Stops and starts
tidbits and scribbles
3 years of notes and files
and pain filled ramblings
but nothing cohesive.
Instead, what’s written are
the short circuit musings of a brain
on the mend after 25 years of
miscellaneous addictions.
I gather all the words together
and wonder what to do with them.
I contemplate deletion, but no,
there has got to be something
here that's worthwhile,
something worth saving.
So I pull out all the lines
that somehow feel right,
lines that have potential,
lines that show me how far
I’ve come since getting clean
and I write down the best of them
and then comment on each
from my current perspective.
I used to chase the dragon
now the dragon chases me
across fields of wet leaves
in the timid December sun.
(I must have walked a thousand miles while being chased)
I force feed the feel good
to override the let down.
(One of the main reasons a user uses)
There is no willing oneself to wellness,
there are no bootstraps to pull on, and
no self talk to conquer the chemical
malfunction in my head.
(Without Faith and Hope, I wouldn't have made it)
It’s a kind of spiritual act,
A mystical replenishing of
all the used-up parts of me.
(Could have said meditate just as easily)
I knew it was wrong
but I wanted it easy.
(Perhaps the most honest thing I have ever written)
It makes me wonder if
the gaps I have are
there to protect me.
But more so it makes me
fear that hidden moments
shaped the core of me,
and when I don’t like me,
what's missing are the things
that if I knew I could not
survive the knowing of them.
(I can only assume this made sense at the time)
I do best when I live in retrospect.
The present is too real.
In the present my demon is here.
In retrospect
I can choose to leave him out.
(So glad I got past this, and live solely in the now)
When we exist for only ourselves
the world is not round,
it is flat and we tend to fall off the edges
into pandemonium and unhappiness.
(Still so very true!)
In all of my searching I
cannot find a way to love you
like you need to be loved.
In other ways, yes, but
second to what you want.
But even so I want you to know
you are my rock, my harbor,
my safe place, as consistent as
the dawning day, as reliable as
the setting sun, and as beautiful as
the harvest moon.
Without you I am lost.
(She saved my life and she knows it)
When I am close to God
I smell lavender.
(Don’t remember writing this but I like it)
A common idiom -
don’t put skeletons in your closet;
My father hung bones like he hangs his shirts.
(Never been a fan of “Do as I say, not as I do")
I can't let myself
be shamed for that
which I'm already
ashamed of..
(Be kind to yourself!)
I'm not afraid IN the dark
I'm afraid OF the dark.
(The unpredictable loneliness)
I will never be happy because
there is too much I don’t know.
(The need to be in control is a death sentence)
There's an uneasiness with the
easiness of stress-free living.
(Chaos is a large magnet and I am sheet-metal)
Sleep never satisfies for long,
like a drug tolerance
its ability to provide escape
loses effectiveness over time.
You'll notice this while dreaming,
your dreams become more vivid
and uncontrolled, a rolling
tide of daytime worries warped
into colors you can't escape.
(Sleep, by far is the most elusive aspect of healing)
I am afraid of love
and that's a difficult existence
when your greatest need
is also your greatest fear.
(Such a horrible paradox to live in)
Pounding my fists on
the darkened altar in my mind
makes the night much darker.
(A place I’ve been where you do not want to go)
The gap of these years has now been recorded.
I am free to move on towards what is to come.
While away from HP, I spent the last 3 years healing mentally and physically. I am now 3 years clean from any addictive substance which for me included Alcohol, Nicotine, Opiates and Benzodiazepines. It has been an extremely long road to recovery but it had to be done. I truly believe that had I not done it, I would be dead. As a public service announcement I just want to say that most people don't know that Benzo's are by far the hardest thing to get clean from. The most important literature out there for this is the Ashton Manual. https://www.benzoinfo.com/ashtonmanual/ I highly encourage anyone out there who takes Ativan, Xanax, ******, etc. on a regular basis to read and reference this.