A person who is struggling with addiction is fighting an epic battle.
The fighting is fierce and continuous.
It is tiring.
And it becomes more and more intense with each passing day.
It is a fight between
the person struggling with addiction,
the substance,
and a third.
The quietest one of all.
The whisper of truth.
All 3 are striving to be heard.
The Person is saying:
How could I let this happen?
I hate myself.
I am not this person, or am I?
I can’t even want to look at myself in the mirror.
Maybe I won’t wake up.
No one will notice.
There is no going back now anyway.
I am too far gone.
No one will ever see me the same.
The Substance is saying:
F*ck the world.
You are fine.
One more time is not going to kill you.
(Who cares if it does?)
You have tried to stop.
You won’t ever be able to.
You are nobody.
Look at all that you have done.
Pick up the phone. Find more. You might not
Everyone has abandoned you.
This is who you are now.
No one cares.
It is us against the world.
The third voice is saying:
This is not who you are.
Do you remember who you are?
Look around, what are you doing?
These people don’t love you.
You are going to die.
You need to stop.
You do have things to live for.
Today can be the last day that you use.
Pick up the phone and call _________(insert name of a person who reached out to you here)
You can do this.
You are worth it.
There was a time where I would have told you that I truly believed that I had strayed too far from who I once was.
I believed that I would never know who I could have been.
I really thought that I been fooled by the voice of the substance.
Today, I would tell you that I was manipulated, deceived, and wholeheartedly believed the voice of the substance..….
but my real fear was that that third voice.
What if it had been telling me the truth?
Any amount of sober time, forced me to see myself for who I had become.
I did not like that.
I hated that feeling.
I hated seeing myself in the mirror.
I truly felt disgust and embarrassment at the thought of who I was and what my life had become.
If I could have told myself one thing- what would I have said?
I would have told myself that I am invaluable and worthy of forgiveness.
That is the one thing that I think I needed to hear all along.
I mattered.
Someone told me that despite all of my choices,
there was a God who loved me and created me to do something bigger than myself.
Someone told me that I was loved and invaluable.
Someone told me that it did not matter what I had done, or who I had become. My secrets could be revealed, and I would still be worthy of love. I wanted to know more.
That is what I want to tell other people.
You matter.
Recovery is more than possible- it is promised, and you are worth it.