Addiction

Content note: This post discusses alcohol addiction, suicidal thoughts, and recovery.

For a while, I was unmedicated and wasn't receiving the mental health support I needed. I knew I needed help, but knowing you need help and actually seeking it can be two very different things.

I started drinking early in my life, and by the time I was in the Navy, alcohol had become a problem. I drank constantly. Eventually, drinking became a life-or-death situation because of what it did to my mental health.

There were times when I drank until I couldn't remember what I had done. During some of those times, I put myself in danger.

Eventually, I had to make difficult decisions to protect myself. I had to acknowledge that there were things I could no longer safely access. Accepting that was incredibly hard, but it was necessary.

The last incident was the one that finally terrified me enough to understand how serious everything had become. Someone I love intervened and prevented me from making a decision I wouldn't have been able to take back.

I don't remember the incident.

That may have been the scariest realization of all.

I knew I had to seek help. I had to stop drinking.

Recovery has been a battle, but today I am 57 days sober, the longest I've been sober in three years.

And I am incredibly proud of myself.

I'm also saddened sometimes by how much had to happen before I understood what seems so clear to me now.

I never wanted to die.

I wanted relief.

I wanted relief from the pressure my life had created. I wanted the fighting to stop. I wanted my mind to become quiet. I wanted to breathe.

Through sheer persistence, so many of the things I spent years fighting through eventually started to turn around.

Now I finally get to breathe.

But today, recovery feels different.

My life is becoming quieter, and I'm realizing that peace can feel uncomfortable when your nervous system has spent years preparing for the next disaster.

I'm learning to sit with that.

I'm learning that I don't have to fight every thought that enters my head.

I'm learning how to exist without constantly surviving.

I'm still working on some things. I still have coping mechanisms I want to change. I'm learning how to live with memories.

But I'm here.

#SuicidalIdeation #Recovery #Addiction #PTSD #Suicide #Alcoholism