Daily Reprieve

WARNING WILL ROBINSON, WARNING!  ITS THE HOLIDAYS!  OK, if you are not familiar with an ancient TV program I used to watch as a child called “Lost in Space,” that might not make much sense to you.  But if you are alcoholic/addict, the threat of the holiday blues can be lethal.  I would advise you to do a few things to protect yourself.  The first time I relapsed was during the Christmas holidays.  If I could go visit myself prior to that episode, these are some of the things I would like to say.  Maybe it will be helpful to you.

1.  NO ISOLATION.  Stay as connected with recovery minded individuals as you can arrange.  Remember that you can be alone in a room full of people if no one has any ability to relate to you.  Plan ahead if you are going out of town.

2.  NO MORBID SELF REFLECTION.  Avoid times of introspection.  Get out of your head.  Slap yourself if you need to, or masturbate, or both.

3.  HELP SOMEBODY ELSE.  Find ways to commit yourself to helping others.  In the military there is a phrase, “its harder to hit a moving target.”  If you sit still, the disease will find you.  Serve at the missions, help provide meals for the homeless, whatever you can come up with.  Obsess with thinking about others welfare in any way you can.

4.  DON’T PUSH THE PANIC BUTTON DURING EMOTIONAL PAIN.  Be aware of the self-delusion of this disease.  Assume that you going to experience some down times, some deep dark times.  The disease will take normal blues that come from heightened expectations and exploit them.  Intense emotional pain can overrule the judgment center of the brain and promote the idea that you need to do something rash to overcome it.  No matter how legitimate it might seem, commit to doing nothing.  Know that it shall pass if you don’t respond to it.  Or you will be better equipped to handle it when normal life resumes after the holidays.

5.  DON’T STAY DOWN!  If you get hit, get back up.  If you are unable to resist and you do slip, shorten the life of the relapse.  Call others in your network as soon as a breath of sanity returns.  Pick up a white chip and start over.  Don’t waste time asking why.

That’s all I can think of right now.  If you get stuck and need someone, you can contact me here on this site.  I will get back to you as soon as I possibly can.  Now, hopefully, I will follow my own advise.  Time to face the music – Nooo, its Christmas carols!  The elves are eating my brain…a little weird.

Rule 62:  Don’t take yourself too damn seriously! [From the 12 x 12, page 149]

NOTE:  If anyone can think of something I have missed here, please comment.

86

I am using the group computer for those of us waiting to go through MEPS tomorrow.  Today is my birthday; 48.  I am getting closer and closer to that life graduation date.  I want to close the circle on this Right of Passage.  I am going to attempt to make a meeting tonight, if it does not conflict with accountability parameters.  I awoke with my slave at My side.  My Father encouraging Me to leave on time.  Me pushing it to the last moment talking with my prized possession.  I will leave tomorrow with a signed contract.  It is time.

89

So once more I return to Montgomery.  This time I should return with a contract.  I am feeling a little burned out tonight.   I did make a meeting, but it was like the entire group was down.  Really strange.  It was like we all could not wait to get out of there.  Anyway, I think I am going to take a cue from My slave and play a game, watch some of the HBO Rome series that her husband loaned us.

90

Bill Wilson from the Grapevine, Jan 1958:

If we examine every disturbance we have, great or small, we will find at the root of it some unhealthy dependency and its consequent unhealthy demand.  Let us, with God’s help, continually surrender these hobbling liabilities.

Then we can be set free to live and love;  we may then be able to 12-step ourselves, as well as others, into emotional sobriety.

Should I interpret this to mean that my reaction concerning my sexuality is a hobbling liability?  It was definitely a source of being disturbed.  A dependency leading to a demand that is not good, it is unhealthy.  I cannot ever imagine me being able to become happily independent of my sexuality and living without my wonderfully dark demands.  It is the counter weight for the oowie goowie aspects of sobriety.  Maybe I will have a change of perspective.  I have before.

I think I have been dealing with issues directly related to emotional sobriety these past few months.  It is different than dealing with the actual obsession.  In the last year since returning home from the treatment facility, I think that I may have dealt with a recurrence of the obsession maybe 2 or 3 times.  Only once has it been at a true threat level that had me running for back-up. 

The problems given to me by this lack of emotional sobriety are imbedded within self-delusion.  It takes me some time to realise that the thoughts it spawns belong to the disease and not me. 

The problem that developed this afternoon came from looking at a Maxim calendar of this beautiful young woman, and her ample breasts and deep cleavage and noticing…nothing.  No arrousal, no interest.  I began to search the files of my favorite sexual fantasies, and still, nothing.  My mind traveled to its most forbidden areas trying to get some sort of reaction from Dr. Erectus, and there was simply nothing.  Despair.  Panic. 

