A Story of Recovery:
No Longer Home Alone
One early morning, right after I had taken my quiet time and talked to my sponsees, I noticed that a particularly heavy and intense downpour had begun. The thunder actually woke up my usually hard-to-rouse four-year-old, who snuggled in my lap, frightened. It was all over relatively quickly. Then a few minutes later, I got a text message from my housemate, who lives in the basement. “Some water got under the door and soaked into the carpet.” I went downstairs to inspect and actually found that an approximately 10×15-foot area of the carpeting was completely soaked. The reason was a clogged, neglected drain outside the house. Totally my fault, and not covered by my homeowner’s insurance.
As a single mom who is still learning the basics of homeownership (my ex-husband had taken care of all that when he lived in the house), I can really pick up the self-hatred when things like this go wrong. I beat myself up for not knowing about all the minutiae of owning a home. I become plagued with fear and financial insecurity. And what’s worse, my disease tells me that I am completely alone in dealing with it—that others have spouses and partners to help them face things like this, and I have no one. I can get into negative thinking and extreme self-pity in a heartbeat. It is only because of daily talks with my sponsor, fellowship calls, the literature, and quiet time that I remember to bring my Higher Power into the picture and to turn my thinking around.
It turned out that the water damage cost me my entire savings, which had grown over a period of months by diligently working with my sponsor on taking responsibility around my finances. But then fellows reminded me that that’s what savings are for! Thank you God that I had the savings to cover it.
The night, after my basement flooded, food thoughts flooded my mind. I am pretty newly abstinent (8 months), and the feelings were intense. I came into FA at 5’4” and 210 pounds, and am grateful to be maintaining an 85-pound weight loss. As a food addict, my most common reaction to life has been to eat. But today I know, without a doubt, that I don’t eat, no matter what; no matter what, I don’t eat. And I know that if I use the tools and disciplines of this program, I won’t take the bite.
So I got on the phone. I made 20 program calls (no exaggeration!), and no one was available. After leaving 20 messages, I knew I had to go to my Higher Power, who is always available to me. I got down on my knees and prayed for the strength to get through this experience abstinently.
The good news is that I did get through it abstinently, with a lot of reaching out for help to my Higher Power, many tearful fellowship calls, and, one day at a time, putting my recovery first. My gratitude list during that time was actually longer than it usually is. The list included my tenant, who actually refused to accept the discount in rent I offered; she insisted on paying the full month’s rent! I also could be grateful for the kind, patient home-store employee, who spent an inordinate amount of time with me ordering new carpet and arranging to get it installed as quickly as possible. And I was grateful for the carpet-cleaning guy, who, purely out of the goodness of his heart, provided a second opinion, free of charge, as to whether my basement was really dry enough (it was!). I thought of all of the people who helped to make a tough situation easier, and I realized that I am truly not alone.
If I had been eating, I don’t know that I would have dealt with the situation with the clarity that abstinence gives me. I would have probably frozen in panic, eating instead of doing the next right thing, and I would have been in full-on avoidance mode. In recovery, I have the ability to show up and take things step by step. I learn to face life on life’s terms and to practice acceptance. I was able to communicate clearly with my tenant and ask for her help with various things. In my disease, I would have been too overwhelmed with the fear of inconveniencing her to do so.
The most important lesson I learned is that when difficult things happen, my Higher Power is not punishing me. I see now that I have tended to hold that viewpoint and realize that it is detrimental to my recovery. There were moments of feeling very angry at God for sending the flood my way (and a host of other simultaneous stresses) in a very short period of time. All this was based on having a sense of a punitive Higher Power.
In FA I get to have “a God of my understanding,” and I need to understand my Higher Power as loving and supportive. My sponsor really helped me to see it a different way when she said, “God doesn’t punish us by making bad things happen. God gives us the strength to get through whatever happens in life.” That flooded basement and the loss of my savings gave me an opportunity to have a much needed shift in attitude. That alone was worth the price I paid!
I still deal with regular attacks of fear, doubt, and insecurity around my finances and homeownership. But fellows with long-term abstinence remind me time and time again that if it’s only money, it’s not a problem. They share their experience that God always seems to have a way of making things work out, miraculously and in ways we often cannot envision. I just need to do my part and stay abstinent, keep showing up for my recovery, do service, and have an open mind. My Higher Power will take care of the rest and will shelter me through all the storms in life.