Smashed

That is the title of a movie I watched this week.  It is about a couple who met while drinking and continued drinking during their marriage.  The wife is a school teacher and is on a hangover and ends up throwing up and telling her students that she is pregnant.  Also told her principal and had them all believing she was.  Finally after one night of drinking she has no more booze and goes to convenience store to get more but it is to late it’s after two in the morning.  She tries everyway she can to talk the store clerk into giving her the wine because the doors to the beer are shut with a chain.

She finally distracts the clerk you have to watch to find out how and steals a bottle of wine and wakes up the next morning in a park.  I do not like wine.  Although when it was two in the morning nothing in the house was safe that had alcohol.  Even my dad’s saved bottles of wine.  Wine coolers my brother saved anything I could continue drinking with.  In the movie that was her bottom that night she stole the wine.  She was talked into attending a small group of AA.  She found a sponsor and talked in group.  Her husband continued to drink.
We all have a bottom that finally makes us change.  Mine was the night I was sent to the state hospital and the state hospital.  One day to life in there and I saw people do ten years in there without getting out or even trying.  That was enough to make me want to change.  To become sober and do without drugs or alcohol and I did try talking to the judge like I usually did when locked up.  I was sent to the county and he did not even see me.  The only way for me was to stay sober and start a new life.
In the movie she relapses and again tries to drink everything she can find.  She finally tells her husband you are my problem, you bring me down.  Either she leaves him or continues to drink.  I will not tell you the ending.  My problem is my old friends.  When you realize what your trigger is it is way to finally understand.  They do not know how they make me drink and also commit crimes when drunk.  Only I can see that and see why.  They picture me as something different than what I picture myself as.
It was a good movie and it made me think.  My old friends never did understand me and did not know what to do with me the times that I did try and quit.  I always relapsed until I went to the state hospital.  In their groups they tell you have to give up your friends to make it.  I did not believe it.  Though when I was released and finally made it back to my old neighborhood.  I knew that I had to do without them.  I told my best friend that we could no longer be friends.  He said “they are making you” I said that is just the way it has to be. 
My other friends came to my apartment building and called my name I just waved and kept walking.  Two other friends came into the apartment building and left a message that they came to see me.  The receptionist thought I would be happy to see them.  At the time the building was mostly elderly.  I never called the number they left.  Now that I have had time to think sober and look back and what transpired in my life.  I do not want to see them.  I do not know if in more time I will forgive.  Although I do know they were my trigger to drinking.  That life is gone.  I do not miss it.

Friendship

A friend I have not seen since April of 2010, when I wrote this blog about my old apartment building that I used to live in. I lived there for about sixteen years. I knew this friend for about fourteen of those years when she worked in the building. I thought that ended after my court hearing. I watched her start as a receptionist and become manager of the building. I can remember the first time she started and also when my granddaughter was born and she helped me wrap her up to take her to visit my mom and dad, whom lived a block away. I really thought I was going to live in that building until I died. That was until three lawyers formed a corporation and bought the building.
Those lawyers were smart I will give them credit. When I sued them for being slumlords they put her against me. I settled as if you read the prior blog you will see. I had all the evidence to really sock it to them, even though they had a lawyer. When she walked down the block from that court I thought it would be the last time I saw her. I still visit my old friends that live in the building. I had known that she had quit after my court hearing, although no one knew why. I will find out why when I meet her for lunch this Friday. When I last saw my friend three months ago, I also saw her husband and he shook my hand. He speaks Spanish and I don’t so we could not talk to each other.
I also thought she would work there until she retired. Times change and circumstances change. I have often thought why I settled that case, I had so much evidence. When I first filed the case it was against another person who worked for those lawyers. When I went to the second hearing they had put her against me. When you have known someone for thirteen years and went through all the ups and downs and people we both knew that had died that were friends you can’t go against a friend and that is what those lawyer hoped for. I was angry at the time although time changes that.
I am just glad that she found me. Now there is no landlord/tenant in between us and we can be friends. I just have to find out if she is happy with her new job and how her family is. I miss my friends that lived in the building. Although I still go see them. I am happy with my new apartment. My grandkids are getting big and no longer come every weekend like they used to. I am looking forward to Friday. You can also check us out at http://mhcd.org/blog

A Friend in the World

Taking command over your own thought processes, as the mind is a universal servant, or can be such the master of horror is not only a challenge, some might say it is quite unusual to say so.
If a friend ask you “what’s up and you answer to the fact that your quitting drugs, your changing your attitude to being negative so you can become healthy and better off in living a happier life, they might look at you with just an ounce of gladness or your friend might say, “It’s about time you thought of changing your lifestyle!”
When you begin to make mental changes, it helps to have support; and we all know how helpful a good therapist is, even the support of mental health groups can be stimulating when you have no other associations. The power of friendship is as such the power of having family and forming a close association with two or three people who are with a positive focus forms a relationship of support which is unconditional.
You should speak often with your friends, almost every day if possible and its best that one of them is not part of your regular cliché of family or friends, that way you can be open without fear of an offending or repetitious demeanor. “These are your best friends, don’t try to gather in the numbers of associations, in other words don’t try to gather so many friends, you want to have good relationships and if you lose a friend, that’s alright you’ll still be in touch no matter the distance no matter the conversation.
So what is all the conversation about as you meet with your friends from day to day or maybe just three times weekly? Most conversation is about victory and defeat and of course what we may be in awe of or whom. Laughter, conversation, sharing secrets and giving and sharing support are all of an air of unconditional caring and the giving of knowledge saying “we may not have come far, but we are here.
Written by: Donald S.

