The Year That Didn't Start in January

Counting recovery one day at a time

I don’t talk about recovery lightly because it saved my life. As of today, I am 3,383 days sober which translates to 9 years 3 months and 4 days.

Sobriety didn’t make me perfect. It made me honest. It made healing possible. This poem captures recovery as I lived it from the early days. The ones where your body remembers everything, your mind is loud, and you’re just trying to stay. I’m sharing this because I know I’m not the only one who has walked this path, or is standing at the beginning of it.

My year didn’t start on the first day of the first month. My year started on the 3rd day of the 10th one. I don't track days by days of the week anymore. I track them by number.

I'll write it all down and put it away in a place that I will forget to remember. And years from now, I'll come across my scribble from a time in my life where my cursive represented my chaos and these sentences were unrelenting problems that danced around in my head.

On Day 1, I wake up and I hate who I have become. I swallowed all of the pain and bit my tongue trying to absorb the bitterness that was me, and I could taste all of the regrets in my mouth.

Days 3-7, 1 think I have the flu because that sounds better than withdrawals and I don’t want to leave my bed. I can't seem to fall in love with the sun again. I'm sweating but it's cold and the blanket is the only weight in the world that I can handle.

Day 10, I can feel the world spinning underneath my feet, but I'm stuck. I've become content with being mediocre.

Days 30-45, music gives me anxiety. I can’t listen to it without thinking of you and my words mean shit now because I’m speaking in mistakes and I can’t understand how you don’t understand and I’m being suffocated by the truth in my throat.

Days 60-90, I was there but, I wasn’t really there. I am only background noise trying to get a grasp on life while struggling to untie my hands from behind my back.

Somewhere within these days I forgot how to be social. I think my words are stuck somewhere in a pill bottle or a beer can.

Day 100, someone close to me told me that expectation is like premeditated disappointment. And I don’t want to be a disappointment…

Days 120-160, there are two extreme emotions that I have come at a standstill with; extremely happy and extremely lonely. I’m not sure which one outweighs the other.

Day 164, I am feeling like my life has become a run-on sentence. No pauses, no breaks. But, I do know that this is just a shift in my new life chapter and it's only temporary.

Day 209, I found myself on a path where two roads meet. The signs read “Patience” and “Compassion.” I laid the foundation and built a home there.

Day 220, I have fallen in love with the sun and music again.

Day 225, somewhere between the Arizona sunset and the New Mexico sunrise, I realized who I was and I am not going to live up to the idea that anyone has of me.... and I don't want to.

Day 234, my life is no longer a Descendants album. When I get up in the morning to make some coffee, Milo, I don’t believe that ‘Everything Sucks Today.’

Day 255, I don’t get the feeling that time is slipping away from me anymore. There’s just this gentle tic-tock reminder to hold on and be ready for my next move.

Day 285, Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo, Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo, Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo. My gohonzon is a reflection of self and I am able to offer love because I no longer see hate when I look in the mirror.

Day 304, a man I met told me that nothing is out of place. There are no spare parts in the universe. And I believe him. I am exactly who and where I need to be. 

Day 326, I value my own self-worth and the peace that I can bring into the universe. Everyday I’m evolving into a better version of myself.

Day 365, “Today I am okay”. As the words roll off of my tongue, I smile knowing that no amount of yesterdays struggles or tomorrows worries can take that away from me. I am already whole.

Sobriety gave me the clarity to begin healing, and the practices I now share grew from that foundation. I don't write this as someone who made it out. I write it as someone who stayed. Today I am okay and that is enough.

Mel K.