Something small happened today that I feel very good about.
Last edited Wed Feb 6, 2013, 06:36 PM - Edit history (2)
My current job is to go to the homes and apartments of mentally ill people and help them with their daily living skills. Today, as I arrived a few minutes early at the apartment of one of my clients, I was gathering my things to go in. As I was doing this, a young woman was walking by on the sidewalk. When she saw me, she came into the street to my driver's side window and signaled me to roll down. I thought she was going to accuse me of checking her out (which I wasnt). Instead she asked for directions to a particular address that she identified as a recovery center. I gave her directions and she went to her car, which was a couple of spaces behind me.
I got out and approached her, told her that my name is Jack, and asked (politely and diplomatically) if she, as I, is an addicted person. She said that she is. She stated that she finally decided that it was time for her to do this. I shared with her that I've been in recovery for 23+ years. I told her that as bad as she feels today, that she's doing the right thing and that it WILL get better. I told her that someday, she'd likely be saying the same things to someone else what I said to her today.
She smiled a mile wide. We said our goodbyes and she tooted her horn to me as she was pulling away. I'd never seen her before and I'll likely never see her again, but I feel so good to see that a young woman, who may not have even been born yet (or at least was very little) when I went into recovery, has decided that she was going to take her first step today and that I got the chance to be a minute part of it!
Please allow me to ad that if anyone here is struggling with an addiction, and if you fear the difficulty of the choice to go into recovery, than it WILL get better and it WILL be worth it! I promise you that the wonderful woman who married me almost 15 years ago wouldn't have pissed on me when I was an active drunk and I wouldn't have deserved it. BUT, it IS a disease that you CAN put into remision one day at a time.
Thank you for letting me share. That's my 2 cents, and quite possibly overpriced at that.
PEACE!
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You added to her confidence at a time she probably needed all the help she could get.
sometimes people observe others who exude a message of trust. You were approachable, I know how that works.
sometimes it's a few encouraging words that make all the difference in a person's life
And I can identify, too. I'm also in AA and last week I introduced myself to someone new, gave her a meeting list. Not only has she come back twice more, but she's planning on coming to the women's meeting that I go to tomorrow. There are so many you never see again, but this one keeps coming back and I feel good about that... 
You can only keep if if you give it away... 
Thank you for sharing that, made me smile. 
Assuming I make it until April, I'll have four years, One Day at a Time. 