Recovering

I am a recovering alcoholic. I do not write much about this part of my life to often. The reason is because I do take my sobriety for granted. It has been twenty three years since I touched a drink. I do not miss it. All I have to do is remember the destruction it caused in my life. Like a DUI and losing my construction job because I had totaled my car. That is one reason I do not drive nowadays.
All the bad memories of drinking and driving, I never hurt anyone but myself. I was never trying to get in trouble it just always found me. I am now able to watch other people drink and it does not have an effect on me. A year into my sobriety, I went into a bar that I use to frequent when I was drinking. I had no intention of drinking when I went into that bar. I just wanted to see what I was missing.
My old drinking buddy was there so I sat with him and few friends. I had a seven up. There was nothing happening so I told my friend goodbye. I remember walking home and thinking there is no attraction for me in a bar and drinking anymore. I knew then that I could be around people who drank and I would not have an effect on me. It was a turning point in my life. My friend who was at the bar that night quit drinking about two years later.
Although it was too late for him to have years of sobriety, because the alcohol had already wreaked havoc on his body. He died about a year into his sobriety. He was the second of my friends that tried to quit but it was too late. I can only imagine all that I would have missed out on if I had stayed drinking. I might be dead or in prison. I would not have the joy of watching my grandkids grow up.

Visiting Old Neighborhood

I went this weekend to visit my old neighborhood and old friends. I had not been over there in at least six months. Riding through my old neighborhood I was hoping to see a lot more of the people that I used to see a lot when I lived there. I did not see that many. The friends I did visit though it was good to see them and talk to them about how life is treating them now. I asked how friends were that I did not get to see. I was glad to hear they were doing well. I was sad to hear that they are not happy in the old building with the new ownership. That is one reason I moved from there. They are hoping they get new owners. Although as I told them it is not always greener on the other side, they were hoping these owners were better that the last management. It turned out to be worse. Sometimes it is better not to ask for a change and let things be as they are. They are still waiting for light rail to be finished next year. I am too that way I can visit a lot more that I do. The bus service there is still awful. I try to keep in touch with my old friends from there. A lot of the people that I knew for years have passed on or moved away like me. Hopefully they will get new owners that are better and not in the business just for the money. It was a good visit and very nice seeing the old neighborhood. I know it will be a while before I can get that way again. Hopefully I can spend more time next time.

A Part of Change is Trust

“Some people are made of plastic, some people are made of wood; some people are made of stone, some people they are up to no good…”These are the words to a song, which was on the Rhythm and Blues charts during the mid-late 70’s. I think about these simple words about people as I strive to maintain my Recovery. I have a basket of all of them, plastic, wood, stone, and things that are no good at all. As many times as I have sought an answer as to why people become mentally ill, the only thought which exist is that the world is filled with people and at this thought I begin to feel a twinge of insanity. It’s not insanity really that I am feeling, it’s more a feeling of indecisiveness, of whom do I trust; so I roll through the punches by escaping any way I can. I believe I am searching a strong bond in friendship, yet we all are, and not being able to decide if anyone person is trustworthy, we keep seeking, finally climbing that tree with someone we believe in.
Friendship is not only trusting someone, it is sharing honor and pride in the livelihood we share, and this is why Mental Health consumers maintain a bond with their clinicians, therapist, and nurses. As Recovery progresses we realize we have made foolish mistakes of which we cannot overlay, yet we also realize friendship is hard to come by considering the circumstances. Hip and cool is not the genre we seek, having been by the way side, yet time and space moves us to ascertain reality, and pain becomes weak as we become more assertive and creative, which is worth more the bonding with those that understand what we are becoming, trusting.
Is your life changing with respect?
“To become the spectator of one’s own life is to escape the suffering of life.”
Oscar Wilde
Written by Donald Sammons

Bonding with Reverence

Humankind has a common bond between one another, no matter the joy or ignorance we live. It is friendship. This bond is a bonding through respect and admiration and love for one another. I am aware that there are those that do not share these bonds with others, yet a large percentage of the peoples of this earth do have these two bonding traits, friendship and respect. Having friendship is having an ally, someone you know well, someone or many you share fellowship with. Respect holds friendships trust, being of honor, esteem and admiration.

I noticed even the lowliest of peoples share these qualities, even criminals and especially the disabled. Those of wealth and those without have regard and acceptance of others of their own station of others greater or lesser than. Friendship can happen in the twinkling of an eye or days there after a sharing comes into being. It’s the sharing of that which we value, through respect which causes us to grow with others we respond with.

It may take weeks even months before we care to share with someone we care to bond with , yet it’s a feeling of almost everlasting joy, it’s a smile we have revived with our reverence and our respect of which we share unceasingly. This what people in Recovery search for, a change in fellowship, where we won’t be left feeling denial because of our ideas, because of our changing attitudes because we wish to care and be cared about.

Written by Donald Sammons