Tonight I sit here and try and process my emotions. Recovery, what is it? What does it look like? How does it feel? In the recovery group I belong to we have people in all kinds of recovery. When new people come who struggle with drugs and tell their stories, it takes me to a place I am all to familiar with. The shame, the hurt, the blame, the denial, feeling to broken to fix. I just want to hug them and tell them that although they may not see it now there is HOPE. Hope is what brought them to the recovery meeting! The hope to feel better, to be sober and to be "normal" again. For me Recovery starts the first day that you admit that you need Jesus in your life, not the day that you stop using. Recovery is messy, and not pretty. Most of all Recovery hurts. But its a different kind of hurt, a good kind of hurt. With every hurt that you process though on the road to recovery you become more free! Breaking chains and flying into gods arms!
When I first decided to get sober, I felt like I wasn't worth anything. That what I had done was so wrong that no one could ever forgive me. I had stolen from friends and family. Lied and betrayed people. Broke into cars and popped tires to leave people stranded just to get my fix. I was a thief, an addict what I thought was too broken to be fixed. I had come to the point of not wanting to live anymore. I felt that my family and friends would be better off if I wasn't there to hurt them anymore. When really I was hurting myself more than anyone else around me. I had thought that if i killed myself that their lives would be better. Who wants an addict for a daughter, sister, niece, or mother. The night I had planned on killing myself, I failed. I couldn't get the lock off the gun. In desperation I cried out to god. I told him what I had done and told him I didn't want to live like this anymore, and if he didn't want me to die to help me have a better life. With in a week I had started my sobriety. I had a few relapses over that next month, but God kept putting people in the way of me using. Then my ex husband told me that he had a spot that was skin cancer and I had a reality check. If I continued to go down the road I was on, my son could not only lose is father but not have the mother he deserved either. That was the last day I ever used. Its like God knew I needed to hear that to really take sobriety and HIM seriously.
God knows us all and how our brains and emotions work. He knows how to nurture us as individuals and to speak to us in ways that no one else can. Its up to us to listen, and trust that what he is saying is true. He never stops speaking to us or seeking us, we stop listening. I hear the term "I was lost" so many times. When the truth is we are not lost, God knows where we are. I wasn't lost, I was running away. Running away from God, from people who genuinely loved me and from myself. It wasn't until I ran straight into a brick wall that I realized I couldn't run anymore and the only way to go was back to God. He was waiting for me with open arms! Looking back though my actions and choices when I was using I can identify where god was, and when he was protecting me and how he never left me even though I left him. Its so amazing to look back and see that even when I was in the midst of my sin, God was still seeking me. He loves us that much!
In the beginning of my sobriety it was baby steps. I couldn't see my future I just new that God had helped me stay sober for 24 hours. I took it 24 hours at a time. I didn't look back but I had no idea how to look forward either. I went to work and came home and read about Jesus. I learned that I am royalty and worthy of God's love. Before I knew it i had been sober for a month. Someone told me to not keep track of how many days clean I had been but celebrate that I was clean. One day at a time. It sounds so cliche but when you are fighting a demon that's all you can do. Now 2 years later, I still live one day at a time, but I can also plan for a future. A future of living for God and living for his will of my life. I still struggle with thoughts of using. Those thoughts seem to be less and less the more I admit they are there and ask God to remove them. The enemy is slowly giving up his fight for me. Now I feel called to help get the enemy out of other people life. To fight with god to break the chains of addiction off of everyone. I believe that in my future we will live in a world where drug addiction is slim to none. For every addict I know now, I know one more person to get sober! God will set the captives free!
I hope reading about my struggles and my freedom has given you hope. The hope that god is always there. That no one is too broken or has too much sin to experience his love. Jeremiah 29:11 says, "For I know the plans I have for you DECLARES the lord. Plans to PROSPER you and NOT to harm you, Plans for HOPE and a FUTURE!" God wants to give you a future, to provide everything you need, to protect you, and to love you more than you could ever know. Now are you going to continue running into the brick wall. Or are you going to run into his loving everlasting arms?
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