The Top 5 Most Read, Liked & Shared Addiction Recovery Articles by Jim Anders on LinkedIn from November 2020 – November 2022 (in Alphabetical Order)

All 5 Articles, in their entirety, are below the 5 Titles short-listed here:

1.?The Intersection of Solitude & Belonging

2.?PTSD: Do Not Forget a Soldier’s Heart [in 9 Short Sentences]

3.?The Resiliency of Recovery Accrued

4.?A Second Chain of ADDICTION BROKEN (& Celebrated)

5.?When “HOPE ITSELF HAS BECOME DEGENERATIVE,” Strive Anyway!?

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1. The Intersection of Solitude & Belonging

"A BOOK MUST BE THE AXE FOR THE FROZEN SEA INSIDE US." - Franz Kafka

For me, an alcoholic in long-term recovery, "the frozen sea inside us" is also the Frozen Sea Between Us. One could easily define alcoholism as "The Disease of Separation." Books are, indeed, only one of the tools in my Recovery Toolbox, but it is a powerful one. Reading helped me bridge the gaps between isolation and solitude and the gaping holes between separation and belonging.

Recovery brought me to the intersection of Solitude and Belonging and books helped melt my addiction-frozen heart. From feeling shunned, isolated and alone in my addiction, years later in recovery, I found myself living in a state of gratitude, inner-peace and solitude. I could not have known the goodness possible in a clean and sober life or I might have found it years sooner.

Addiction answered all questions and (at the same time) left me clueless as it slowly evaporated me. Going from shunned, isolated and alone in my addiction to my current state of gratitude for inner peace and a quiet solitude in recovery has been a long haul. I couldn't have known that all of a sober life's goodness awaited me. It would not have been possible without finding a place of belonging in recovery first.

We humans are pack animals, like wolves. "Separated from the pack, the chances of survival diminish. Alcoholism is this disease of separation. The alcoholic needs the alcohol to the exclusion of all else. Recovery is largely about rejoining the human race. Connection with self, reconnection with self. Connecting with others, reconnecting. Overcoming alcoholism, the Great Excluder. The irony and paradox of Happy Hour can silence" almost anyone who pauses for a moment to reflect.

The loneliness of an alcoholic death.

That's what many of my recollections boil down to. Reciprocity is keeping me sober. Sharing with another alcoholic. It really is that simple. I used to drown the loneliness caused by alcohol with (what else?) more alcohol. Solitude seemed an impossibility when a bottle of booze sat next to me. Alcohol lorded over me and made solitude an impossibility. Loneliness, inescapable. Solitude, unattainable. Sobriety, unimaginable...

"It has taken time to still my mind instead of passing out as I used to do. To glide seamlessly from waking consciousness into a blissful night's sleep, waking up refreshed, alert and drug-free. This did not happen overnight. Thankfully, I have enjoyed this slow transition. Two months of Transcendental Meditation could not have done this for me. Impetuous youth and alcohol" were a near deadly mix. From barely surviving my addiction to a thriving and blissful recovery.

Two different worlds unimaginably connected.

Books were the axe transitioning me from the frozen sea within me to connections with the human race learned and sustained in my recovery.

Connections with the human race.

Everyone has a place.

Your table awaits you.

*****

2. PTSD: Do Not Forget a Soldier's Heart [in 9 Short Sentences]

Lost in Terror when My Bottom Found Me,

Then This: So Close to PTSD, I wrote:

A Soldier's Heart is what they called Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) during the U.S. Civil War (which ended in 1865, 156 years ago). They did not know what else to call it. It was at the core of what they felt. "He's suffering from a Soldier's Heart," they said.

Time marches on (and did march on) and during World War One the same sick soldier would be called Shell-Shocked. The munitions changed and the positions changed, the diagnoses altered slightly from the Soldier's Heart to the shell-casings of bombs dropped too near.

The concentric circle of war overlapped once again in World War Two and combat stress reaction and a spray of other diagnoses erupted as the medicalization of symptoms evolved and the prescriptions changed.

Today we call it PTSD and for a second we may look upon that same soldier as if under a microscope whose magnification may bring us closer to the truth found possible through advanced scientific methodologies, yet somehow far further from the man, the man an echo beneath a barrage of symptoms...

