Words from a former sponsor

I had a wonderful sponsor in AA a few decades back. Poor fellow has since passed on and I miss him dearly. He was not afraid to “tell it like it is”, and I often happened to be on the receiving end of it. I have since learned to be grateful for him doing this (it sucked at the time though, lemme tell ya).

There was a phase where I would start to do better because of meds, and as soon as I was feeling better I would go off them because of the side-effects. I would immediately get worse again and wind up in the psych ward. When I was talking about with Ed about how much I hated the pills because of how I felt they blunted me, here’s what he said…

YOU think YOU’RE impaired? Because of this damn program I’m a salesman who doesn’t dare lie because it will wreck MY health. You have NO IDEA how HARD that is. And you think YOU’RE impaired? You need to shut up, take your pills, and be grateful you’re not an honest person working in sales. Man, some people think they have problems but they got NO CLUE.

(Ed was wagging this massive finger under my nose and stomping what I swear was a size thirty foot for emphasis as he said this.)

I got better about taking my meds after that. Not perfect, but better. Also discovered that I would adjust to them after a couple of months of not playing games and could cope more readily with the side-effects. (Except for Haldol. Devil drug, that one.)

10-96

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