A Story of Recovery:
My Curtain Call
I have been in FA for more than 19 years. I came in at age 22 weighing 280 pounds. My life was completely unmanageable. I was not only obese, but I had trouble showing up for the basics of life: work, friends, and family. I also was in a really bad live-in relationship and spent hours sitting on the couch in our dark basement apartment, smoking about a pack of cigarettes a day. I had panic attacks, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and bad credit.
In my first decade in FA, many miracles happened in my life. I lost 150 pounds and got a body I never could have imagined. After about a year, I got the strength and courage from the Twelve Steps and the fellowship to leave the relationship I was in, which I never thought I could do. I quit smoking almost immediately, something I also never imagined doing. The panic attacks stopped.
About five years into the program, I was accepted to law school and I passed the bar exam, which would never have happened without this program. (I was a mediocre student before.)
I thought for many years that I would never get married and never be able to have children, given my relationship history and what I had done to my body. But about 10 years into Program, I moved for a job and met my husband almost immediately. A few years later we had two beautiful daughters.
The country was in the height of the recession when my first daughter was born, and my husband lost his job. He was at the tail end of a graduate program that we thought would be the key to a better professional future. Four years went by and he never got the kind of job we both expected. He started his own law practice, but a law practice takes many years to build. It wasn’t paying the bills and he had to supplement building his practice with many hours of legal contract work to make ends meet. Our life with two small children became very stressful.
Ever since my husband got laid off (and even before), I did not have an easy time accepting that I had to be a full-time working mother. I did not dislike my job, but I showed up for it begrudgingly, because I thought of it as just a placeholder until my husband got the job of his dreams and I could stay home with the kids. I stayed abstinent, talked frequently about my situation with my fellowship and my sponsor, worked the Twelve Steps, and did my best to accept the things I could not change. I did service, practiced gratitude, and worked my program, so I stayed abstinent. But looking back, I realize that I spent about four years very focused on my husband and his job search.
A few months ago, we were on Step Four in my AWOL and I began to really think about what was going on in my life. I don’t remember the context, but I stood up and said that it had been very hard for the past few years, and that I wasn’t experiencing the “magic” that I experienced early on in Program. I had expected relief. I had expected that God would eventually provide my husband with a job that would make things easier. I really didn’t think that it was “God’s plan” for us to struggle as much as we were. We were trying so hard to do the right thing.
I couldn’t blame my husband, because he had pounded the pavement looking for a job, and when he didn’t get the right job, he started his own business and worked harder than I ever had. I didn’t understand why God didn’t work this out. So I just kept waiting. We explored moving to other states, but nothing panned out. My husband was offered jobs that would have been terrible for him and decided to reject them. We tried everything and thought of every solution…we thought.
During my Fifth step in the AWOL, I began to think and talk about anger. Surprisingly, what came out in my conversation with my sponsor was that I was angry because my life was too stressful. I knew then, and during my Fourth step, that I would eat again if I stayed angry so much of the time. My sponsor and I came to the realization that, yes, my anger had to change, but also that the stressful life that made me so angry needed to change too.
After talking to my sponsor, I did some writing and sat quietly with God. I realized that I had moved for a career that I really wanted and had worked hard for. God gave me that career, but I didn’t appreciate it—I was too busy thinking that I should be home with my kids. At the same time, I realized that I had searched for a long time for a loving husband and someone who could be a good father, and God provided me with that, but I didn’t appreciate it. I was too busy thinking that my husband should be given some opportunity to make more money to make our lives easier. I realized in that moment, in my writing, that I did not have to keep focusing on my husband’s career and my wish to stay home with my kids. It had been four years, and neither of those things was happening, no matter how hard we both tried. I saw that if I kept focusing on those things, beating my head against a brick wall, and acting like a screaming Mimi, I would jeopardize my abstinence. I realized that I could make a change. I could look for a better paying job for myself.
Two days later, I was driving to work at 7 a.m. on the Monday before Thanksgiving, and I got a phone call. It was a new agency calling to see if I was still interested in a position with their legal department. I had forgotten that several months earlier I had applied online for an interesting job there. Two months later, I got the job, and I know this is nothing short of God working in my life. Who calls a candidate for a job at 7 a.m. on the Monday before Thanksgiving?
This was not the plan I had imagined for my family. But this job pays much more than I was being paid before and has much greater promotion potential. I was able to negotiate a schedule that is more manageable than my other job. It is more demanding and the hours are longer, but my schedule is much simpler, and I get plenty of quality time with my kids. The benefits for my family are amazing. My husband is going to be able to quit his second job and pick up the kids from school. And guess what? I haven’t thought about my husband’s job, or lack thereof, for weeks. He’s doing his own thing, and he’s doing it well. I have confidence that his practice will continue to build in the way it’s supposed to. I look back now and see that God wasn’t withholding my magic, I just had to look behind the curtain.