When I Lie, I'm High

Hi my name is Patrick and I am an addict.

"Hi Patrick."

I don't know how to start saying all of this and I don't quite care what anyone thinks of me for saying it.  It must be said and it must be said aloud.  No more hiding and no more lies.

Some of you now what it took to get me here and I'm not going to rehash an entire life to get the point across to those who don't, so you'll have to settle for the abridged version.  Suffice to say that I am an addict who had someone who truly tried to save me from myself.  I dropped my life and moved to New York for that woman.  I worked my ass off when I got there to make a life with that woman.  I asked that woman to be my wife.

They say that there is no one too stupid for recover, only those who are too smart for it.  Some think that they can do this on their own, that they are somehow better than their addicted peers.  I would be that oh so smart dumbass, but we'll get to that in a minute.

As I was saying, I had this woman once who took it upon herself to save me from my malfeasance.  I lost that woman because I am an liar and a addict.  She left me over the phone while I sat in green scrubs in a psych ward a thousand miles away from home.  So there you go, background.   Now, moving right along, I have a few things I need to say.

I've been having a really rough time getting over what happened in New York, I just can't seem to shake it.  I have been half-assing this program from the minute I didn't have to piss in a cup for this very hospital.  I can't seem to deal with the pain on my own, I keep taking the so-called "easy route."  I wrote this email the other night to said ex, I was drunk and feeling sorry for myself, hoping maybe she would say something that would take this pain away.  Maybe she forgives me, you know, maybe she understands. 

The old quote keeps ringing in my head:

"I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that I can never trust you again."

Shockingly enough she responded, I don't know what I was expecting to hear.  I wanted her to say that she loved me, that she knew that I loved her as well...I guess maybe I'm dumber than I thought.

"I never doubted that you loved me. But the lying came before me. The alcohol came before me. The drugs came before me. I was always last on your list of priorities."

Oh how that stung.  I feel it beating in my chest now, crushing me and begging me to get drunk and forget.  Trouble is that no matter how much I smoke, how much I snort or how much I drink...I don't fucking forget.  That's what makes this next part hurt so much.  You see, she ordered the three things I put in front of her just as they were intended.  They say the steps were written in order for a reason, so were her words.

Lies

Alcohol

Drugs

I'm might be dumb but I ain't stupid, I know why she left me and I fucking knew it before she ever wrote me back.  I've been living a lie my whole life and that lie has taken nearly everything from me, it almost seems I won't be satisfied until it truly takes the last things I have.  That brings me to my point.

I have these two orange keytags, "Orange you glad you're in recovery," you know?  It is more like, "orange you supposed to be clean when you take those fucking things?"  I took both of them under false pretense.  I lied about my clean time, talked out of both sides of my mouth in these meetings and fell back into the same piss poor routine that I have lived my whole life.  I thought for a while it was no big deal, I could hit that bowl one time or have just that one drink.  Kinda threw that theory out the fucking window driving home drunk the other night.  Took a keytag the next night, cause I was to embarrassed to admit it...pretty pathetic, huh?

So like I said before, "there is no one too stupid for recovery, only those who are too smart."  I guess I'm not so smart after all.  See, that email from the woman who ripped my heart out of my goddamn chest told me something I knew all along but did not want to admit.  I am fucking lying again, just like always.

When I lie, I'm high.

I want to give these two keytags back, I do not deserve them and I never should have taken them.  Think of me what you will for this, but it is better to feel the pain now than later.  It is time to take responsibility for my actions and stop hiding.  The lies have to stop or I will never get clean, I will never be happy, I will never hold down a job and I will never find love again.  I can't handle that thought, at least I can't handle the thought of preventing myself from the chance at each of those.  I would ask for your forgiveness but I know the only reprieve that matters is the one I give to myself.  I may fail again but for God's sake I must be honest about it and learn from my stumble.  Life on life's terms, right?