Christian would not have a struggle with alcohol, and should not need the help of unbelievers in AA to stay sober.

I honestly did not feel like dealing with that attitude, or argument. I weighed the pros and cons of not going to meetings and decided that NOT dealing with my daughter's critical spirit was better than getting my butt kicked by my sponsor, IOP group and therapist.

Now, I am an exhausted mess. I left my daughter's in Michigan at 9:00 a.m. I picked up my son in Pittsburgh at 4:30 p.m. I was 20 minutes from home when a bad accident stopped all traffic on the PA Turnpike, and I ended up sitting for over an hour. What should have taken 11-12 hours at the most ended up taking me over 15 hours.

I must get to a meeting in the morning, and talk to my sponsor.

I just needed to dump and get rid of the squirrels.

Trish

 

[BobW188]

The big thing is, you didn't drink. You may have made a bad call; but you stayed sober.

 

[TheMainException]

Squirrels...ugh. Sounds rough...but you made it through! And I hope you had a good time, although somewhat busy it sounds like, with your daughter and her family. I think you made the right choices.

 

[BlessEwe]

Hi Madison, so glad you got on I was thinking about you.

This is honestly not about my pride. It is about my daughter's ignorance and lack of empathy and compassion. She is a devout Christian, but she suffers terribly from a critical spirit, and she has no clue about addictions or alcoholism in terms of the disease concept. She views them as weaknesses and has the deluded belief that a good Christian would not have a struggle with alcohol, and should not need the help of unbelievers in AA to stay sober.

I know this all too well and it is a very sad place when there is no compassion for someone Christ would be 100% there for, without judgment.
It is lack of understanding as you know, someday I would like to go into churches and talk about the struggles I had while going to church, and bible study. I only told one lady there to ask for prayer ( good old friend). So many feel just like your daughter.

It sounds like you were really there for your daughter and family. You are sober and get to do that now, one of the promises of recovery

I wonder if you are ever in a position like that again is to bring your laptop and go to a on line meeting ( if possible ). I have been on line for a few and found them to be very good.
I am going on a cruise in Aug. to Alaska and plan to do just that.
Sometimes life circumstances are out of our control so we have back up plans to keep our conscious brain in line with the program. Sorta like our brains are attending the meeting but not our body

You hung in there and didn't drink, and I am very proud of you. And glad you made it home safe!

 

[Bellicus]

Pennsylvania sounds a bit like Norway. Here the government control the wine and spirit sales in special stores, and only beer is available in grocery stores from 9 in the morning to 8 in the evening. In the countryside they even have special stores for the beer. And the prices for alchohol is really high. And I think it helps in keeping people from becoming alkies.