Category: Recovery From Addictions

It is said that resentment is the number one offender that leads many sober people to a relapse of their addiction, which is why I work diligently to remove any within me, and to seek the forgiveness of others if I discover I’ve harmed them somehow. So, when I learned not too long ago that a person I hadn’t spent time with for years didn’t want to come have a coffee with a mutual friend and I over potential tension, I made an attempt to connect with them to see if I had harmed them at some point in the past. Because I was totally unaware of anything I may have done to lead to such tension within them. When I finally got a response from them via text as to what the tension was all about, it wasn’t anything I had done at all. Rather, it was their opinion of me, and it was described in three words.

Annoying. Pretentious. Judgmental.

I was at dinner with a friend of mine when this text came through. And sadly, I let it ruin the rest of my meal because I continue to struggle owning what other people think of me, no matter how hard I try not to. I have worked so very hard to be a selfless person in my life and to erase the selfish nature of my past. I don’t think of myself as better than anyone else. I do my best to accept everyone as they are. And I try to keep my childlike sense of humor alive to keep going in a world I often feel less than in, especially when I find myself owning other’s negative opinions of me.

My only desire ever with this individual was to make amends if I had harmed them somehow, but ironically, one of the things I received in return from them was the very thing they were accusing me of being. Judgmental. But it shouldn’t matter what they thought of me. Their approval shouldn’t matter one bit. Except I can’t seem to shake this pattern of me owning what others think of me. So, I keep writing about it. I keep dealing with it in therapy. I keep trying to be a good person. Yet, I keep allowing myself to get struck down by others’ negative opinions of me again and again.

This individual like so many others who’ve had negative opinions of me in recent years have no idea the humility I’ve put myself through by being as transparent as I am through my writing and speaking on the life I’ve had. They don’t see the world I live in, one where I do my best to help so many, just to try to make a difference. But it shouldn’t matter they don’t see this. What should matter is what I will declare once more…

I AM A GOOD PERSON!

I AM A BEAUTIFUL SOUL!

AND I DO MATTER IN THIS WORLD!

I spent an entire childhood and most of my adulthood feeling completely the opposite of those statements. When I finally got right with myself and God and found true recovery from my toxic past, I began to find myself in the line of fire from so many who felt the opposite of those positive statements when they thought of me. And the more I listen to them, the more I find myself thinking about checking out like my parents did. Yet, I press on. I fight to live. And choose to end this by saying to this individual…

I love you and forgive you for your judgments of me. While you may not choose to see the beauty of my soul and all that I do every day to contribute to the love of this world, rather than take from it like I used to, all that matters is that God sees it. I just need to keep reminding myself of that…especially when the world around tries to tell me otherwise…

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

Sometimes I really think that the darkness of this world, or maybe even beyond this world, is always trying to find ways to snuff the light out in any way it can from those doing their best to bring light to others. I feel like I experienced this firsthand during one of my 12 Step presentations recently at a residential housing program for recovering alcoholics and addicts where my only purpose was to bring light to those there.

Whenever I do a 12 Step recovery lead, it’s typically for an hour, where I begin with my journey talking about the dysfunctional childhood I had with addicted parents. I next move on to discussing how I fell into addiction with alcohol and drugs. I move on from there talking about the many addictions I fell into after I found sobriety from them. And finally, I conclude by sharing the life of recovery I’ve been doing my best to live over the past decade. I was close to the end of one of these leads recently at one of the addiction programs I volunteer at here in Toledo, Ohio, when suddenly a voice cried out in the room in front of me this…

“I don’t like you man! You’re full of ego and arrogance. I don’t like you one bit! I think you’re full of sh$$!!!”

I’ve probably shared my personal testimony of addiction to recovery easily over 1000 times now and never once have had any outburst like that…ever. Truly, I was shocked, taken aback, and really didn’t know what to say.

Whenever I do 12 Step leads nowadays, it’s never about ego or arrogance. In fact, it’s the exact opposite, where I level any pride and ego and talk about how much I had to lose to gain my heart back and a more selfless nature. Sharing about the crazy upbringing I had with addiction, getting both molested and bullied along the way, watching both of my parents die by terrible tragedies of their own making, then losing most of the money they left me due to my selfish and addictive nature, I would never classify what I share in my leads as coming from ego or arrogance.

Thankfully, many of the 30-something people who remained after that outburst told me afterwards, they felt nothing of the sort and offered me reassurance of how much it helped them. But, by that point, I was deep in my head. Why? Because, I used to be a very prideful, arrogant, and egotistical individual, who couldn’t walk in a room because I lived with such a fat head, always thinking I was better than most. I tend to think the opposite these days, and find myself more than not, putting myself down, struggling to love myself unconditionally, mostly because I don’t have employment and continue to battle so many health issues.

