Surrendering

I used to think that having a strong faith in God should be enough to conquer my  alcoholicism, afterall, I am a new creation in Christ, right?… But clearly (in my case anyway), it’s not that simple.  I needed to come not only to a place where I believed in God, but to be able to accept my disease and my short comings and ultimately to surrender all of it to Him and to press into Him.  This is something that I find that I have to do on a daily basis if I want to stay sober and in a healthy place.

Interestingly enough, although I’ve been a believer and active in the church for over 20 years it took coming into the rooms of recovery to really see this in a clear way for me. Because my default position in life is to hold on tight and try to handle things on my own. I’m continually amazed at how many times I will recognize that I need to pray and call out to God about something, yet I still hold off on surrendering and sit in my junk. I don’t know if I’m being stubborn or its just some dysfunctional place of comfort. Of course once I step up and pray and give it over to Him I almost always feel relief and laugh about how stubborn I am at waiting so long to do it.

One of the most difficult things that kept me down and active in my alcoholism was shame. As a believer, it was so hard to feel like such a failure and big sinner and to know that this was not acceptable behavior. So I would hide it, I would lie. I would pray, I would ask for forgiveness, I would plead with God to help me, and I would vow to myself and to God never to do it again. … Yet, it happened over and over again for several years, ranging from somewhat manageable to not manageable at all at the end. They say everyone has their bottom. I hit mine 9 months ago when it became very clear to me that I was not only putting myself in danger with my drinking, but more importantly, my children and others around me.  This was a hard realization to come to and as life changing as it was, I ended up drinking again a couple of weeks later thinking that I just needed to be more careful. As you can imagine, that didn’t work out either. But I use those last few times that I drank to remind me that I truly cannot drink at all and how my head will still try to convince me otherwise, which again, for me, simply comes down to surrendering daily.

The very idea of never being able to take a drink EVER again for the rest of my life was daunting. It still is in a way, but thankfully I don’t have to think that way today. I only have to not take a drink for today. And tomorrow when I wake up, I’ll do it all over again. Not drink just for that day. … When I first came into recovery and I was really struggling, my sponsor would just encourage me not to drink for that hour. I could do that, I could commit to an hour. Most of the time the urge would pass by then. Today I am very comfortable with not drinking for today and most of the time I can even carry that thought out to tomorrow or next week. I still make a point not to look at it in terms of the rest of my life. That’s still tough, and quite frankly, it’s not necessary. I just need to worry about today and deal with tomorrow, tomorrow.

I remember distinctly laying in my bed about 3 weeks into my sobriety, crying out to God and finally saying to Him, “OK God, I surrender to You, please remove this obsession from me and take away the desire to drink”. I physically felt something lift from my shoulders and at that moment the obsession to drink was lifted for me. Not to say that I haven’t felt the urge to drink or been tempted on occasion because I have. But today I can walk down the liquor isle at the grocery store and it doesn’t trip me up. At the same time I try not to put myself in situations that can be tempting or difficult at this point in my recovery.

It’s not easy. The truth is, it takes a lot of work. More work, in fact, than I ever realized going into recovery. But the rewards are so worth it and beyond what I could have hoped for. I wouldn’t change a thing about any of it so far.  I’m already seeing things come back to me. Trust, a deeper relationship with my husband and for sure a deeper connect with God.

I am very aware that if I don’t stay on the path of recovery that I am on, it will just be a matter of time before I am arrested for drunk driving, hurt someone, or destroy my marriage and lose my children. Or, all of the above and much worse. So for today I will keep going to meetings daily, reading my Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous, working the steps and applying the things I am learning and using my newly acquired tools, stay connected to my God and surrendering to Him daily, meet with my sponsor regularly as well as stay immersed in the fellowship of some others who are choosing to walk the very same path with me. And tomorrow, I will wake up and do it all over again.

I would love to hear your thoughts and/or experiences with surrendering…