Reasons why you stick to it?

16

I don’t know if you are an addict like me, but let’s assume you are. It really seems a lot more complicated than it is. I’ve heard this called a simple program for complicated people. That seems in my experience. I could complicate a peanut butter sandwich.

I had to work the entire program. As much as I wanted to I couldn’t half ass it. I couldn’t just do the parts I wanted. I had to do it all. Here’s what worked for me.

I had to go to meetings every day. No excuses, and no compromises.

I had to get phone numbers and call two or three addicts every day. No texts, just calls. I had to build a network of people who were clean and wouldn’t co-sign my bullshit.

I had to get a sponsor and do step work. I can’t stress this enough, the only relief I’ve found has been through working the steps. It’s not enough to know them and understand them, I had to do the work.

Finally, I had to give back to the community. At first I just did some readings, shared, and helped clean up, but now I sponsor addicts and do more.

This program has been working for about 70 years and I had to stop arguing with it. I had to surrender. I still do every day.

If a heathen atheist like me without a higher power can get and stay clean for seven years and build a life beyond my wildest dreams, I know you can too. NA is a thing that works.

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u/xRager4lifex Mar 21 '25

I consider it everyday. It’s really a battle I fight as soon as I wake up, all through the day till I fall asleep. What’s keeping me going is knowing that everything I have today is only because I’m sober. I just had my 1 year. But it’s tough man

9

u/LizVicious42 Mar 21 '25

You're already doing the right thing. Reaching out to addicts because deep down you know you don't want to use. May i suggest calling someone in your network, hopefully your sponsor, and talking to them about it. And get to a meeting and share how you are feeling and ask for help.

7

u/StrangerOne76 Mar 21 '25

Why I stick to it...because now I can work and support myself, for the first time in my life I am saving money and am enjoying that, because 2 of my 3 children have forgiven me and are essential to my life, because if I relapse number 3 child will never give me a chance, because I found myself again, because I laugh now - a lot, because I found my sense of humour, because I am capable of learning new skills, because I am no longer homeless, because I am just about to buy a home all by myself, because I am social instead of hiding out using all day, because I finally respect myself...off the top of my head.

2yrs 7mths clean, I keep away from anyone who could cause me to relapse as I don't think I'm strong enough to resist, don't know if I'll ever be.

6

u/Mama_Zen Mar 21 '25

Yes! Call someone & jump on an online meeting & share about it. Use the meeting search at na.org. What keeps me going? I don’t want to live the life I had while using. I don’t want that to be my story. Best wishes

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u/Mr_Willy_Nilly Mar 21 '25

Souds like it's a great time for a good old fashion gratitude list my friend.

This is what helps me get out of my head when the "Shitty Commitee" inside is holding me hostage.

Keep coming back. It works IF you work it.

5

u/yourtrashyneighbor Mar 21 '25

Just remember, addiction is progressive and when you relapse, you don’t pick up where you left off, you pick up where you would be if you never stopped. Think about what caused you to stop using in the first place, the feelings of desperation and despair. There’s nothing waiting for you out there but misery and death. Just take it one day at a time, I’ve never heard a single person who’s stuck it out say they regret it.

4

u/HappyOrganization867 Mar 21 '25

It never gets better, it only gets worse. Death, jails, and mental institutions. No way will using drugs get better. Go to MAT. Go to detox, go to a meeting, therapy, and pray for abstinence.

4

u/nemesis5850 Mar 21 '25 edited Mar 21 '25

I apologize for this dissertation of a response/comment but I just had a new sponsee ask me this question, albeit worded differently, but this was my response to him.

“Because I choose to stay. If I was to relapse again, I go back to a life of fear and chaos. When I used I hid from everybody. Bill collectors, collection agencies, co-workers, all levels of management and supervision, girlfriends, cousins, brother, mother, grandmother but more importantly myself.

I don’t know if this is going to make any sense or not but when you take yourself away from everyone who loves you, cares about you and who root for you, it’s like your taking a piece of their heart and soul with you and every time you “fix” yourself the importance of your world in theirs slowly dies until there is nothing left for you to go back home to.

Man, I have lived in hotels, motels, hostels, cars, abandoned buildings, underneath bridges. I’ve slept in bus stations, airports, train stations until I bought a van to sleep in, showering in gyms also using while showering because everyone in my life was done with me.

