Timing Is Everything… so don’t waste it

Like most people battling addiction, I relapsed more than a couple of times before my unconventional rehab at my older brother's house a little over 6 years ago. It was while watching every episode of that old tv show about a shadowy flight into the dangerous world of a man who had an awesome talking car for the umpteenth time that I decided that I would no longer follow Einstein’s definition of insanity and began looking at what things I could change in my so relapse wouldn’t happen again.
One of the first things I got rid of was the clock we use to count down every minute, day, month, or year of our sobriety, ending the self-inflicted anxiety, I think it causes. I even went as far as giving myself credit for time served.
Now instead of saying “I’ve been sober for a day” I would say “I’m on my first week of recovery” completely eliminating the seconds, minutes, hours, and days from the count down. Then after a week, I changed it to “I’m on my first month of recovery”. Then after a month, I changed it to “I’m on my first year of recovery” until now where I can proudly say “I’m on my seventh year of recovery”.
My theory was that an addict already has enough pressure on them trying to not only get clean but get their life back to some kind of normal so why not lighten the load a bit, RIGHT?
The next thing I got rid of was restarting the clock after every relapse and faced the reality that I was never really sober but instead only took a break from my addiction. It was a hard reality for me to accept but as they say in every type of meeting the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.

Remember when in recovery going from using to success is a time-consuming event so don’t put any more pressure on yourself and with no doubt, you will be another one of the great success stories besides nobody has more faith in you than I do.

Hope This Helps
Your friend in recovery
C.S. Bear