I suppose you’re wondering what I’m doing here. Or probably not, because you have no idea who I am. Let’s keep it that way.
I’ll tell you, though.
This is my 2018 Road to Joy because I don’t want to be cliche and write Road to Recovery. There’s some things that I’m struggling to talk about, mainly because I feel like it’d be too much for those in my life, and partly because I don’t know how to talk about them. Switch the mainly and partly around and it’ll be more accurate.
I’ll try to be a more reliable narrator. Promise.
This idea came to me when I was rereading my unfinished Big Bang fanfiction and triggered myself. Yes — fanfiction. Who knew it had that power? I did, because I model my writing after life experiences. It’s supposed to be “cathartic.”
Yeah, not so much when you end up reading about ending up drunk off your ass, smoking weed, and trying molly on a Wednesday. Sounds fun, right? (Side note — the molly had no effect. But that’s another story.)
I don’t want to keep everything inside anymore because, as my drunk-at-four pm-on a Saturday self was telling MB, I’m working on acceptance. Keeping it all in seems counterproductive. So here I am, on a website I don’t really understand, trying to use comedy as a way to cover up the fact that I’m fucking terrified of where my life is at right now.
I’m scared to go to work tomorrow because I think I’m in trouble. I’m scared because my supervisor (we’ll refer to her as WL) knows just how fucked up I currently am, but there’s still things that I have to do, in a certain way, and I just haven’t. I’m absolutely horrified at my behavior and some of the things I’ve done to myself over the last year and a half.
Hello shame, my old friend.
Let’s get back on track. I didn’t take adderall today so sweet baby Jesus knows just how hard it is for me to concentrate — curse that combined type ADHD.
Moving on.
I had my first “harm reduction group” last Thursday. It’s technically a chemical dependency recovery program. Rehab, but not abstinence based. I wasn’t any days clean or sober. I don’t even know if I want to be clean or sober entirely. Someone brought up failure. I talked about my last experience setting myself up to fail. Others commented but those motherfuckers did not use “I” statements and like — I am not there yet. I’m not to the point that I can move on and not beat myself up, instead move forward and do better. I’m struggling not to use right now. But I haven’t used the harder substances for a while.
It’s hard to be proud of that when you’ve got it in your possession. But I try.
The facilitator brought up the fact that it’s hard to move forward and get to any level of clarity when you’re actively using. It’s not going to be enough, this harm reduction group. I can recognize that right away. But I’m not ready for anything else. That would be a bigger failure.
There’s a website, I forget which one but it’s fairly unimportant (ha! hacker’s stay away!) where one of my security questions is “what is your biggest fear?” It’s not spiders, or fire ants, or my mom finding my stash of cocaine — it’s failure. And that’s all I’ve felt since December 2016.
And one final thought, because it’s light hearted and I’m not sure that I can handle publishing this while feeling real emotions.
BK was sitting beside me at the bar, and PJ was encouraging me to finish the sangria (what would have been what, my fifth drink? I don’t remember) and I was saying no, because I wasn’t feeling well by then and other reasons. But BK said, “c’mon you’ve got two more drinks in you before you get annoying. I know you.”
I love my friends even when they say bullshit (entirely correct) things about me.
The Sun Came Up 