By: Marc McMahon
I don't even know where to begin. Well, I wanted to talk to you all about my life, my recovery or lack thereof sometimes, and where that leaves me as far as being an advocate for those who may not have a voice or don't know how to express how they feel with words. Whether I can still take all my years of experience with addiction and still be able to talk with those in recovery who come and ask for advice as it pertains to my personal experiences. Ya know for the first time in 20 years I have managed to carve myself this little life I have. I am wanting full-time sobriety I know that is what's best and makes me happiest.
The problem I think is that my life is going too well I think to force me to go back into recovery. My life is not a complete disaster like it used to be in my crack cocaine addiction. I am an addict through and through there's no mistake about that. You see the knowing recovery is best and all that good stuff is not enough to cause me to get clean, no way my addict is a beast and it usually takes near-catastrophic events to occur in my life causing unfathomable amounts of pain that drive me to recovery because I have nowhere else to go. So this wanting to get sober on my own while my life's as good as it's almost ever been has proven tough for me is all.
You know I was going to or was waiting to sit down and write to you all after I had regained 100% percent sobriety but as of today that hasn't happened yet so, I thought I might share what's on my heart and my mind because that's just kind of how things go on this blog. Straight up, from the gut truth. No bullshit just truth.
I have been contemplating a lot lately about not being able to stay clean all of the time and where that leaves me in terms of writing about my recovery and giving people advice, encouragement, and sometimes inspiration when they ask or I feel led to write about. I have given it much thought, maybe too much but here's what I came up with so far. I think there's still room out there for me in this current state of mind to continue assisting others when they struggle with life as it pertains to my past experiences. Being clean and sober is my goal always has been I have just struggled to attain it. It's been this way my whole damn life and usually, my addiction kicks my ass so bad that I am left assed out in an alley, homeless, cold, and shivering, wondering how the hell this happened again.
That is how things used to be, my crack addiction was or is a monster of enormous magnitude. So big that no matter what I did I could not stay clean for more than two years. Do you know that it took me 16 years of trying to get clean before I ever got six months under my belt? Ya, and by that time I had been in treatment, inpatient 8 times. It was the biggest monster I have ever fought and although I did not beat him into submission I was able with the help of the big man upstairs to wrap enough chains around the son of a bitch that he hasn't been able to squirm his way out and destroy my life like he wants to do.
Nope, what my addiction did was let me win the crack battle and it came at me 2 years clean with methamphetamine in hopes that it might have the same destructive effect on my life as crack did. Thank God. Somehow I have managed to maintain some type of manageability with my habit, nothing I have ever had before. I have never had any control over my drug or alcohol use at any time in my life until now. Today I manage my own life and it's so cool because now I have a life to manage and it's working, not perfectly, but well. Would it be even more amazing if I was clean all of the time? Hell ya, but until that happens I am going to enjoy this life because I have never really had one since I was 26.
Do you know that once I started doing crack at 26yrs old that I was homeless 12 years in a row behind that habit, tried killing myself twice, and spent two years behind bars and I'm still here. It is nothing short of a miracle I praise God for my life amidst my still struggling to stay clean. So despite my meth use this past 2 yrs since my relapse I completed yrs 5 & 6 of my apt lease which is the first lease I have ever really had in my name and I was almost 47 before that happened. And I have been able to come back and begin to start writing again and encouraging others and telling the world they are loved fairly consistently as of late with more improvement to come.
My mental health is doing well and my overall drug use is at an all-time low which excites me because I know sobriety is right around the corner I can kind of feel it, I have been for a while now. I just wanted to share with you all what's going on with me and not be such a stranger anymore. I don't in any way want to glorify drug use or even imply that there is any good that can from it. Drugs are bad stay away from them all please give yourselves a chance, don't let drugs screw it all up and ruin half your life like I did, pls. Abstinence from drugs and alcohol is my goal and one I will achieve in the hopefully very near future. I love you all like you don't even know. Thank you for all of your amazing support over the years and to be frank. Thank you for putting up with my shit and for being patient and supportive through it all. You all are amazing have a happy holiday's and a very pleasant new year stay blessed my friends.
About the Author: Marc is a 52-year-old Author, Speaker, and Soldier in a war to loosen the grasp that Substance Abuse has on our society. He is a Father, Son, and friend to all those seeking refuge from this incorrigible disease. Marc resides in the beautiful Pacific Northwest where he enjoys, writing, hiking, and kicking the disease of addiction in the teeth, every chance he gets. As Marc always likes to say, “be blessed, my friends!”
