View Full Version : An Update of My Daughter's Doings :)
Today my 19.5 year old daughter celebrates her one year of complete sobriety!
Some of you may remember me sometimes posting IN THE PAST about the horrendously scary and stress-filled teenage years she had; she was doing heroin and all other manners of substances including alcohol, weed, AND abusing various psychotropic drugs for her bi-polar issues. At one point when she was 16, she ended up ditching school in the beginning of the year and heading out onto the open road hitching her way across the country. I ended up having to fly out to Sacremento, CA (from Detroit) to get her...
At any rate, she kept hitting bottom after bottom and finally, a year ago today, she accepted that she was completely powerless over drugs and alcohol and was then able to start on the road to recovery!
So in the past year she has passed her GED exam, is going to community college and taken Culinary Arts and math classes (she has expressed an interest in being a high school math teacher down the road) and is working part-time.
I am SO, SO PROUD OF HER! Sometimes I am absolutely amazed that we both survived it. One big thing for me is this year I am finally able to turn my cell phone ringer off at night and actually get a full night's sleep! I went through years of middle-of-the-night phone calls and always wondering when the other shoe was going to drop, always fearful of getting a "THE" ultimate horrible call that she was found dead somewhere. I used to live in a permanent state of high anxiety. Thankfully, I am now at much more at peace and my health is much, much better.
Today I am filled with gratitude and so happy to have my daughter back! She is a really neat person and it is great to watch her blossom!
That is awesome!!!!! The first year is always the hardest and if she has made it this far....the rest will fall into place! It will be an amazing ride for her and you as you see her life unravel! I am glad you are able to sleep and not be so anxious.
mtnlaurel
1-31-12, 12:04pm
I am so happy for you! What a blessing.
Thank you for sharing the wonderful news with us.
This is balm to my heart to read. My nephew fits her pre-sobriety description to a T. He is 19, and very actively using. My sis has been trying to get him out of her house, to little success. I pray for the day when I can say the same about him as you have about your daughter.
Congratulations to her! And to you, for hanging in there. So, so hard. Hugs all 'round... Thank you very much for sharing this with us.
Congratulations to you, her, and your family as a whole! And enjoy those extremely well-earned zzz's! :)
loosechickens
1-31-12, 1:46pm
That is just SO great!!!!!!! There is nothing easier on a parent's heart than seeing a child turn their life around, and know that they are doing well and back on track.
Congratulations to your daughter, and to YOU for making it through intact as well.
chanterelle
1-31-12, 1:56pm
wow!
She should not only be very proud of herself, but of her mother who did not give up on her. I wish you both the best of life.
ApatheticNoMore
1-31-12, 2:40pm
That is awesome!!!!! The first year is always the hardest and if she has made it this far....the rest will fall into place!
The year is the big AA/NA/etc. milestone, but sometimes people get so peaked out at having "won the big prize" (the AA year), with no equally "big prizes" in sight, they they crash and burn after. As if sobriety was really all about external reward and not something one ultimately does for oneself. Yea, I've got some real issues with AA reward systems.
Ok, too much of a downer on stuff that probably doesn't apply to you. It applies only to a very specific psychology: pushing oneself for the AA tokens (the yearly one being the best, even a cake), and then giving up when the world doesn't provide enough external reward for it. "Oh what's the point, f it all, world not paying off, where's my pony? I'm depressed and the rewards of the sober world aren't worth it and the tokens aren't even coming anymore, why the sky didn't even split open nor the seas part for my year - just a lousy cake, nothing in sober life seems worthwhile, I'm gonna use ....."
Congrats, SiouzQ to you and to your daughter. She sounds like she has found some goals that interest her and that's a plus. I do remember your prior posts and how painful things were, how confusing, how difficult to know the best ways to approach the situation. I am glad to hear that you turn your cell phone off at night.
jennipurrr
1-31-12, 5:20pm
That is wonderful to read! I remember your previous posts and am so happy for you and your daughter.
What a warm story. So delightful hearing about this. Extending a special wish you and your daughters way for continued happiness and success.
A friend has celebrated his 13th or so year of sobriety. He is now a sponsor. Whatever works is great.
Another friend had a daughter abusing alcohol and unknown other substances. When she got her 2nd dui and went into a diversion program with house arrest/ankle monitoring for 6 months, it helped turn her around. So far so good.
Bastelmutti
1-31-12, 7:03pm
Congratulations!
Blackdog Lin
1-31-12, 8:43pm
I am also so happy for you Sioux-Q, and wish you many more days of normalcy and happiness with your daughter's sobriety.
I posted along with you in earlier years (as Hens4th), in our earlier incarnation of this forum. I've been there, done that. DH and I said for several years that it would probably take prison to get DS on the straight-and-narrow, and it did (it was minimum security, shades of a summer-camp sort of prison, but still.....it WAS prison, not just jail-time). But it worked. He's been clean for 5 years now. And doing very well, in an alternate-lifestyle cash-only kind of way.Not what I'd dreamed/planned for him, but life happens. I love the s.... out of him. He's a remarkable young man.
I look forward for you to when you can read the local newspaper and not dread the police reports (it took me at least 2 years to be able to look at the local police reports without worrying - we'd just been through too many pseudo-recoveries).
We'll never as a family completely get over those years. DS and DH are still estranged; DS and I are still okay, though I don't see him as much as I would like to. It makes it difficult.
But we overcome this family sh.., don't we? We celebrate how far we've come, with what we have, as far as we can.
You go girl. I am truly happy with your daughter's recovery. Sending prayers and wishes for her continued "cleanliness". And prayers and wishes for your recovery too. I'm talking YOU getting over the years of fear, and unhappiness, and being scared, and trying to figure out how to pay for all the stuff that has come down the pike.
Been there.....
Thanking for posting such uplifting news...congrats to all of you...
Thank you everyone, for your comments and well-wishes! Me, my mom, her other grandma, and her sponsor took her out tonight for her "birthday" celebration and she could not stop smiling! What a difference a year makes! She looks well-scrubbed, healthy, and vibrant. She is incredibly smart too, well-mannered and well-spoken. Hard to believe it's the same kid!
Miracles are all around us.
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