Alcoholism

Where Does God Fit into My Recovery from Alcoholism?

Alcoholism, God, Purpose By Matt Salis 7 Comments

Climbing a 14er Looking for GodLet go and let God is the cornerstone of Alcoholics Anonymous. My rejection of this mantra is one of the main reasons AA never worked for me.

 

Let me be clear: I reject the slogan. I do not reject God. Quite to the contrary, actually. I have been a believer and practiced my faith to varying degrees my entire life. God is everything to me. I just don’t believe He wants us to hand Him the steering wheel of our life. I think He wants us to listen to His call and point ourselves in His chosen direction.

If You Drink, You Might Miss It

Alcoholism By Matt Salis 5 Comments

A Cold January AfternoonI expected big things to happen when I got sober two years ago. I expected weight loss and financial gain. I thought my marriage would improve and shame from over-drinking would diminish. I expected major, life-altering transition.

 

What I didn’t anticipate were the subtle, seemingly unimportant ways my life would transform in recovery. I spend a lot of time screaming about the dangers of anonymity and the death count from alcoholism. But when I’m quiet – when I take a break from screaming – when I lift my head up from my determination to battle the stigma – when I shut-up and listen, that’s when I am surprised by the unexpected.

Can Trust Overcome Tragedy?

Alcoholism, Family, Marriage By Matt Salis 6 Comments

My Wife Loving on a CatOne of our cats died last week. Even with an opening line like that, I can assure you this is not a story about a cat. I don’t like cats, so I would never write about them. I do like my family, however. In fact, I love them. So I’m going to tell you a little bit about my dead cat for context.

 

They called him Royal. I called him The White One or Princess. We had three cats, and two of them are orange. So, The White One was descriptive enough that my wife and kids knew which cat had drawn my ire. I called him Princess because as he walked, he crossed his back feet side to side, one in front of the other, like a fashion model walking down the runway. His tail was always pointed straight up as he sashayed along giving him a royal aloofness and sense of superiority. My wife found it majestic. I couldn’t understand why Princess was always showing me his pooper. I think he liked me about as much as I liked him.

Alcoholic Anonymity Kills

Alcoholism, Purpose By Matt Salis 6 Comments

Matt's PassionA reader contacted me last week and explained that he had five consecutive months of sobriety in 2017, but then decided he could handle drinking again. He didn’t go into detail, and I didn’t ask, but he told me 2018 ended very badly. He has been sober since New Year’s Day.

 

He asked me about my rock bottom. I told him about that and the many times I relapsed before I finally made it over the daunting and invisible hump to permanent sobriety. I shared my reading list of memoirs and brain chemistry explanations.

 

He would read one of my blog posts, comment about how strikingly similar his story was to mine, then ask me to point him to another of my posts from the past. This went on for some time, and it didn’t surprise me. There are lots of reasons people become addicted to alcohol, but the disease works basically the same for all of us. My reader was amazed to be reading his story in my words.

 

While we were discussing how I made it over that elusive hump, I told him that exactly one year prior, on January 10, 2018, I sent 3,000 emails – one to every email address I possessed – coming out about my alcoholism.

 

And that’s where my story and that of my reader diverged.

The #1 Reason Traditional Addiction Recovery Programs Fail

Alcoholism, Untoxicated Podcast By Matt Salis 4 Comments

A Balanced Plate from the Recovery Diet“Go to Dairy Queen and get your favorite flavor of Blizzard,” says my good friend and Untoxicated Podcast partner, Jason Polk. Jason is an addiction therapist who has for his entire career offered this advice to clients when they are dealing with cravings to drink alcohol or use. It is basic, fundamental advice given not just by Jason, but by most addiction recovery professionals and on every social media platform in early sobriety communities. The idea is that a sugar-filled treat will take the edge off the craving and be an alcohol or drug substitute. The associated phrase is, “harm reduction.” It makes sense, and it works in the short-run. The problem with this advice is it’s dead wrong and actually provides oxygen to the very addiction the sufferer is trying so desperately to suffocate.

Fixing Christmas

Alcoholism, Purpose By Matt Salis 5 Comments

Homeless Neighbors at Christmas in the ParkChristmas leaves me feeling like shit. It has for at least a couple of decades. I’m not talking about Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. I’m talking about the month or so that follows Christmas. It’s easy to point to January as a long, cold month devoid of major holiday festivities, and for many years, I blamed my post-Christmas blues on winter. A lot of people do. But that’s not it. Short days and cold temperatures don’t have much to do with it, really. My January dreariness is because I’ve been doing Christmas wrong.

When Love and Alcohol Can’t Coexist

Alcoholism, Family, Marriage By Matt Salis 12 Comments

The Pressure in My Head was UnbearableI didn’t even have to open the email. The subject line conveyed the devastating news. “Project Terminated.” Those two words delivered a massive blow to our plans for the next couple of years. We had an agreement to sell our business – an agreement complete with payment amounts and transition dates – and the buyer was trying to back out. There had been signs of his wavering commitment to the deal he had made, but my naturally optimistic outlook kept me pushing forward without consideration for what it would mean if he tried to turn and run. Now the reality stared me in the eyes from the subject line on my computer screen.

 

The pressure in my head began to build as the multitude of negative consequences raced through my mind. There would be practical, business matters to which I would have to attend. My lawyer would have to be consulted and litigation would have to be considered. I might have to go back to square one and try to find another buyer with barely two months left on our lease and, thus, not nearly enough time to make a deal in a new location with a new person.

 

But the work involved was secondary. The pressure in my head was because I knew the tidal wave of disappointment, stress and failure that had just crashed down on me would have no immediate relief. I had to live this nightmare with my eyes open and weaknesses exposed. I am an alcoholic almost two years sober. A lot of good has come from my work in recovery. For the next few days, however, sobriety meant only one thing. I was defenseless against the tremendous pain. I would have to wallow in the dire truth of my situation, and suffer through the disappointment, anger and fear without relief. I would not sleep – at least not much – and the other things that deserved my attention, like my wife and kids, would be all but ignored while I tried to figure out how to manage this disaster.

10 Gift Ideas for Concerned Drinkers this Christmas

Alcoholism, Shame of Sobriety, The Pit By Matt Salis 4 Comments

A Gift for a Concerned DrinkerWhen I quit drinking, I didn’t go to Alcoholics Anonymous because I was too ashamed – ashamed of my disease and embarrassed to be tainted with the stigma that is persistently and unfortunately associated with AA. I didn’t go away to a 30 day rehab because I couldn’t wrap my brain around letting go of my family and business responsibilities for a whole month. I took a different path to permanent sobriety.

 

I read. I read book after book after book about alcoholism and recovery. I read clinical books about how the body processes alcohol and the many diseases and biological dysfunction heavy drinking causes. I read books about neurotransmitters and other detailed explanations of brain function. And I read memoir after memoir written by alcoholics who had visited the same depths of despair where I wallowed, but made it out and had the strength to tell their stories.