Month: November 2016

Mental Blackouts From A Sex And Love Addiction?

Is it possible to experience a mental blackout from something other than alcohol or drugs? That’s the question I’ve been pondering as of late in my recovery life. Why? Because of things I have not been able to remember at all, which people have been telling me recently we did together during a period of my life where I was heavily engaged in only one addiction, a sex and loved-based one.

First off, I should clarify what a mental blackout is before I proceed any further and it’s probably for the best I describe it in terms of those days when I used to get heavily inebriated. As back then, I’d often drink so much I’d go through periods of time where I was conscious but completely unaware of what I was doing. Each of those times I’d usually wake up in strange places having no idea how I got there or what took place for several hours prior. And sadly, the friends I had during that stage of my life frequently had to fill me in on those things.

Now zoom forward to a long stretch of time that spanned from 1995 to 2012. While I was sober from alcohol and drugs during that entire period, I was still heavily engaged in a sex and love addiction on and off throughout. And although I assumed I was completely aware of everything I did during all those years, I began to wonder if that was true because of things people have attempted to remind me of recently.

Take the other day for example, when I reconnected to a friend on Facebook I hadn’t spoken to in years. During an online conversation, he recollected my time in his hometown (Charlotte) and how he had picked me up at this guy’s house that I had been staying at while there. For the life of me, I wasn’t able to remember this house or the guy who owned it, even though I had supposedly spent several days there. Even worse, there were plenty of other mental blank spots from the trips I took to Charlotte.

Some could say that this is just a sign of aging and how I’m simply beginning to forget moments of my life because I’m getting older. I’d beg to differ though only in that I have a pretty great memory overall these days, much of which often seems to be photographic. And the only difference nowadays is that I’m sober from my former sex and love addiction. In Charlotte, I wasn’t. As there, I “dated”, or sexually pursued being the much better word to describe it, at least five different people at the same time.

Ever since reconnecting with this friend from Charlotte, I put a lot more thought to other moments in my life where my sex and love addiction was quite active. Take for example a trip I took with a guy I was once extremely obsessed with from Massachusetts around 2008. During it, we went to Six Flags Great Adventure and New York City. But here again, I was unable to recall all the rides I rode at the amusement park or what I actually did in New York City.

What’s ironic about all these memory lapses is that the moments I seem to remember the most during the sex and love addicted periods of my life are when I was in the midst of hooking up or attempting to hook up. Yet I’m unable to remember far too many other things that were part of my day-to-day living during that time.

So are these really the same type of mental blackouts then that I experienced from my alcohol and drug addiction? I guess it’s slightly different in that when I got overly drunk I couldn’t remember anything I did, yet when I excessively engaged in my sex and love addiction, I was only totally oblivious to everything going on around me except for the person who was the focus of that addiction.

Thus my conclusion is this. Addictions in general robbed me of many of my life’s fondest memories. Call them mental blackouts, call them memory losses, it really doesn’t matter. The fact is I don’t know if any of them will ever come back to me. But at least I can say this isn’t happening to me anymore, as working my recovery, doing the 12 Steps, and seeking to do only God’s will in life has thankfully changed all that. Now I can truly say that every moment, every memory, and every second of life are very precious to me and I want to remember them all. And I think I stand a pretty good chance of doing that, so long as I remain free from all addictions…

For New Blog

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson

“Queen Of Katwe”, A Film That Opens Your Eyes On Some Of Our World’s Poverty

Have you ever watched a movie where you found yourself being more interested in a certain aspect of the movie versus the plot itself? Queen of Katwe ended up being one of those for me.

Based upon the real life story of Uganda native Phiona Mutesi (played by Madina Nalwanga), Queen of Katwe revolves around Phiona’s discovery of an incredible ability to play the game of chess at a very young age. While the film itself was quite inspirational, I found myself more drawn to the fact that Phiona grew up in extremely impoverished conditions. Much of the film drew upon that and showed scenes from the conditions of the slums she once lived in.

Why her impoverished upbringing was far more interesting to me than the story of her becoming a master chess player is simply this. I have never experienced what it feels like to be poor like she did and to totally honest, much of the previous years of my life I was pretty ungrateful for the abundance that God had blessed me with since the day I was born.

Things like having running water, being able to take showers or baths, having ample food in the cupboards, sleeping on cushiony beds, and having windows and doors to my home that can actually be opened and closed were all things Phiona never knew during her childhood. Her home was initially a metal shack with one room and an area where she and her siblings slept next to each other on a hard slab. Water came from a rusty spigot in the center of town that she had to carry in buckets home each day. Food was consistently scarce for her and usually came from daily bartering on the streets. And due to how poor her family ultimately was, she spent most of her younger years not being able to get a proper education because they couldn’t afford to send her to school. Thus she was never taught how to even read or write. Each of these aspects of Phiona’s life were things that automatically came to me in the family I was born into. I grew up in one that was middle to upper class and I’m sure from Phiona’s childhood perspective, I probably lived a life of luxury.

I feel sad when I think about how ungrateful I used to be when billions of others were and still are living in severe poverty-based conditions just like Phiona once did. Yet it’s easy to forget about that in today’s society and instead dwell on nothing more than what we don’t have in life. Take when I was a young teenager for example. Back then every one of my neighbors had cable and I was angry that we didn’t. And when a childhood friend got a full-size arcade game for his garage, I became irritated at my parents when they didn’t get one as well. Those were just two of the many ungrateful moments I had in life that I never realized how good I really had it.

Thankfully I’m far more aware of it these days and am quite grateful now for things such as my humble abode, the food I eat each day, the clothes I have to wear, the water that comes into my home, and for so many other things that are a regular part of my life. As now I’m aware of people out there who don’t have any of these things and instead are living in dire straits like Phiona did during her adolescent years.

So while the Queen of Katwe movie was mainly about the emergence of a poor female chess player from Uganda, my interest remained fixated throughout the entire film on the conditions a little girl was born into and had to endure. Given the stark contrast to the rich bubble life I grew up in, I’m thankful to God for helping me to see just how much of an abundance I truly had growing up and still do.

It’s my hope each of you will think about this the next time you find yourself becoming ungrateful for anything you perceive is lacking in your life…

For New Blog

Peace, love, light, and joy,

Andrew Arthur Dawson