I don’t think I can remember one time in my life since adolescence were I could not achieve some sort of sexual inspiration.  And then the thought hit me that I had been able to respond freely when under the influence.  RED FLAG! 

I think maybe this is what makes the second year so difficult.  I have graduated from dealing with the obsession to dealing with the impact of not having strong emotional sobriety.  I respond poorly to stress and illness and medications.  I amplify them and their affects.  My libido is dampened by this process. 

Today, my response was to remain active, to talk to my sponsee, and go to a meeting.  I resisted too much self reflection.  I may work some on Step Two in the  “Explore 164” page.

91

I have passed my physical.  My waiver has been approved.  I went to MEPS to process the contract and sign the dotted line.  But MEPS was unable to get a doctor to acknowledge the waiver in 3 days, and, although I am approved and ready to go, it has to travel through the system and MEPS has to get some sort of special email back.  So, I am still waiting.  On a “special email” to return.  Bureaucracy!  Civilian government workers comfortable in their niche, totally useless if there is anything that requires an extra effort on their part.  I should have been in several weeks ago. 

So it is up to me to use my time to get my body ready for the physical demands that will hit me in a few months.  And I will do what I can to help bring my sponsee forward in the program.  He is doing well since we started meeting together on a regular basis and moving through the Big Book together.  I probably should have been doing that all along.  It is a learning process for us all, I guess.

92

I have been approved for re-entry into the military!  This is a wonderful day in many ways.  It is the celebration of First Night, when the slave first knelt before Me.  We had a wonderful time together, and ate at IHOP.  My Father and I went out to celebrate at the Iguanana Grill, our favorite source for Mexican food.  I am stuffed and drained and happy.  In an hour I will meet with my sponsee, and then head off to a meeting.  Today, I love this life.  One day at a time, this day is what counts.

97

I dropped my daughter off.  My father has gone to sleep.  My slave is cryptically silent.  I have been to a meeting and talked with my sponsee.  And so that just leaves me.  What does it mean to be “restored to sanity,” as it says in the Second Step.  I was reading some material on this, and it defined insanity as prefering fantasy over reality.  The disconnect between the two comes when the world of fantasy is built upon self-deception.  The fantasy world has many advantages; I am always right, I am always justified, any infringement of my rule is a punishable offense, and the universe bends around my goals, and bows to my creativity.  The problem is that my world has a true population of only one, with some occasional tourists.  Reality is where I export my products to others, and interact.  But I isolate this fantasy world to protect me from dangerous criticism.  It is cold and lonely.   But the steps help build a connection to reality.  The problem with this thinking is that it puts me in a second-guessing frame of mind, and I just don’t need to stay there too long.  But I don’t want to die of isolation and lonliness because I cannot connect the inspiration of my fantasy with the work of my reality.  Balance, grasshopper, balance.

98

My beautiful young daughter came home yesterday.  I really love being with my children.  She said a few things that challenged my parental courage.  We talked intensely and then I spent some time with the Higher Power.  Parental fears are worse than any Saw movie, and can turn grown men into blithering apes.  Having a daughter as beautiful as mine and being a man well familiar with the impact of lust on the male psyche creates a playground for horror scenarios.  I spoke to her of vigilance and keeping her brain engaged and my spider senses tingling about a particular guy that she she likes as a friend only.  When I went to the meeting and connected with the recovery social mind once more, I could see past the fear, and see the strong and intelligent young lady who still loves her father, and is willing to listen. 

So she and I sat down and watched the movie “Jonathan Livingston Seagull” together.  I had been putting it off for fear that my hopes and expectations for the movie would be disappointed.  This is the same reason I have not been able to watch the newest Indiana Jones movie.  The very first one was a source of spiritual ecstasy, and this last one has a link to Edgar Cayce via the crystal skull phenomenon who was instrumental in re-opening me to the prospect of intuitive contact with my Higher Power.  Actually, I attempted to emulate his methods for my own personal meditation.

The Seagull movie was powerful.  No disappointment.  She wants to bring it home for her brother to see.  Today I was able to chose courage and inspiration over fear and repression working the principals of this program. 

I may take a risk on the Crystal Skull movie today.

99

I haven’t written a letter to my HP in a while.  A lot has happened.  I wrote one today, and posted as a page on this site.  It is password protected.  Email me at parboncreeb@yahoo.com if you want to know the password.  When those who know the password have accessed the document 27 times, I will remove the password.  In 100 days, I will remove the letter from this site.