Serenity

THIS IS MY NEW GOAL: far from being just blank and "clean" (never was sure of the "clean/dirty" terminology) but to strive for the true peace and Serenity (as NA call it) of Recovery.

Recovery is not a mere state of being but a process. As far as I understand it is the process of reconciling oneself with the reasons and forces that led us down Smack Alley to the morass of Addiction and moving on from there to learn how to live without drugs of any kind.

NA put great store on this "avoid all drugs" motto (and I think this is the most dangerous aspect of their thinking). They say that even having a drink is using, even if drinking never formed part of your using. Swapping focus from one drug to another is "like switching seats on the Titanic: you're still going down"...

Yes I can see they have a point. And their point makes doing the NA programme actually harder than living "drug-addiction free" than many normal people do, who might pour out the red wine before dinner, continue quaffing while cooking and finish a bottle a person over food after a hard day's work, then feel entitled to get slaughteringly drunk at the weekend (well: if you're British, Irish or Australian especially) and then in this drunken state perhaps turn to 4am spliffs and perhaps cocaine. Millions of "normal" people with respectable jobs engage in such behaviour on a weekly basis. In my day popping ecstasy pills was the thing. You'd go to the club or rave and take the magic tablet (or one and a half or two)... an hour later you're in a wonderland that, most amazingly you share with everybody there. It felt like the most amazing thing. None of the people engaging in this activity would have called themselves "addicts".

Once you have become a full-blown addict, I suppose you have to recognize that you've messed up brain and body to such a degree that for a very long while drugs of any kind ~ including drink ~ are going to be a no-no, unless you want to risk slipping back into deep waters ...

Having said that, I feel some people at NA take the "all using is relapsing" theme too far. I've heard a few stories about people who "lapse" maybe by popping a sleeping pill or knocking back a Scotch. Next thing anybody knows they're back at the heroin and crack. And in this country the vast majority of NA-members are there for one (or more usually both) of those two drugs.

I don't know why I'm saying all this: to convince myself...? To tell you all I'm convincing myself..? I don't know.

PS IF you want something entertaining, click here for a quick snapshot of my "personality"...

PPS ANSWERS to my Coca Cola quiz are: cans (in reading order zigzagging down) Arabic, Russian, Hebrew; the bottle was ARMENIAN!!!

PPPS I SAID I was going to put up stuff for worried parents. Of course I have not done. But there is one organization called Adfam for the families of addicts and users. Clickonthem for more info. The link I got was British but there are similar organizations internationally.