Do Not Forget a Soldier's Heart...

*****

3. THE RESILIENCY OF RECOVERY ACCRUED

I identify myself now as an alcoholic in long-term recovery. Strong, resolute, unwaveringly committed to continue on this sober path, helping others where and how I can. This is how I spend my days. Decades of less than minimum wage pay as a waiter and bartender do not a mogul make. Advertising Coordinator at a Casino (1988) was my last 'real job' before my long, slow and painful alcoholic descent. A small advertising agency I co-owned, which disbanded a few years before that, did little to add to my Social Security benefits 30-some odd years later.

My short stint at what was then Merv Griffin's Resorts International Casino & Hotel ended when higher-ups insisted upon my seeing a therapist to discuss my problems with alcohol. Steeped in denial, I quit and immediately started a full-time food server position rather than face up to my alcoholism.

Recurring emergency room visits evolved into two short stretches at what was then the Atlantic City Detox. Eventually beyond their resources, the hospital arranged for my first real Rehab Hospital in Lakewood, New Jersey.

"When I first got out of Lakewood Hospital's rehab wing, I wore the plastic patient's I.D. bracelet for three months. That bracelet was my Scarlet Letter and my Red Badge of Courage, ever reminding me that I have a sickness, an illness, an identity that I could not change, that I am an Alcoholic Forever. One of my forever's would have to be that I would have to change if I were to remain sober. I did not know it then, couldn't have known it, but that plastic I.D. bracelet was like my own personal 'Serenity Prayer'* incarnate, unspoken, felt, neither consciously known nor understood."

The point I'm making here is that sobriety is so very fragile, and I was so very empty and lost when I first got sober that very first time. Multiple relapses would follow, but that patient's I.D. bracelet comes back into my consciousness often, reminding me of the road I had to travel before I eventually found sustained sobriety and an identity of my own.

That bracelet was the only thing I owned at that time because even the clothes on my back were really the gift of the Atlantic City Rescue Mission where I lived until I could scrape together enough money for a single room in a boarding house.

Today, I know that "nothing matters more than we remain sober because when we remain sober everything matters more."

One of my many, many mores is my memory of the plastic bracelet essential to saving my life as a symbol of change and hope. I discarded my old life and with help was brought forward to this new, vibrant and doable, durable life of recovery. Like that bracelet, I would have to learn a certain plasticity as I was bent and pounded into a new shape, transitioning from an alcoholic in his cups to a sober being who yielded to the permanent resiliency of recovery.

"And once the storm is over you won't remember how you made it through... You won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm's all about" - Haruki Murakami

That's more than good enough for me, the resiliency of recovery accrued.

*****

4. A Second Chain of ADDICTION BROKEN (& Celebrated)

The consequences of addiction lead down many paths that in recovery we struggle to conquer.

After 8 years of being on the wagon, off the wagon and back on again, I finally had my last and final drink. Four years after that, four years into what is now my 18th year of continuous recovery, I broke the second chain of my past addictions:

I QUIT SMOKING!

There are two relevant things I wish to express here:

1) Change your perspective and it will change your life.

2) Become responsible for the inevitable consequences which arrive long after your addictive behaviors no longer control your life.

One of the simplest and most life-changing things I ever read was folded countless times into the tiny pamphlet that accompanied the Quit Smoking Patches I used to help me taper off my addiction to nicotine. Prior to this, for my 8 years of on again, off again sobriety, I had begun to think of myself as The Relapse King.

CUT TO THE CHASE: That little pamphlet, paraphrased here, said something this "Don't think of yourself as a smoker who is trying to quit. Think of yourself as a former smoker."

BAM! I had a little epiphany (of sorts). I shouldn't have thought of myself as The Relapse King. I should have thought of myself as a former drinker seeking long-term recovery. That tiny leaflet changed my perspective on quitting smoking (and drinking) from the get-go.

CHANGE YOUR PERSPECTIVE and you will CHANGE YOUR LIFE.

More than 8 years after I quit smoking, I was diagnosed with Cancer, an unintended and almost inevitable consequence of 42 years of smoking two or more packs of cigarettes a day.

