Day 5 in a few hours, I’m very grateful for that! I’m of course sitting here wondering how I got here, as if I haven’t pondered that a million times before🤪. But something new has come to mind going wayyyyy back. So listen, not writing this for anything other than this is my truth, no sympathy, if anything please share your thoughts, ideas, maybe you have been through something similar, what worked for you? My dad was addict my whole life, all kinds of different drugs or booze, I don’t know if he was ever not in an altered state, even with that my life was actually pretty normal, middle class life, my mom was a saint (at the time) , have a sibling, lots of extras in life…but it was the violence, the horrible beatings we all took, sometimes with metal bats, sometimes just with his hands, the guns in our faces, the having my mom wake me up in the middle of the night to sneak to a hotel to stay for God knows how long again when he had finally passed out, we couldn’t go to my grandmas or other family because he always showed up with guns terrorizing everyone. When I was 11 I sent him to jail, he almost killed my mom with knife after coming home from the bar, I called and the police and he was taken away. Life went on without him in it for a while, only for my mom, who never drank to become a full blown alcoholic within months, my bro is older so he was already at college, here I am now 12, home alone every minute I wasn’t in school or with friends. I moved out at 14 with older friends, in an apartment, got a job at 15 and got on with my life. I’m highly successful in my field today, perfect family, husband, perfect everything but me. I have always looked back on those years and thought they made me stronger, that I’m going to accomplish everything and more just to prove the world wrong, I’m not a lost cause because of how I grew up, but now sitting here in my current state day 5 after a relapse wondering, did it actually make me weak? Keep in mind I didn’t jump into using anything actually until my 30’s, so did it just catch up to me? Or did I make a conscience choice?
I believe we all make that choice at first , but I don’t think we just wake up one day and say “oh I want to be an addict today and for the rest of my life!” No. Our brain decides that for us. And I wish more people understood that!! What you like, I may not … and vice versa! (Hope this made sense lol)
Your late bloomer like me😁 I recently had relapse but it truly slap some sense into me I don’t belong in that lifestyle nomore it will never gonna be the same. Thankyou for sharing your story… Sending positive thoughts and vibes your way
Your 30s is when you start really gaining perspective on your childhood. It happened both to me and to my wife, and shook us both up quite a bit. We communicated, sought counselling, spoke with friends, and it’s made us stronger. But it has required us to significantly re-evaluate ourselves and realize that it wasn’t as simple as we imagined back then.
You’ve been through relentless physical and emotional abuse. That is not normal. You survived by existing in survival mode. Survival mode is about having some food and somewhere to sleep (which can be escaping to a hotel at times). It is about basic physical needs.
Survival is about limiting vulnerability, which makes intimacy difficult. I don’t mean sexual intimacy, though that is a part of it; I mean emotional and relational intimacy. (Edit to add: human connection. We need human connection. We need to not be alone.)
Recovery is a process of learning to be intimate. Learning to have relationships of healthy exposure and understanding: first with yourself (exposing, seeing, accepting yourself; that is a vulnerable process), then, if you choose to, with others.
You are entering a new chapter of your life, where you will become intimate with yourself. The pain and abuse you have been numbing will come up. You will have to face it. You may feel afraid; that’s ok. Take it one day at a time and look for support. You need support. You can find it online, you can find it in groups & communities (Resources for our recovery), you can find it in other healthy environments. But you do need it. You cannot put up a tough face and tough this one out. It doesn’t work that way; you’ll have to build a support network of sober contacts who can help you walk this path.
You’re a good person and you deserve a safe, sober life where you can be your full self. 
I guess what I struggle with and maybe why it’s hard to admit to myself that I made that choice, because I knew the consequences. I watched my dad be a person he didn’t want to be no matter how hard he tried, even the medical community didn’t think his body could live without it anymore and he was on methadone before people even heard of methadone or opioid addiction. 280 mg a day, close to his death when he was on fentanyl it wasn’t even enough he was begging for opium… point being I knew not to pick up and the risk I was running and I still fucking did it, why?
Thank you so much. Wow, I’m not gonna lie your post scares me horribly🥲 I can’t relive that again, most people don’t make it out the first time. I do appreciate your honesty and my eyes burning with tears tells me that your right
Thank you so much, I appreciate your support and if you need anything, I hope I can help you someday too.
You are not alone and you do not have to do this alone (and you should seek support).
Take it one step at a time. You’re right that it is a whole childhood and youth of pain and it cannot be processed in one go.
You don’t have to relive your past. Your focus is on building a constructive present, and part of that is learning to not run from your past. You can accept it and let it go, without having to relive it. (Yes there will be pain as you learn to let it go, but you will find new strength as well.)