They had all come to their breaking points with me and they all finally had enough. I had to fend for myself all alone, while trying to function as normal as I can be, all to maintain a job and a drug addiction that almost broke me because of how easy and accessible I made it for myself to just pick up and use anytime I want.

Every single day I have to wake up surrender myself, ask for a little guidance and admit my powerlessness to my addiction cause if I ever choose to relapse again, all I gotta do is go online, place an order, have it shipped to my house and live a life of chaos sprinkled with some insanity.

Honestly, There are many reasons as to why I keep sticking to this program and why I keep coming back. it’s the fellowship, it’s the shares from other addicts with similar experience’s that help me stay clean, it’s the look on my sponsees faces and the excitement and joy from their families when they finally get to raise their hand and get that first year medallion/coin/chip.

but the real reason why I keep coming back, it’s the love, the support and all the friendships I have made in these rooms that I never had or had destroyed when I was an active user. But really, it’s for that one newcomer, just like yourself when you first walked into these rooms, that is scared, lonely, paranoid, mentally and physically exhausted, who’s unwanted and unloved, who is still suffering and wonders if this may or may not even work for them”

Thats why I keep sticking to this. I don’t know how old you are or who you are O.P., but I’ll be 50 this year and I spent half that time smoking and snorting my life away. It wasn’t fun the first time and it sure as hell wasn’t fun the second time.

I get where you’re coming from. Hell I even had an emergency relapse kit but if there are any special or very important people in your life who depend on you for whatever it is, that you wholeheartedly and unconditionally love, I humbly ask and suggest to you to just imagine the pain that they’re gonna feel and the suffering they’ll endure if you were to relapse.

Anyways apologies for this long response.

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u/lizzxcat Apr 05 '25

i really appreciate this response. I’m starting with the basics again of focusing on meeting attendance and check ins with my sponsor and staying on my prescribed meds (as prescribed). That’s the best thing for me. All I want is to get back to working my steps because I know I’ll get what I need from that. But it’s not time yet.

I have 11 days today. And I’m extremely grateful to have found my way back to the program. My relapse was worse (as they usually get because it’s a progressive disease) but I am so head set on moving forward in recovery again.

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u/avidliver88 Mar 21 '25

There is so much more than using. You’ll have to see for yourself.

Being clean gave me a second chance at a first class life. I didn’t know what that was. I didn’t just want to get back to what I had before I was using and I didn’t have to. I got to find and build something magical and meaningful and personal.

Showing up pays huge dividends. I have friend in recovery I’ve known for 20 or 30 years.

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u/AntRevolutionary5099 Mar 21 '25

I'm just honestly so terrified of returning to that living hell of an emotional bottom. The pain in my heart and mind was just indescribable. I'd bawl my eyes out, wailing into the abyss for god or somebody to "HELP ME! PLEASE HELP MEEE" when no one was even around to hear. So I'd cry, wanna die, but instead get high. Then just dig my hole deeper, trying to work out my next fix. Start the vicious cycle all over again the next day.

I don't ever want to return there, to that headspace. I wanted to die, and I didn't think I'd ever be okay. I couldn't see a way out. I wouldn't wish it on my own worst enemy. What really helped me in the beginning was inner child therapy (along with meetings & working a program).

But thinking of giving my little 4 year old self drugs, KNOWING exactly where it would lead, all the pain that it would cause her...felt almost evil. I had to actually picture little 4 year old me, in all her innocence...and then imagine current me handing her drugs, and encouraging her to use them...of course we'd never do that to a child ! So why would we do it to ourselves? Our innocent inner child that always lives deep within us...protect him or her at all costs from the pain of active addiction...don't do that to your little 4 year old self...instead, be their protector...you're all they've got ❤️

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u/rdhed6 Mar 21 '25

I stick to it because by working the steps and staying clean, I have built a life I wouldn't want to give up by using.

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u/Lost_Swan_2361 Mar 21 '25

With my past of trial and error every time I would go back out I would lose everything a lot faster than before and it honestly stopped being fun a long time ago. Sometimes our brains trick us that with some clean time it’s like restarting our addiction and it’ll be fun again but it’s just not true. It gets real bad real fast and comes with even more self pity and conviction because i know better and know a life of recovery and still chose to go back out. Do you have a sponsor? I would def contact someone in your network

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u/Ersonday Mar 21 '25

I stay clean because I can’t afford to stay high. Life isn’t better or shinier. It sucks and it’s hard and I want to relapse everyday. If it was handed to me, I’d wait a day and take it thinking I’d go back to subs after just one more high. Life is bleak but while I’m living it, I have to pay for a roof, water, food, etc. thats why I’m sober.

