Dear future me. You seem to be working your recovery again and gleeming with positive optimism. Everytime you get comfortable or cocky I want to remember everyday is your choice, remember who and what is helping you pull through this hard times. recently you were saying you have no friends, no family, you lost everything. But you have all of your sober time family, your two beautiful girls, your mother who tries her hardest, a recent fellow at work has befriended you and helped guide you with lifting and offering advice, you have unity and fellow ship of a.a and everyday whether you believe it or not you inspire someone.
I know you think sobriety was going to give you back what you had during your child hood, the innocence, the care free filled with imagination. The kid who got up on stage filled with thousands of ppl and sang itsy bitsy spider. You can find that peace again. Remember the teacher who picked on you bc you the thought the town you lived in was called new York, yeah let that go, remember the teacher who had the whole class laughing bc you couldn’t figure out a math problem, don’t worry about it. How some of your family picked on you bc your cousin was better at math then you, just let it go.
Did that cause you to start drinking, idk? They surely made you start to feel insecurities, you started sneeking alcohol to school thinking you were cool. It was just a weekend thing at first, your mother didn’t stop you because she thought it was just a phase. Then you dropped out of school bc you wanted to “work” no you wanted to start being able to party everyday, you couldn’t even show up to the jobs. You got your first dwi when you were 17. Lost it for a year and actually did try to get a lil bit of your life together and held a job and got your license back, quickly. So now it’s time to start partying again, insecurities start becoming worse. You act cool and bullied ppl around, driving around and racing drunk with ppl in your truck be thankful you didn’t kill anyone, you get your second dwi when your 19. Again wasn’t a drinking problem tho, it was just bad luck and dick head cop right ?. Well dont forget you almost ran that cop over the night before drunk driving while you he was dirrecting traffic. So we get are life together one more time, god believes in you so he gives everything back quickly. You go to St Joe’s and play the system actually getting the counselor to believe you don’t have a problem and get you’re license back again. Only to have society and your insecurities tell you it’s ok to party and do this stuff just stop getting caught. So we go back to thinking were cool, we don’t have a problem still drinking and driving thankfully again never killing anyone. We’re 21 and at the bar, your cousin offers you coke. You swore you would never touch coke, but alcohol took away your inhibitions and said fuck yeah let’s do it, you definitely wouldn’t of tried it sober, but your drunk and fuck me you loved it. It started out small just a lil here and there while partying, then you started needing it everyday stopped showing up to work or you made sure you had it at work. Found Mariah, she didn’t know about your problem, you actually tried to pull it together for her a lil bit. But you still needed to party, one of your connections asks to borrow your truck so he can go get and he will hook you up, you were sober from coke for a lil bit but you couldn’t resist free coke. Boom you’re hooked again and start crazy partying getting you’re 3rd dwi after a night of leaving Mariah home and speeding by the cops on a double yellow line. This time you’ve had enough of the cops harassing you and play victim, you actually start winning the case and kept you’re license…through all of this Mariah is pregnant with your first born autumn June Marie. You honestly didn’t even really care she was pregnant but acted like you did, alcohol and coke had you and wanted you to keep partying, doing drug runs leaving her home for days on end pregnant not knowing where you are. Finally one night you stay home, you shoo Mariah to bed so you can do coke all night. She goes into labor, but wtf why tonight in have coke to sniff. Well ok let’s go to the hospital, you bring the coke With you, Autumn’s born and you’re all coked out. You finally get some sleep wake up and need to go home to “shower” you do a bunch of coke again and don’t show up to the hospital for hours. Mariah has a feeling when you get back. Sometime after having autumn your lawyer needs 3000 more dollars to fight for your license but you don’t have it so plead guilty to your 3rd dwi. Well now your fucked, you have A 60,000 dollar truck you no longer care about so you let it get repossessed so you buy coke everyday. Your not helping with autumn, your just doing coke, running around hiding, making up exuses of you can’t pay rent, acting like your losing the money or your dog ate it. So you beat the dog for it. You were 23 and