Nevertheless, after this man’s outburst, I really did question myself, wondering why I was continuing to do this work, because being on the receiving end of something like that frankly sucked. Of course, my ego wanted to engage before that man had fully left the room. But all I said was I’m sorry he felt that way and that my story was truly one coming from humility. While I may battle from time to time with ego thinking I should be better off than I am, if there’s one thing I can say for sure about my 12 Step leads is that it most assuredly is a humbling, pride-leveling, action for me each time I stand in front of a group of strangers, sharing about how much I “f$$ked my life up” due to my seriously addictive nature.

In the end I became thankful for this man’s outburst, because I learned later that much of the PTSD I’ve worked through was the very same PTSD this individual continues to battle, falling into drug addiction to cope. I know that place oh so very well, and pray this man finds healing one day from it all in the 12 Steps and with a Higher Power’s help.

As for all the darkness that’s out there, you can say what you want about me, but truly, I am going to keep doing my 12 Step leads, as I do them from my heart and for God, and I know it’s helping others, even if you find one person to throw shade at me, trying to convince me otherwise…

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson

I learned of a very alarming opioid statistic recently. It is estimated that 1.25 million years of life have been lost to drug overdoses amongst American teens and young adults based upon an average life expectancy of 78.8 years over the last two years.

While COVID itself has sadly taken many lives, the opioid crisis continues to grow exponentially yet remain relatively unseen to the masses. This pandemic has led to social isolation for so many, where addiction and mental illness have grown in the process. Much of the younger generations out there right now don’t know how to ask for help and continue to turn to things like drugs for answers.

In the year ending May of 2019, there were 374 reported overdose deaths in teens between 13 to 19. But in the year ending May of 2021, that number jumped to 1,365. That’s a very disturbing jump because if you do the math, it won’t be long before we begin to see overdose deaths amongst youths regularly being in the 10,000+ range.

While I do care about all the deaths related to COVID, I feel it’s my job to shed light on something that continues to get overlooked, especially since COVID began. I know I’ve written about this before but seeing this latest statistic of 1.25 million years of life lost to something that can be prevented, I’m deeply saddened.

How many family’s lives have been torn apart and shattered due to all these sudden deaths of so many children from opioid overdoses is countless by this point. Many often don’t even know their kids are struggling with an addiction to opioids until it’s too late. Fentanyl-addiction is the biggest culprit now for this and I face this every time I volunteer at a local detox.

No one seems to be talking anymore at these detoxes about alcohol addiction, or addiction to any other substances. It’s all fentanyl now. I’ve worked with enough teenagers to know, and most don’t know how to stop or have the support at home either. So much of the public health drug intervention gets focused on adults, when the reality is this addiction typically begins at adolescence, which by the time adulthood is reached, it’s extremely difficult to break, regardless of education.

I consider myself one of the lucky ones really. With all the mental, emotional, and physical pain I’ve gone through over the years since getting sober from alcohol and drugs, I know for a 100% fact that I would have been a fentanyl addict right now or probably dead from it if I hadn’t found sobriety when I did.

Opioids are the main driver of drug overdose deaths these days and fentanyl, a synthetic-based version, is the biggest source of them. It’s 100 times stronger than morphine and originally developed to treat intense pain from things like cancer but now can be found far too prevalently on the streets everywhere. Whenever I do my addiction-leads now, I ask how early people have been introduced to drugs like this. The age keeps getting younger and younger. The other day, one such person talked about being exposed to it when they were 10!

What COVID has done to this world may take a long time to repair, with kids needing that the most. All this isolation isn’t healthy as it can lead to profound feelings of emptiness and loneliness, which in turn can lead to picking up an addiction to cope. While on a spiritual journey, spending time alone can be beneficial, in general it’s not, especially when kids are coming from broken homes with unhealthy family dynamics, where opioids are often used for coping mechanisms in both kids and adults alike.

Look, I know COVID has led to so many painful deaths, but honestly, at some point it is going to go away, or at least become an annoyance like the flu, but this opioid pandemic isn’t. It continues to grow exponentially and to end it, it means bringing greater connection and love to the children in our world, to drawing closer together, especially during these isolating times.

Choosing to spend most of our lives on our phones, on the Internet, streaming long hours on TV, immersing oneself in games, away from the world in general, is only going to lead to kids turning more and more to things like drugs to cope. I pray that this world will wake up and realize that there are things growing worse the more we only focus on COVID. I hope more people will wake up to this and see it’s time to stop isolating and instead begin connecting a little more with each other again. You never know, you may be helping to save someone’s life from addiction just by loving them a little more…

Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson