Hello World!
Tough times don’t last, tough people do. – Robert Schuller
My name is Ciana ‘Ci’, and I am an alcoholic. I’ve struggled with addiction for most of my life. As a teenager I experimented with drugs and alcohol but was always able to stop using drugs without any significant withdrawals or impact. Alcohol on the other hand, was not so easy.
I’ve maintained sobriety in the past for long periods of time but always given in to ‘one drink’. For those of us suffering from addiction you know that one drink is too many, and one more is never enough. I wanted this time to be different, I needed this time to be different, because no matter how much I lied to myself and tried to lie to everyone else, I could see the effects in every aspect of my life.
So, I went to rehab! I started journaling as part of my daily routine in rehab. I kept thinking about something I heard there that really resonated with me. I watched a recording of Brene Brown who said, “One day you will tell your story of how you overcame what you went through, and it will be someone else’s survival guide.” I don’t know if this blog will become someone else’s survival guide or just my journal to reflect back on later, I will be stronger for it either way.
May you be sober and happy always! Ci
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Some Days, Sober Is Enough
6.28.25 Being sober doesn’t mean there aren’t shit days. Life still lifes me. I have days when I don’t want to get out of bed. Days when my skin feels like it’s crawling because I can’t get out of my head or out of my own way. And sometimes it’s not even the whole day—just
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Paradox of Conformity
6.27.25 I really appreciated the Daily Reflection for today. It actually made me chuckle, because I’ve never been one to conform to anything. Mostly because of sheer stubbornness—and what I now know is my disease: addiction. AA changed that for me. I made the choice, and I continue to choose every day to live by
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Security Blanket
6.26.25 Grief is such a strange companion — familiar, unwelcome, persistent. I’ve lived with it for so long, in so many forms, that it feels woven into my DNA. But today, I’m acknowledging something important: even though grief may stay, it doesn’t have to direct. Letting go doesn’t mean forgetting what mattered. It means releasing
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I Wanted to Run Away Today
6.25.25 I can’t remember the last time I didn’t want to come home. But today, while I was at the office, I checked my personal email and saw a delivery notification. The sender’s name stopped me cold—it was the package with keepsakes made from Tyson’s mane and tail. One for Kendall, one for me. We