Today, in Recovery, I am becoming Responsible for Whatever Else Hits the Fan from my long, dark and inglorious past.

4 years this March since my Cancer Diagnosis (As of today, I remain cancer-free).

13 years since my last cigarette.

After an earthquake, the aftershock tremors may go on indefinitely.

Today, I celebrate this breaking of the second chain of addiction.

I was a chain smoker. That chain has now been broken.

I have not let Cancer break me. I am responsible for my Cancer recovery.

My perspective has changed and will continue changing.

Life is good.

*****

5. When "HOPE ITSELF HAS BECOME DEGENERATIVE," Strive Anyway!

Addiction is a degenerative disease characterized by progressive and sometimes irreversible deterioration and partial or total loss of all matter of bodily functions and organs.

Some changes are unchangeable (I'm getting a little choked up here).

Imagine being the sibling, parent or child of someone deep into their addiction. Now imagine wondering if the addict doesn't stop now, they may be on the road to where certain changes to their brain will become permanent. It may be too late already, you think.

You know that the addict or alcoholic is still using because you see with your own eyes that they have been slowly dying. You are glad when they get arrested because you know that when they are behind bars, their disease has also been arrested. It's not living, but it's not dying either. You squeeze a little hope out of this jail cell interruption. This is wearing on you, has been wearing you down for years now. Your hopes are slowly eroding, hoping for the best, but beginning to expect the worst.

Each time, each relapse, each arrest, each drama more like the countless times before. Hope itself has become degenerative.

Unwillingly, you are swept up in your user's addiction too.

You, too, will now need help.

Whether you can feel it yet or not, you are becoming the victim of a victim of addiction. Twice removed from reality you may begin to wonder about those around you. Are they becoming a victim of a victim of a victim? Thrice removed?

Addiction spreads outward from the human pool, infecting the waters.

None will be untouched.

These waters have become dark and silent.

You have long felt that everything you do and/or don't do has somehow become part of the problem.

"You didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it."

You'll hear this in an Al-Anon meeting. The 3 C's. Cause, Control, Cure. "You didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it."

There are no 100% right or easy answers. Every situation is different. Every person is different.

It is easy to forget that Change is Possible.

"Addiction spreads outward from the human pool, infecting the waters. None will be untouched.

These waters have become dark and silent."

"Hope is still possible," I tell you.

You are reluctant. You've heard it all before, from the addict, from others in recovery, from deep within your own heart (I'm getting a little choked up here).

Change is Possible.

I've seen it before.

I warn you that I've seen people suffer permanent brain damage. Suicide. Complete and utter hopelessness. But I have seen change, too. The possibility of change. The reemergence of hope after the smallest hope seemed nothing less than foolish.

I have seen too, that recovery may miraculously spread outward from the human pool, purifying the waters. All may begin to heal. These waters may become restorative and resilient.

"It is not the most intellectual or the strongest of species that survives; but the species that survives is the one that is able to adapt to and adjust best to the changing environment in which it finds itself."- Charles Darwin

These are the waters in which we find ourselves. These are the waters of addiction and these also are the waters of recovery. Every flick of our fins may move us towards the Beauty of Recovery and away from the Complicit and Degenerative qualities of Addiction.

Swim in the direction of Recovery and away from the progressive, downward pull of Addiction. There are 10,000 ways forward.

Find your way forward because "nothing matters more than that we remain sober because when we remain sober everything matters more."

Recovery is possible, doable, irreplaceable.

Strive.

Strive on.

It is the least, the most and sometimes the only thing that we can do.

Strive!

******

Immerse yourself in my Descent into Addiction and eventual Recovery in my Autobiographical Fiction, ALL DRINKING ASIDE: The Destruction, Deconstruction & Reconstruction of an Alcoholic Animal

(Find it on Amazon. Book it here): https://lnkd.in/esP83n-c

Check out my NEW Non-Fiction, BECOMING UNBROKEN

#alcoholism #addiction #recovery #books: Reflections on Addiction and Recovery

(Find it on Amazon, Book it here): https://lnkd.in/dkF767RT

Both Books are Available in Print and Kindle Editions.