losing everything, Mariah cheats on you because she needs love and affection, it just makes you worse you hold ressentment and keep the drug and alcohol going. You really start going down hill it’s 2018 you haven’t had a license in about 4 or 5 years. No money, in debt, couldn’t be a father, but yet still think you need coke and alcohol. You’re so depressed that you decided it’s time to stop doing this to your family, so you take a whole bottle of Tylenol, you’re drunk and going to bed. Something wakes you up and says wtf are you doing be a man and get it together so you go to the hospital and get your stomach pumped. Sit in icu for two days and doctors tell you how lucky you seriously are to be alive. You try rehab, only last 5 days because it feels like prison. But you manage sobriety for about a month, your buddies wedding happens and your tricked into thinking you can have some drinks. You get completely hammered and make a fool creating more insecurities and starting the addiction all over again. Back to coke on the daily, spending 600 or more almost weekly creating more debt. Youre sick of it again, and need to leave your family so they can have peace. January 30th you try hanging yourself, you cry to your mom and she doesn’t know what to do anymore. It turns into a fight and she tells you to go ahead and just kill yourself, so you Feb 2 you buy a bunch of coke and Adderall and go to your buddies house and hide in his basement doing it all ready to kill yourself again. God pulls you through to Feb 3rd even tho you don’t believe in him yet he brings you to Northstar, you have been sober since and actually got down and prayed to God February 23 asking for his forgiveness, and to plz take the obsession away. You may have had some struggles in this 175 days Mike. But have you drank? Do you still think things haven’t gotten any better? Do you still think ppl don’t care about you, you’re loved and you’re a great father. Youre gradually getting all the little things, peace, love, friends, confidence. It’s all coming. Don’t hold ressentment, don’t dwell on the past anymore. Believe in your higher power and always remember this is what made you who you are today.
That was really deep and thoughtful, Mike. I’m so happy to know you here and very proud of you. I think you’re a great person and friend. 
Thank you Donna. I was feeling this while I was here at work and figured it needed to be written down, I was going to try and save it for paper. But I got out what I could while it’s fresh, i have more I’m going to add to paper about how Addie came into the picture as well. But for now I got out what I need for my next hard time. Thank you for being here with me
Wow! That is some powerful writing there my friend. You’re doing an amazing job with your sobriety, I think being grateful for what we do have is a very powerful tool and something we should all do daily. It really helps me, especially when things get heavy and stressful…I wish you all the best, keep going one day at a time, thanks for posting this. 
Wow: that is a powerful, moving letter. Thank you for sharing, Mike - it’s an honour for us that you trust us with that.
I admire you very much, and as much as is possible online, I think of you as a friend. You are honest, with yourself and with others. You are not afraid of being afraid; you are not afraid of feeling incomplete. You live your life, your beautiful, growing life, fully and presently.
I admire you as a father. Your girls are learning from you what love and belonging feels like. They love you.
I admire you as someone who seeks his safe home in himself, so that he can be safe with others.
I admire you as someone who works his recovery day by day, as a process, living in the present moment.
Thanks for sharing your journey with us Mike 
Absolutely I agree. And thank you
Thank you Matt. I really do trust all of you, and as much as this story is personal. I do like sharing it,for me it helps me heal
Wow ! Great work.
I’m so proud of you for writing this Mike. Your girls are young enough to only know you as the great father you are. Thank you for sharing!
So privileged to get to read this it is very powerful and much respect to you for sharing that, it’s definitely motivating. Thank you 
Thank you guys, I appreciate all of you and the support
He’s building up his memories now so he can treasure them after his girls grow up and spread their wings
Wow. Thank you for this. This was so powerful and yes I definitely believe we are a sober family. I look forward to hearing from people daily. That they are okay and still battling and pressing on and winning just for today. This was very courageous to share and it was very moving. You don’t need booze or drugs when you have us as we ALL got your back! Keep up the good work! You should be proud. Be kind to yourself and keep on!
It certainly makes it real writing down where addiction take us, you are doing some amazing work 