I decided to write this post in the living room today, so as to be with the Gremlins Three instead of squirrelling away in the (generally) child-free office. After all, I'm a woman with a family, right? Surely I can get a blog post done surrounded by my beautiful children, right?
I don't know what I was thinking. It's been 15 minutes and I've managed to write one lousy paragraph. One. I've broken up two fights, comforted a sobbing child, managed to get a dog to stop barking with excitement as Spawnling taunted her with a very loud squeaky toy, and threatened to take the highly anticipated chocolate store trip away if everyone didn't give mommy some freaking quiet time to write her gosh darn blog post (Yes, I managed not to swear. It took more effort than I could possibly convey in writing).
The threat is working -- for now. I'll write quickly. Please excuse any grammatical errors or accidental cursing that may happen during the making of this post.
Wait a minute. My husband just came in and started talking my ear off. Does he not understand the mental zen I need to achieve to write such masterpieces? He so owes me coffee.
There. I just read him the first three paragraphs and he took the hint. Smart man. Onward, shall we?
Today marks my nineteenth year of sobriety. No drugs or alcohol for nearly two decades. It's unbelievable, really, that someone as infatuated with escape could go this long without. And yet, here I am. Thank goodness for sugar and caffeine to get me through the rough patches.
... Hey, nobody said I was perfect. Near perfect, maybe, but not perfect.
Nineteen years ago, I was a fourteen-year-old addict who drank every day, got high whenever she could manage to score, was terribly depressed, cut herself to release the pain, had pushed away any friends I had left, had been expelled from school, and wanted to die more than anything in the world. I was a lost soul with no future in sight.
By all accounts, I shouldn't be here today. By all accounts, I should be dead.
It took some persistent parents, six months in rehab, countless self-help meetings, lots of therapy, and a willingness to change that I had no idea I even possessed, but here I am, at 33, alive and sane enough to tell the tale.
"We have a good life," Geekster said to me this morning as we sat outside and had our morning coffee. The littlest gremlins were running around with their new water guns, the sun shining down on their bare shoulders. Their laughs infectious, I smiled wide.
We really do have a good life. Nineteen years later, I have a fantastic husband, three great kids, a home I love, the most incredible friends, and I fall asleep every night feeling grateful for all of it. Even the ugly, frustrating days. Even the overwhelmingly sad days. I'm just grateful that I'm here to experience it, and that I have more than I imagined I would. When you figure you'll be dead before you hit twenty years of age, anything and everything feels like a miracle.
On Friday, Intrepid accepted an honour roll award and made his mama very proud. When I looked at him up there accepting his certificate, I thought of what I was like at thirteen, in grade 7. I was in a completely different place; a darker place. And yet, wonders of wonders, I managed to have a son who is racing into his teen years with a smile on his face and a good head on his shoulders. It's amazing.
Intrepid says it's because he sapped me of my awesome stores while in the womb. He's probably right. It's a good thing they replenish so quickly. I'm an evolved form of awesome, you see.
Thus concludes my sappy moment in the Blogosphere. Thank you for indulging me. It's just that, sometimes, I can't believe I'm here, in this place, so damn happy most of the time. It's cause for making people puke a little in their mouths, it is. Breath mint?
My family members did stop interrupting me for a few minutes. We're still go for the chocolate store trip.
Thank god. I think that would have hurt me more than them.