The One Thing that actually Comforted me through Early Sobriety.

From the time I came to the realization that alcohol was damaging my life and relationships to the time I found permanent sobriety, 10 years elapsed.

It was the most traumatic and horrifying decade of my life-full of dry periods of various durations, broken rules surrounding my attempts at moderation, a growing chasm in my marriage, and dramatically intensifying alcohol-induced depression and anxiety.

If I’m lucky enough to live to 100, that’s still a double-digit percentage of my life wasted. Now, in my third year of recovery, the significance of the chunk of life I spent analyzing the severity of my affliction and avoiding the inevitable outcome is breathtaking to me.

Oh, what I would give to have those 10 years back!

At the top of the list of reasons that it took me 10 long years to find lasting recovery was my perception-the very popular societal perception-of traditional methods of recovery. This opinion was developed over nearly a half century by media and pop culture, and also regularly reinforced through the stigmatized remarks of my friends and neighbors.