This post was originally published on September 8, 2014.
While everyone reacts to being sober differently, one thing is certain—you will change. Whether your change is for the better or for the worse is up to you and your willingness to do the work, but if you simply stop drinking and using drugs, you will see a difference in yourself.
Sometimes it’s hard to see our own progress. But when you take your sponsor’s suggestions and begin to live by the principles of the program, you start to show the world what you are made of. And one of the biggest, most common surprises that alcoholics in recovery experience is the fact that they are—despite their personal history and statistics—really solid people. So it was a great shock to me when I began to hear some of the things listed below after a lifetime of having heard the opposite:
1) “You’re early!”
My entire life I have been late for everything—school, work, parties, dates; I was even three weeks late to my own birth, which seemed to set the pace for the rest of my life. I have never been a morning person (I was also born in the late afternoon) and adding a hangover to a wake up problem is a recipe for unemployment. Every therapist I had said if I really wanted to change the behavior I would, so there must have been something about being chronically late that worked for me. I concluded that it was a mixture of self-sabotage and untreated ADD. But when I got sober, a strange thing happened. I started arriving on time or early to everything I did. At first, it was with great effort—I didn’t want to be seen as a mess anymore—but then it sort of became effortless. I just stopped considering lateness an option.
2) “Wow, that’s really impressive!”
As a life long underachiever, I have always barely passed everything I was ever involved in. I never was the best or even close to the best at anything—nor did I want to be. I looked at life as something to get through, not something to thrive at. But once I stopped drinking and started uncovering the shame I had about being an unimpressive human, I began to want to challenge myself. I felt strongly that if I could quit drinking, I could probably do anything I set my mind to. By my second year of sobriety, I had run a full-length marathon in Hawaii and was doing stand-up comedy on a regular basis.
3) “Can you drive me to the airport?”
While nobody in their right mind would strive to be the person people ask to drive them to the airport at 5 am, I was overcome with shock and joy the first time someone chose to rely on me to get them to the airport on time and in the wee hours of the morning. None of my pre-sobriety friends would ever think of depending on me for anything, except maybe to get drunk and weird. The fact that someone saw me as responsible seemed like a miracle—almost as miraculous as the fact that I actually agreed to do it and then showed up. It taught me what it felt like to be respected—and I liked that feeling.
4) “What’s your part?”
Justified anger is a luxury of people who are not in 12-step programs. Of course, I still indulge in it, mostly with my non-sober friends who allow me to bitch about all the ways I have been screwed over by people. But when I am talking to my sponsor and other program people, I know that no matter what is bothering me, they will inevitably ask me what I think my part in the resentment is. It doesn’t mean I am necessarily at greater (or equal) fault but even if the answer is that I’m staying involved in a friendship which I know no longer serves me, I have been taught that I have a part (something that is equal parts helpful and annoying).
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