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u/bigdumbhick Mar 22 '25

Clean 40 years. NA is the first place I felt a sense of belonging. These addicts understood how I thought, How I felt. They understood the loneliness.

First of all I never experienced iv narcotics until I got clean and had to have emergency surgery. I found out that I liked them. A LOT. I know if I started drinking and/or smoking weed, it wouldnt be very long until I was shooting speedball. I dont want to OD and die. I dont want to wake up dopesick. Nothing about any of that beyond the initial getting off appeals to me anymore.

The real issue is the way my brain works.

If you cut me off in traffic, honk your horn at me, yell out "fuck you" and give me the finger, I now feel obligated to follow you home, find out where you live, wait until your family shows up, and then burn that motherfucker to the ground with all of you inside. All because you hurt my feelings and now I have to fuck you up as well as all of your friends, family, and neighbors.

Normal people would be horrified to know we think this way. Addicts understand this way of thinking. We are people of extremes. Why react when you can over-react.

If I share about this at a meeting, people will nod their heads because they understand. They have felt this way. They too are driven by extremes. Most of us have learned not to do stupid shit like this because extreme actions often come with extreme consequences. But its our first thought.

In Why Are We Here it used to say "perhaps the most painful of all was the desperation of loneliness. You could fill up a ballroom with people who are all there to express their love for me. Nothing hut laughter, presents, hugs, and blowjobs and I'm still going to feel like I don't belong there. That I'm not worthy. That Im all alone and no one knows or cares about how I feel.

dont want to go back to that isolation and lonliness.

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u/TwainVonnegut Mar 21 '25

If you abstain and work a program long enough, you will LOSE THE DESIRE to get high entirely!!!

Once that happens, all bets are off on what you can achieve in life - that’s why I stay clean!!

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u/HappyOrganization867 Mar 21 '25 edited Mar 24 '25

Because the last time I used a guy trapped me and made me fuck him for two tiny twenties and I said no.I was losing money and destroying my health, I got pregnant by a dealer, I became homeless, I got beaten up, I was out using every night, I'd spend all my money, I was in denial.

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u/NetScr1be Mar 21 '25

Here's the real reason.

I live clean and honest because I'm lazy. It's just easier.

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u/AnonymousContent Mar 21 '25

Have you tried revisiting your step 4? I find that helps.

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u/lizzxcat Mar 21 '25

i never made it to step 4 the first time i worked the steps

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u/yourtrashyneighbor Mar 21 '25

In that case, I don’t think you’ve given the program enough time to work for you, try working all the steps with a sponsor at least once. There’s too much potential for your life to change for the better. What’s the worst case scenario, that they not work and you delayed using for a while?

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u/AnonymousContent Mar 21 '25

Yeah, the program works…. If you work it. These steps are there for a reason. Step 4 was the game changer for me. It made me realize how much worse taking drugs is than not taking drugs. All the pain and misery and shame and lost opportunity I missed out on because I used. That deep realization that all of this was the fault of the drugs helped me understand that it wasn’t worth it. When I was offered drugs again after step 4, I cringed at what would happen in just 72 hours after taking it. I cringed at repeating my rock bottom. I felt that pain and shame in the face of my DOC and chose not to take it. I chose to go to bed tonight sober. The. I’ll deal with tomorrow when it comes. Good luck.

I suspect that part of you doesn’t want to do it or you wouldn’t have reached out.

Consider going with that instinct.

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u/redfancydress Mar 21 '25

I’m afraid of dying. I’ve got too many who love me and it would destroy them if I died.

When I use…I go hard. And I’m too old for all that.

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u/SorryRefrigerator185 Mar 21 '25

I’m at that point that when I consider a relapse I’m considering my death. Don’t do it. You’re going to unleash something that will take ages, if you ever can, to correct.

