Serenity in Sobriety

I Blog about Addiction, Trauma and Recovery

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Normalization and Stigma

            Downtown Prince George on any given time, day or night, you’re not going to get away from the poverty that consumes the people that are left to fend for themselves. Opportunities taken away and choices made. The stigma that berates the very people that hide in the night and walk around in plain sight during the day. The businesses are affected, garbage meaninglessly thrown…

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500 days!!

            Today marks 500 days! A huge milestone in my life and the days keep on coming one day at a time. I remember saying once that if I only put 1% every day, it will add up to something remarkable and I am so very grateful for what I have accomplished and it started with 1 day.

            Today marks another milestone for my very best friend Stefanie, she is 2 years sober…

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Keeping Strong

            July 31st 2020

            My work I am doing is nothing what I used to do before however it is more meaningful than I have ever imagined it. My jobs in the past were mostly camps, mining, sawmill, rigs out in Alberta and running heavy duty machinery. I was a functioning alcoholic at best and there were obvious great points however there were low points as well. I…

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Progress

            July 28th 2020

            This is the first Blog I am doing since being out of the recovery house, I’ve already had some struggles and some of my support has vanished. I’ve reached out to others as I’ve needed them however I was expecting with expectations and that is not fair to me and to my others. I’ve met back up with a bunch of people from in and around Prince…

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Sympathy versus Empathy

July 18th 2020

            Sympathy Vs Empathy

            I did a program about this a few weeks ago and it really stuck around in my brain and even had a few debates with other people, I want to talk about it and give my best view on it.

            “Sympathy Drives Disconnection” a quote from Brene Brown on a video that was presented in the program about this topic. I had to…

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July 10th 2020

            Living in a Recovery House is not what a lot of people would do, face their truth become something other than normal however normal is not what I am. Living here in the Okanagan has given me opportunity to become unique, it has given me struggles and hardships and the ability to say I am grateful to be an alcoholic/addict. It has shown me that that I had to go through what I…

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The F word

            I’m curious to what you’re thinking when I call this writing The F Word. I’m talking about feelings. I’ve heard recently that in the beginning of recovery that I shouldn’t trust my feelings cause the best of it got me into recovery to begin with and nothing else. I can say that’s true enough, feeling the way I was feeling was horrible to say the least. Feelings got me to…

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I-S-M in Alcoholism

I-S-M in Alcoholism #trauma #addiction #recovery #alcoholism #ISM #symptom #disease

Alcohol is only a symptom of the disease alcoholism. You can take the alcohol out of alcoholism but what is left is the “ism” part of this disease. The ism is why we drank, the ism is what drove us to bad neighborhoods in our mind, who drove our bus. The ism will quickly get you drunk again if not addressed in recovery. The disease—the ‘ism’ of alcoholism—involves more than the act of…

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Distractions

Distractions #serenityinsobriety #trauma #addiction #Recovery #Distractions #awareness #action

            What are distractions to us? Which are good and which are bad? Why do we do and how do we do? These are some valid concerns to how we distract ourselves and how some are good and some are bad. This topic I will be talking from an “I” perspective because I cannot speak for others and that is fair enough right? I’m going to say “right!”

            I’ve noticed how I’ve…

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Things I learned in treatment

            Thinking about my time in treatment I learned some valuable lessons about myself of how I was looking at life externally rather than within myself. Taking on others stuff and making them my own. Bringing me everywhere I went and not being present with what was actually going on around me. The biggest thing that caught my eye was that I was always saying that being “aware”…

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Broken Boundaries

            Part of this week was working around boundaries and what was the greatest boundaries we lost growing up. I heard everyone’s stories and it touched me in a way that made mine incomprehensible to everyone else’s however that’s the thing about our individuality, it’s owning our own story and what that story means to us. Like I said some of their stories were incredible and I am…

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Dear Alcohol

            The thing is I am going through Treatment here at Round Lake Treatment Centre as a 7 week refresher and the Kool thing is that I heard a saying that when the students ready, the teacher will show. Unexpectedly 31 teachers showed up for me as my peers and I couldn’t be more grateful.

            So I took this program last summer and I met some amazing people and did some…

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Baby Jesus take the Wheel

Baby Jesus take the Wheel #trauama #addiction #recovery #serenityinsobriety #realeyes #realize #reallies

I have had some instances in my recovery where I micro-manage, I let ego and pride take over, I don’t receive messages and I can be a plain out asshole cause I am reverting what I have learned my whole life. Recovery is the hardest thing I have done to date. It was a lot easier just over 300 days ago that if any of these problems came up I could easily shut people out, walk away,…

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Lateral Violence

Lateral Violence

What is lateral violence? Although it is found everywhere, lateral violence in this case refers to its impact in communities, workplaces, homes, events and literally everywhere there are people. Lateral violence is a learned behaviour as a result of colonialism and patriarchal methods of governing and developing a society.

What are the behaviours linked with…

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Understanding Trauma

Understanding Trauma

Traumatic events and experiences are subjective. Subjectively, some individuals are more vulnerable or susceptible to stress than others who are more resilient or resistant.

How are traumatic occurrence affects an individual depends on many factors, including characteristics of the individual, the type and characteristics of the events or occurrence,…

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"How I Met Your Mother"

"How I Met Your Mother"

Sometimes things have to fall apart to make way for better things

– Ted Mosby (Josh Radner)

            My life had to fall apart from what I was doing, to make way for better things I was destined to do. It was me in a quote from a TV show that I watched called “How I met your mother.” I have watched this show many times before, yet this stuck with me.

            What came to…

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Writers Block -_-

Haven’t forgot about you all out there, I am having a bit of writers block and having to get as far as I can with my English 12 before I head back into Treatment. No I didn’t relapse, I’m going back to work on some core issues of sorts, I’m hoping that by being around new and raw people in recovery will invoke new things I can work on and do this all before April 7th because this is my…

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