Well I’m at the coffee shop and even though I fully charged
my laptop, my battery icon indicates that my time remaining on this computer is
just one hour. That’s usually enough time to type up a post, but now I feel
pressured…
My last post harvested
some emotional and well phrased comments both publicly and privately, but once
again, the darkest posts bring my mind to the darkest places and throughout the
week I’ve been reliving the event in my mind periodically.
I wrote only of that one night, but the theme was recurring
in that part of my life. I was in and out of jail, and stealing from everybody
I knew, and many people I did not. I wasn’t particularly good at stealing—I would
say I had a 50% success rate—and I caught my first felony when I was just 18
for theft of a bicycle.
That felony from 1997 is still on my record because of how
long it took me to successfully end my probation (8 years for a one-year sentence.) Sometime in the year 2005 I
received a letter stating that my rights had been restored, but the felony
would remain active and a part of any sentencing process for the next 15 years.
So, in 2020, my first felony will be removed from my permanent record.
Processing my past mistakes and writing them out for the
world to see has been part of my healing, and even though I replay a lot in my
head, the idea of getting high or drunk has left me entirely. I have no desire
to imbibe or ingest all those things that made me feel good. I feel good on my
own now and it’s because I put the same effort into my recovery as I did into
my criminality.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking that created them.”
Albert Einstein
Vincent Maertz
There’s no way I could maintain the relationships I have
currently with the thinking and feeling I used in my addiction. The most
important thing—and I’ve recalled this numerous times—is love. I don’t mean
that I now have this ability to love other people and things, I always had
that. I mean that I now know how to feel, accept, and process the feeling and
words of love from those that surround me in my home and family life. When I
receive a compliment, I do not shy away or retort with sarcasm (well sometimes
I’m sarcastic, but only when it’s super funny, which I always am, just ask me.)
I can embrace that which makes me feel good.
I feel love every day. More often than not, I am greeted
with hugs and jumping and screaming. I tell Amanda to stop jumping on me but
she just gets so excited. But really, these two children have been such a
blessing in my life, and I am grateful that I have this unique opportunity to
impact their lives with love and laughter, and I show them gratitude by showing
up in their lives as a responsible adult. Gratitude goes in both directions for
me, and I have to give away this freedom and newfound love of life that I have
been gifted. Maybe that all sounds cliché and sentimental, and I definitely
repeat these same ideas over and over, but like I said earlier: I repeated my
mistakes over and over until I was at the bottom, now I have to do the opposite
to survive. It’s that simple for me. If I stop the cycle of gratitude and love,
there’s a certain gamble that I will fall back into the world of hate and
mistrust and shame.
There’s no more room for gambling in my life. The direction
I’ve chosen is a sure thing. The 12-step program with which I’m affiliated has
all of the answers I need, and although the work is hard, the reward is
precious.
