08.29.25
I needed a break today. Work and life have felt so heavy lately, so I took a long lunch and got a pedicure—the polish was just a bonus, I was there for the chance to sit in that massage chair for an hour. Letting the rollers dig into my back while my brain mercifully slowed down. Why don’t I have one of these chairs at home, damn it?
The alumni meeting later was powerful. A resident shared the topic: rock bottom—how you know when you’ve hit it, and how you begin the climb back up. Rock bottom looks different for all of us, but also the same. There’s always another trap door, always a way to go lower, deeper. Just when you think you’ve sunk as far as you can, addiction shows you otherwise. And there’s always that self-justifying voice telling you it’s not “that bad,” convincing you you’re still in control. But the thread that ran through everyone’s shares was this: we don’t get up by ourselves. It’s the hand of another addict, the fellowship, the community that pulls us out. Someone who’s been where we’ve been and still reaches out anyway. That’s the way home.
Afterward, I called my mama. She started Al-Anon when I went to rehab, and it’s been its own journey for her. We talked about forgiveness. How it’s not really about the other person at all—it’s about us, about releasing what we’ve been carrying. Forgiveness doesn’t come like some magic fucking wand in the night. You don’t just wake up one morning and all the wounds are healed, all the scars erased. Some of them are too deep. But even being willing to forgive—just the willingness—starts to shift something inside.
She called me back thirty minutes later, her voice lighter than I’ve heard in years. She told me she had a spiritual moment after our talk. She finally decided to forgive someone she’s held resentment toward for thirty years, and she said it out loud. I could hear the release in her tone, the weight lifting from her shoulders. I felt proud of her and grateful at the same time. She’s learning to let go. And I love that we’re learning together—each in our own program, each in our own way, but walking the same road home.
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