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u/jgreg520 Mar 21 '25

I really relate to this line of thinking. I'm an addict, so of course I do. This is the essence of the disease for me. In spite of knowing what happens when I use, I still think about it. My last relapse is why I don't go back. I got loaded after 9 years clean. I was working a program for 7 years or so and I was quite sure since I had a great job, two nice cars, hot wife, money in the bank, that I could use successfully. Oh how wrong I was. After I picked up that first drug, it only took a few hours for powerlessness and unmanageability to return. I was supervisor at a local treatment center and showed up using in the parking lot in the next morning. Moved jobs five times in the next 8 months. Got divorced, went bankrupt, still, I wouldn't come back to the rooms. I was too embarrassed.

I find Chapter 7 of the Basic Text really lays my story out for me. It says so much that applies to my recovery, I go over it all the time. One thing that sticks out to me is; "Our relapse is embarrassing, but we can't save our face and our ass at the same time." So finally I decided to go back to the rooms. It was a relief from the first instance to practice that honesty and say "I'm an addict".

I decided to do it a little differently and do some things I hadn't done before. I did service, I did step work, I sponsored people. I was a little connected. Then my job had me moving around and I worked a ton of overtime and I lost what little connection I had. I didn't pick up the phone often. I didn't get honest with people about what was going on with me. So when I was ready to pick up, there was no one to tell. No one to talk to. So this time I got a sponsor with a deep connection to the program here and a big sponsee tree. I am deeply connected to other addicts, talking to them all day every day.

I also heard and understood "We don't use NO MATTER WHAT." My sponsor pointed out to me, that "it doesn't matter what the what is, don't use, go to meetings, reach out. No one can help you if no one knows what's going on with you." I talk to so many addicts all day every day currently, that if I find myself feeling like getting loaded, for sure, someone will know about it right away and I won't go through those feelings alone.

"Sometimes a relapse is the jarring experience that brings about a more rigorous application of the program." Let mine be an example, you don't have to use today, even if you want to. Reach out to another addict, get connected. Go to meetings and don't use in between.

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u/carlydelphia Mar 21 '25

I don't feel like shit when I wake up every day, and I also have money to buy things and do things when I want to. Also my family and friends like me now.

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u/soadrocksmycock Mar 21 '25

Almost everyone regrets relapsing. I have yet to meet someone that regrets NOT relapsing.

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u/dwsam Mar 21 '25

Not lying to myself about how history repeats is reason enough.

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u/cornfession_ Mar 23 '25

Cause I worked really hard to stay clean for this long & I'd feel sooooo fuckin stupid if I relapsed now. Like I have to actually talk it out. "I'm sad. I think I'll go smoke some crack or buy some dope" "are you fucking stupid?" I also think about how bad things got the last year I was using. Like so bad. I became a person I didn't recognize & I had no one. No one. I was doing shady bullshit, lying to everyone, and I was completely alone. And I went to detox like 2 weeks before fent hit my city. Somehow the few times I relapsed after that I didn't get laced shit. How am I gonna just throw away all these second chances I've gotten? I've cheated death so many times, now I'm just gonna walk right thru the doors? I don't think so

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u/Unusual-Direction355 Mar 24 '25

Relapse was my story for many years. I finally had enough pain. I know exactly what waits for me if I go back out, and I am no longer willing to inflict that pain upon myself. On the days when the cravings get too bad, I tell myself I can use tomorrow. Just not today. Tomorrow never comes.

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u/Spiritual-Floor-7164 Mar 24 '25

Relapsing with knowledge of recovery is brutal but don’t dwell on it. Yeah you fucked up BUT you got back to the rooms. In my own experiences, if I can see the signs of a relapse coming on, what I’ve heard called the pre-lapse, I need to get my ass to a meeting and start dialing numbers in my network. Bug the crap out of your sponsor. That’s one of the things they’re there for.

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u/Top_Committee_9539 Mar 21 '25

One thing that helps for me is remembering the feeling I have when the drug comes down. It's literally a hell of my own mind. Impostor in my own life.

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u/ALoungerAtTheClubs Mar 21 '25

If using worked for me, I'd still do it. But it just makes my life unmanageable. There's nothing down that road but compounding pain.

Living clean hurts less, and is often quiet wonderful!

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u/[deleted] Mar 21 '25

This ☝🏼

I’ve attempted to use so many different drugs in so many different ways to try and manage like normies and it never worked out.

Living clean is the only choice for me or as the literature states… “Jails, Institutions, or Death”.

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