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Grief in Recovery
My name is Dan and I am an addict -
I have been a member of Narcotics Anonymous since 1992 and I have been one of the fortunate ones that has not gone back out. I also believe that relapse does not have to be part of recovery and the sooner that it�s not all about the drugs anymore and it�s about living, we stand a better chance of not picking up. The 12 Steps have saved my life and I also believe in our readings when it say sometimes we need to seek outside help and for me part of that means to seek information to help me get well.
As I did my Steps over and over, I found some issues that didn�t go away, like my Mom and issues with my x-wife. I wasn�t grieving them and I didn�t know how.
We are born with the natural ability to grieve. We trust our care-givers and they allow us to grieve as a child. When we take a ball away from a child, the child cries for the loss of the ball and then moves on. The child has grieved. As we get older, like five or six, things change in our environment. We start getting mixed messages.
The messages we start getting are things like "go to your room, "stop crying or I will give you something to cry about." We come home after having a fight with a friend and Mom says here, have a cookie, so we learn to stuff our feelings. We bring it up again and then we�re told not to cry over spilt milk, so we�re taught not to feel. Our pet dog dies and on the weekend Dad goes out to buy us a new dog so we learn to replace the loss. How many of us have gone from one relationship to another replacing the loss, never grieving the last relationship and bringing our baggage with us to the next with all our insecurities with us wondering why nothing changes. We grieve more things in our lives that we don�t realize. Moving from our home, pets, relationships, or life with drugs, jobs, friends, etc. We are taught to be strong for others. Not to show our feelings. Get over it. Time will heal everything. Some of us escape by gambling, shopping, eating, drugs and I am sure you can identify more in your own life.
I had a friend that watched his Father set up a hose to his car before going to school and when he came home that day, found his Dad dead. He was eight years old. His Uncle sat him on his knee and told him he had fifteen minutes to cry and after that, he didn�t want to see him cry over his Dad again. What kind of message are we getting here? No wonder he relapsed around the anniversary date of his loss. De hadn�t grieved or was not allowed to process his loss. Are we getting the big picture here? We are taught that grief isn�t a feeling and we need to not feel it at any cost. Most of us are afraid to talk to someone that has had significant loss, saying things that are inappropriate, like there�s a lot of fish in the sea, you can always have another child, they are in a better place and running away as fast as we can because we are not comfortable talking about it.
The best medicine for someone who is grieving is talking about it. I always ask open-ended questions so it gives that person an opportunity to share their feelings and I listen, not trying to fix the. When we grieve, we suffer from a broken heart. We are not dealing with a disease, so why are we always trying to fix them? What I suggest to people is to make a life graph from the time of their first memory to today. Then I suggest they do a relationship graph of the person they are grieving, pointing out all the highs and lows.
The next thing to do is forgive them for all they ever did to you, even the abuse. Ask for forgiveness for all you have done to them and tell them any significant emotional statement you may need to say to them. And be honest. A good way to do this is to write it down and share it with someone you trust.
I have learned to do this naturally again today. I had a very close friend in the program who hung himself. I was angry with him and that was ok. I went to the coffin and told him what I needed to tell. I told him I was angry, I forgave him. I asked for forgiveness and told him I would miss him.
I also didn�t feel guilty like most people that knew him for hanging himself, asking themselves what could they have done, because I didn�t do anything on purpose to hurt him. We feel guilty for too many things in life that we are not responsible for. the definition of guilt is hurting someone on purpose. Think about it.
I have learned to do this naturally again. something that was taken away from me as a child. Something all of us have lost and can get back. We need to re-educate ourselves and allow ourselves to grieve. I really believe in my heart with all that has been going on in my recovery the last few years and believe me being clean doesn�t bean that life is always ok. I wouldn�t have gotten through it without grieving my losses.
- from Sudbury, Ontario, April 8, 2006
persons have visited this page since April 18, 2006
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Copyright � December 1998
Victor Hugo Sewell, Jr.
N.A. Foundation Group
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All rights reserved. This draft may be copied by members of Narcotics Anonymous for the purpose of writing input for future drafts, enhancing the recovery of NA members and for the general welfare of the Narcotics Anonymous Fellowship as a whole. The use of an individual name is simply a registration requirement of the Library of Congress and not a departure from the spirit or letter of the Pledge, Preface or Introduction of this book. Any reproduction by individuals or organizations outside the Fellowship of Narcotics Anonymous is prohibited. Any reproduction of this document for personal or corporate monetary gain is prohibited.