Hello friends,
I’m Andrea and I’m an addict. So cliche trust me I know. It’s true though seriously I am. Drugs, food, shopping any and all things impulsive I’m in. Drugs is the front runner in my list of truths though. My favorite. I was able to look in the eyes of the people I was talking to, I was social, I felt “normal”. I thought I fit in and I thought I was so relevant. I was a mom, an employee, a friend. A functioning addict …a true member of society. I spent many a days looking out the window asking why and how did I get here? I spent many a nights working and hustling to support a now raging habit. I new death was imminent. One more contaminated move and it was over. I didn’t want to die. I just didn’t want to feel. Anything. I looked in the mirror one day and what I saw shocked me. My face with fresh sores picked through paralyzing bound of anxiety. My eyes looked a 100 years old while me skin aged a lifetime. I knew I needed to change. So I did. About ten years now. I’ll say though nothing prepares you for sobriety. All those buried feelings come right back to the surface. Raw, rare and exposed. It’s wierd to feel again, to feel human. I know now what I say matters, I hear my voice and I like the sound of it. There’s so much I don’t know. 20 years of hiding and wishing i was normal, which is just a setting on the dryer by the way…I’m now at a place of acceptance. I’m in recovery but am I truly recovered? I have urges sometimes….fleeting thoughts of getting high. The process. The chaos. The feelings or lack there of. I miss it sometimes, but not enough to ever go back. I’m lucky….I got out. I have a second chance, and I’m eternally grateful. I don’t know a lot but I know I just need to keep hanging on because my journey is so far from over. Thank you. We do recover.