Good. The disclaimer is done. Let us move on to the good stuff.

Whenever I give a talk or share my experiences with newcomers, I am almost always a little hesitant to share what my early recovery was like. My experience of early recovery, say the first 18 months or so, was not pretty nor very typical. I am Dual Diagnosed. In other words I am an addict and mentally ill with OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder). "Self-medicating," using alcohol and other drugs in part to mask the symptoms of OCD, kept me out there a long time after I knew I was an alcoholic. When I stopped drinking, the disorder I live with and just being newly sober and emotionally raw, made life very difficult. My marriage fell apart, I lost my job, had no place to live that I could call my own. All the stuff that is supposed to happen before you get sober. Things were so difficult for me my sponsor once announced to my home group that if I ever had a good day I would relapse. Only partly joking I believe.

Looking back, he might not have been too far off the mark. There have been times when the thought of going through all of that again (early recovery) has kept me sober. I think in many ways I am more afraid of that then of drinking again. All of that emotional turmoil, the pain and the rapid unraveling of the structure of my life, once glued together by my drinking, left me only one place to go to be OK. That was to the tables (that's what we call meetings in this part of the world).

Why didn't I just drink?

I am not sure I really know. I suppose, as we say," It works if you work it". Nothing major had happened at the point I got sober. I had not been arrested, my job was not in danger, nothing had occurred like that. I was just tired, tired of drinking in the dark. I was tired of just existing in this bleak winter world on which I lived. I was not living I was just existing.

I had tried everything else to find some measure of peace. I had tried marriage, religion, therapy, career changes and nothing had helped. I did not get sober to be happy. I tried sobriety to be just OK.

I knew I could always just go back to drinking, so I would stick it out just one more day. The chaos and pain of the change, forced me to embrace the program or drink.

I sought out those I saw around the program and fellowship that appeared to be OK or even happy and I asked them what they had done to get there. I then tried what they had.

I heard many things around the tables and still do, with which I do not agree. I try not to dismiss anything out of hand. I will just file it away as something that might be useful later.

I also sought outside help for my ocd diagnosis. The program does what it is intended to do very well but it is not a cureall. It does help keep me in a place where I can live with the other disorder and so does help with that in that fashion. Staying clean and sober and being clean and sober are just part of the program of recovery that I try to practice in my daily life. Without sobriety I would have no hope.

What I have been doing has, so far, proven successful. I have not picked up a drink since the day I walked through the doors to my first meeting, over 11 years ago. I am still mentally ill. Today, however, unless I choose otherwise I am OK.