Can you do some therapy? I have been doing that off and on for 5 years now and it has helped me unpack things. It also helps to have a one on one with a trained therapist who can guide you in the process of understanding yourself.
Also - remember the focus is on building your present. You don’t have to re-experience every single thing you lives through. Your goal is on building a grounded, constructive present. Both therapy and recovery groups help with that.
One thing that’s for sure is you can’t live with what you used to do; using / escaping through drugs isn’t working. So, it’s time for a change. Take it one day at a time and focus on building that constructive present, and you’ll get there.
I haven’t been to therapy since I was 11, obviously the state intervened once he was arrested, after learning SOME of my story, I had a therapist look at me and say, with tears, this is the worst case of abuse I’ve seen and then I know what your going thru. That was it for me, thanks and no ya don’t haha! I did end up in juvenile institute for almost a year at 13 because I too had become very violent and got expelled from school and got in countless fights, if there was an opportunity I was in the middle of it, I just had so much anger, anyway, one of the counselors in there I actually grew to trust, we still talk 30 years later, he’s almost 70 now. He calls me his success story, oh boy, if he only knew…
And I don’t hold any resentment and anger for my Dad, quite the opposite actually. My heart breaks for him his time on this earth was miserable and I love who he really is, so I always considered that I did let go and forgave….is that not the case?
Is it your job to forgive your dad? Why?
My point is: it’s not really about your dad. It’s about you.
Do you forgive yourself?
I think it’s more for me. The reality is he probably didn’t care either way, but I always attributed what he did to the substances he was on, not who he really was. I mean how could someone willing be a monster like that? The perfect storm, his addictive nature and always seeking and the ability to, my grandparents paid for everything, our houses, cabins boats etc so he was enabled his whole life. I never turned my back on him, there would be long stretches we didn’t interact, years, but in the end I always worried about him and reach out.
I believed that I had to be perfect and hide my flaws. That stems from shame within myself believing that I must be a mistake, a piece of worthless garbage. It’s common for those that grew up with abuse and/or abandonment. Shame is the root of my addiction.
No. I expect way more from myself, that haven’t been able to do. I did what I very literally despise, how can you just tell yourself it’s ok forgive yourself. I knew the consequences and I did it anyway
I don’t even know what to say to this, not in a bad way at all. I’ve never had anyone say that to me, and I’ve heard ALOT. I have to process this…
Another perfectionistic comment I would say to myself rooted in my own unhealthy shame.
So, you’re being the exact opposite with yourself than you are with your dad. You are setting impossible standards for yourself, while at the same time not having standards for your father.
You are living in a contradiction.
Neither perspective is helpful for you (or anyone else). Because both sides of your contradiction are impossible (it’s impossible to reach the “standards” you’re setting for yourself and it’s also impossible to not recognize that your father did things which are criminal and which he should not have done, irrespective of his history - all humans know these things are wrong, at a deep level; if they didn’t know they were wrong, they wouldn’t try to hide them or obscure them) - because your contradiction is impossible, you needed an escape.
And you found one in your drug, in your addiction.
This type of contradiction is very common in addiction. At some point all of us fell into something that numbed our sense of paralyzing contradiction. It numbed the impossible feeling we had.
Eventually we realized that our addiction was an empty, hollow lie. At that point we had to ask for help to climb out of the hole we’d dug for ourselves. We find this help in recovery programs and/or counselling. We find this help in recovery groups like Talking Sober.
We have to learn to live in a more complex understanding than we did with our contradictory past. The real world is more complex and we have to learn the emotional and mental self-management skills to navigate it. We can and do learn these things. It takes time and it is scary.
You’re starting on a new chapter of your life. Take courage. You are imperfect, like all of us. That’s ok. You don’t have to be perfect. You are accepted anyway. You matter and you belong. You are a worthy person, a good person, no matter what your past, and you deserve a safe, sober life where you can be your full self.
I guess I don’t look at it as a contradiction because that’s all of knew of him, and after he was out of the house and I was safe for a few years I felt bad for him and for me, well at least I thought I knew me, that wasn’t me which is why it is harder to forgive. I don’t know if that makes sense. I also know that I always did seek his approval in some f’d up way, I realized in my teens on my own, absolutely knowing for a fact that is because of the abuse and the feeling of not being accepted by him, but I could never stop, did it up until he died. I would question myself as a kid in my teens, what is wrong with me that I can’t stay away? What is wrong with that I want to know him and believe he can be a dad?
Still processing your line of thinking, I don’t know if I agree but I have to think on this more 