"Sometimes There Isn't A Next Time"

This moving letter from a grandmother, originally published in the Delaware County Daily Times, had such an impact that I wanted to share it with as many people as possible.
If you have any concerns about your kids, please contact me at 484 431 2931, or email me at KenWilliamsRecovery@gmail.com

http://www.delcotimes.com/article/DC/20150902/NEWS/150909924

The Recovering Person's Guide to the Holidays

Some thoughts on surviving the holidays clean and sober:

Image by George Eastman House via Flickr

1. If you're fresh out of the rehab, don't feel that you have to hang out with your old friends because it's Christmas. This is especially true if your old friends are anything like my old friends were. Everyone is just going to make each other uncomfortable. When you're fresh out of the rehab, everything is uncomfortable anyway. So don't make it worse.
   
2. It doesn't have to be the best holiday ever. It's easy to think that way when the last twenty or so were kind of screwed up, and you're fueled by the desperate desire to make it all  better. But one Christmas (or Hanukkah, or Kwanzaa) is just that. One. Hopefully of many to come. Easy does it.
3. Always have an escape route. Even when it's the most beloved of friends and family, after the sixth or seventh cup of Christmas cheer, Aunt Tootsie from Tobyhanna's hysterectomy story really loses its zip. You find yourself biting your lip and looking longingly at the bottle of Jack D over on the server. It's time to go, preferably to a meeting. 
4. "But I don't want to go to a meeting on Christmas!" (Or Hanukkah. Or Kwanzaa.) It's going to be nothing but losers!." My sponsor periodically reminds me of when I would go out to a bar on Christmas day to buy drinks for the poor slobs who didn't have anybody. Of course, I did have somebody--several somebodies--all at home, waiting for me while I was at the bar. Just stop whining and go to the meeting. 
5. It's not your job to educate every well-wisher you meet on addiction in general, and yours in particular. It's hard for ego-centric types like us to grasp, but sometimes when people ask  how are you, they are just being polite. They don't want to hear how the craving to smoke crack is subsiding ever since you began to deal with the childhood sexual trauma issues. Oh yeah, and the self-mutilation's improving too. They want to hear, "I'm good. How are you."
6. Bottom line, it's just another day. We get through it like we get through all the others, with a mixture of grace and awkwardness, anxiety and exhilaration. Keep your phone handy with all the important numbers on speed dial. Hang in there.
7. Oh yeah--don't use!
   

Kids

Image by kr4gin via Flickr

"Don't get me wrong, I love the Holidays. It's my family I hate." 

The speaker was 15 years old, and filled with adolescent angst.

"They're materialistic and stupid, and they don't want anyone to have a good time." He had a point. He had recently been caught smoking marijuana on school grounds, and the stupid, materialistic parents had spent a lot of money on fines and lawyers, had to kiss the school administration's ass during hours of meetings, and fun was not big on their minds.

I pointed out that good lawyers charge multiple hundreds of dollars per hours to keep you out of jail.

"So put me in jail! I feel like I'm there already!" Of course the closes to jail he had been was probably an episode of Prison Break. 

"Listen, " I said, "they're worried about you." He sniffed. I swear, actually sniffed. Like a character out of Remains of the Day. I was getting a little warm.Figured it was time to shift gears.

"Let me tell you a story," I said. 

"Can I smoke?"

"No."

He slumped.

"Once upon a time..."

He smirked.

"--there was a mom and dad who were very worried about their son. He was hanging with the wrong kids and getting high, and getting in more and more trouble at school."

He grinned at the word "trouble." If it was a badge he would have worn it.

"They had loved their kid and raised him and tried to instill some basic values. They weren't perfect. They made mistakes. When he became a teenager, they made some big mistakes because they had never raised a teenager before."

I checked. there was some eye-rolling, but also some minimal attention. Of course it was probably because I was doing all the work.

"He got in bigger and bigger trouble, and they worried more, and paid more lawyers, and had a hard time sleeping. They were desperate, and didn't know what to do. But I'm sure you know what happened next."

He nodded, sensing victory.

"Right. They moved. Cut their losses and ran. Threw him to the wolves."

"What?"

"Pulled up stakes and changed their names. All of a sudden he was on his own, in court with no one who loved him in sight. Funny thing about love, when it's there it's easy to take it for granted, but when it's gone, it leaves a pretty cold and empty vacuum behind it.And suddenly, instead of dealing with people who love him, he's dealing with people who look at him as a social problem to be handled."

"Oh no, I've taken mommy and daddy for granted!"

"There, there, little fella" I said.

The vibe on my cell phone interrupted my reverie.

Okay, that's not exactly how it happened. It would be nice, though. Usually it takes two sessions, right?

Right.

Happy Thanksgiving.