Belle of the Bar

Today is a very humbling anniversary day for me. Three years ago today, a doctor looked right at me and sent me to a locked facility for help. Who would know? I didn't. I know my folks didn't. My fellow drunks did. My employer did. The people I worked with did. My cousins, strangly enough, did. The world I was trying so desperately to cling to came to a crashing halt on July 10, 2000. I couldn't find a way out. I was terrified in the most extreme, most unimaginable manner of being. I was alone to an extreme and everything seemed dark all the time. I couldn't remember what the sun felt like on my face. I was a night crawler. I had this unreasonable, uncontrolable, isolated, dark emotion clinging to my inside of me that I have heard some people describe as a hole. A black hole. I could not control what was happening around me, nor could I control my own behavior. My world fell apart. What's worse was that I couldn't remember anything. I still don't, except those emotions. The doctor's gave me something and I slept. Sleeping was such a relief. I had periods of some awareness when the nurses would come in and take my blood pressure. I slept for what felt like forever, but I think it was only 24 hours. I was so relieved when I woke up. I was safe. I didn't understand what was happening, but I knew inside that everything would be okay. I still couldn't talk about anything real. All I could talk about was playing spades, smoking cigarettes, and what was next on the agenda--lunch, meds,etc. Everytime my parents would talk to me I would cry. I was there for a week, and I could have sworn it was a year.

Today, I live in my own apartment out in the woods, kind of like Emerson. I spend time with God on a daily basis and completely understand that what happened three years ago today was His idea, not mine. I do still cry, but not because I can't talk, more because I am sad. I laugh today too. Loudly. I love my laugh. I wasn't used to being able to do so. I am not angry, or sad, or alone, or afraid. Sometimes I get this way, but I know that God is there and it only gets better from here, and then the feelings don't possess me. Today I have hope.

I actually pay my bills today. I don't go to bars. I go to the coffeeshop. I am happy. I am never alone. I understand that I have a long way to go, but when I look over my shoulder at my past, I understand that I have come a long way too. I was the Belle of the Bar, now I am . . . me, God's child, worthy of recovery.