Narcotics Anonymous

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Post Info TOPIC: substituting addictions


Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 3987
Date:
substituting addictions


Hi folks,,,


back home after many days and slepless nites in hospital,, finally the doctors got the gall bladder renoved to save me from another attack of pancreitis !!!!


They say thers no problem and that a human can live well without a gall !!!


As i lay restless,, just in order to focus on recovery i took an inventory of my eating habits.


Id learnt that one result of obesity in the abdominal region is damage to the gall bladder or liver !!


Ive always had a paunch,, especially the last years of my using when i ate a lot of mutton and custard to keep myself safe from any ill effects of brown !!


Then in recovery,, via a therepeutic community first,,, i things like running and Yoga and got that paunch down.


Then I was doing meeting of another Fellowship,,, they had stopped their main drug of choice but man was food real big time with them.


I dont remember anyone at all in that felowship that had long abstinence,, who didnt have a paunch !!!


But my paunch was under control and i was an active,optimistic young man all over again !!!


Then after deciding to do the Fourth Step with my sponsor,,, and at the end of it i decided to first stop smoking and took someones help and did so !!!!


I was relieved after quitting sometime, the first time i had ever stopped smoking so long !!!


But i did notice i was eating a lot more now that my taste buds were working full time,,but justified that as part of getting healthy !!!


Then when i had an intense interaction again with my sponsor,,, this time i decided to quit meat and be vegetarian (though my sponsor of that time had become vegan !!!!)


I however did eat and less,,, in fact  I ate vegatarian food in largere quantities justifying that with my belief that i needed to eat more vegetarian to get the nourishment I got with nonveg !!!


So life went on,,,,i was a proud father, a good musician and businessman, a good son,and brother,.


Also a good friend to many as well as a sponsor and goodFellow NA !!!


Then three years ago when i was on a one year stint with a seven star hotel,,, i really got involved into that food,,,,,,fatty,oily,,,but tasty as hell !!!


I enjoyed the meals after and durng the sessions and made a lot of money too..


Then one nite i noticed a weird feeling in the stomach,,,, but that passed and so i let it be till the next time that came.....


then the duration got nearer !!!! there were amny sleepless nites but i did not once feel the need to go to a doctor,, thinking how they were not required yet !!!!


Then my music life got real busy and one of the rewards was the hearty meal,and the desserts that came after the show and boy did i hog !!!!


Mnay a time i was serious about getting tht paunch down but didnt really care as things seemed to be going my way !!!


The these last three four months the pain came back to haunt me at nites ,,, leaving me feeling real weird and unthankful for all else that was going my way !!!


Then came that nite when the pain got so intense,, the naxt morn i was in the icu and they did a laporoscopic stone removal,, followed by a complete removal of of gall bladder that they said was making those stones in the first place !!!!


So now my life takes a new turn,,,, im forced to shun fatty,oliy,spicy food and many things like desserts.


I know i need to surreder all that in order to even survive and recover from the problem.


Like Lon said 'giving up that leads to a better life,,,"or words to that effect !!


The message i get from this experience is that i had transferred my addiction to food !!!!


Narcotics Anonymous basically is for the drug addict,,,and the TEXT cleary says


""when we substitute one drug for another we release our addiction all over again"""


In my case though not a drug,, food became an addiction that i wasnt aware of,,, but now accept and it made my life unmanageable !!!


im back home this day,, got to take my medications and live just for today all over again ,,,


i need time to heal and get back to my music,,,,the only thing i know to do for a living !!!!


 


God Bless you !!!


Thanks for letting me share and take care you all !!!!



__________________
Raman an addict clean and serene just for today in NA Worldwide ; live to love and love to live the NA Way !!!
Lon


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 190
Date:

Hello Raman,
At least for me, NA focuses on the disease of addiction not a particular substance. When I got into 4th-7th steps a lot of things came to the surface that on the first look were not at all related to drugs.Many of the behaviors that I had to list on the 4th step were not obviously related to getting high, but they did put me into an emotional state that made using seem attractive. If all we had to do was stop getting high, we could simply stop using and life would get better. I not only want to be off drugs, I want to be able to live a happy life. From that comes my belief that all of my behavior, and all of my thoughts I have about myself need to be examined. If the review finds that they do not contribute to living a good life, I need to become willing to change them.

I'm glad you made it through the surgery safely Raman, and I wish you a speedy recovery from surgery. Thanks for sharing your life with us.

Lon

__________________
Courage is not the towering oak that sees storms come and go; it is the fragile blossom that opens in the snow.----Alice Mackenzie Swaim


Senior Member

Status: Offline
Posts: 100
Date:

thanks for sharing raman, glad you are gonna be okay. i've had to change my eating habits recently myself. like any addict i swing from eating too much to not enough.gotta find that middle ground! anyways you take care and thanks again.

__________________
just for today


Guru

Status: Offline
Posts: 3987
Date:

Many thanks Galeon and Lon,,,,,


many times i would eat and feel bad about it,,,,got down my self esteem no end,,,


food and anger have been real bugaboos in my recovery !!!


Now im going to have to do the Steps on these,,, and like my sponsor said=


Denial of reality is where it all began !!!!


And like Lon says,,,


i say too that I must now look closely at the anger aspcets in my life and how just a small shift in attitude and communication will go a long way in giving me more serenity and ease than i have now !!!!!



__________________
Raman an addict clean and serene just for today in NA Worldwide ; live to love and love to live the NA Way !!!
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