I'm not sure if this I should post this here or keep it to myself in my private journal, so if this disappears or gets heavily edited, it's because I've changed my mind about saying some things publicly.
Tonight, I really, really, really wanted to drink. Or smoke weed. But I didn't. I coped with my stress by paying attention to my breathing (one of the things this awesome counselor in the hospital told us was that when a person breathes shallowly all the time, their brain isn't getting enough oxygen and can't function right - whether this is factual, I don't know, but it sounds good to me) and I stopped thinking about my crappy day and my mood and thought about more positive things.
My roommate and I walked to the supermarket and got a movie from Redbox, snacks, and I got a 2 liter of Mountain Dew, because I've been drinking it like mad since I quit drinking alcohol. The caffeine doesn't even affect me anymore, and I used to not be able to have caffeine after a certain time, or I wouldn't be able to sleep. I thought about getting some non-alcoholic beer, but decided not to try and tread those waters... a) that stuff tastes like shit, and b) it might make me want real alcohol.
Tomorrow is a new day, and I think I'm making good choices. I don't feel as alone as I did earlier and I'm looking forward to dreaming. I've been having really interesting dreams lately. I've been dreaming about my genetic family a lot, and I watched Melencholia the other night, so last night's dream featured a huge planet looming on the horizon, but in my dream it turned into a spaceship that looked like a planet. I got to fly in that dream, and of course there was train-time in it. (I don't know why I always dream about trains. Almost always. It's so weird.) The dream turned out not-so-good though, because the aliens fooled us (my family) into thinking they were good but they just wanted to use us. To get away from them my dad got us tickets to some country in South America (for $150 each!), and when I woke up this morning, I was really confused about whether or not I was going to South America, and wouldn't all my friends be jealous of my travels? Ha. Actually, the flying part of the dream was before we were leaving for South America, and I was astral projecting in my dream (meaning I dreamed I was astral projecting, not that I was really astral projecting) and I was flying over these gorgeous green hills, almost mountains, with lush trees and beautiful birds and it was wonderful. From afar, it looked like mossy rocks, but when I flew closer I could see the foliage. I want to have more dreams like that.
Anyway, tomorrow I'm going to the SMART Recovery meeting at 9:15 am, then I might go to this rally thing with my roommate. I want to check out an Agnostic AA meeting, too. But I don't think the AA model is going to work for me based on my personal belief system. The other night in group, I felt like some of the group members and one of the counselors were trying to sell God to me. It felt manipulative. I said that I wanted to be responsible for my actions, and the counselor relayed this little adage they use in AA to me: Say you're digging a hole. You keep digging, and digging, and digging, and finally you get so deep that you can't get out of it. And then you have to ask somebody for help, to get you out. That person is supposed to be the Higher Power.
Do you want to know what I say to that? If I've dug a hole so deep that I can't climb out of it, knowing that there's a good chance that nobody is around to help, or I am out of their hearing range, I look around and see that I still have the tool that I dug myself down there with: the shovel. It's going to take a lot of work, but with that shovel I can create notches in the walls to climb out of the hole with. And if the Higher Power is even paying attention to tiny me, maybe it'd be proud of me for getting myself out of the jam. They argued with me last night that it's all about having faith. I have faith. I have faith that there's something bigger than me, that can't be denied. The universe is a powerful force that we don't understand... I have faith in that. I also have faith in myself. And I have faith that things always turn out just the way they should in this universe (the multiple universe theory is for another time).
It's 1 a.m. I haven't stayed up this late in weeks. I am exhausted and I can't wait to curl up with my pillow and heating pad (it's almost like cuddling with a person!) and hopefully have more cool dreams.
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