Day 617
I got into my acting-out troubles because of one thing: Me.
There may have been something over there, or a biochemical interaction over here, that may have made a difference at some point, but I fought the fight long enough that I had many chances to overcome; I just didn't fight the good fight. I did not know how.
Was there a moment, a single decision, that turned me from a normal red-blooded, hormone-fueled, American male into a sex addict? I've already spent too much time on this question, and I still want to know. I would love to find data that lets me blame someone else or even the devil himself for what I became, and for what I did. But our lives are too complicated to be able to answer this with certainty. In the meantime, through therapy and meetings, I've learned far more than I knew I needed to know. I also am experiencing the paradox that informs me that the more I learn, the less I know.
I hate surrender!
We are taught by all things holy to not be on the side that gives up or gives in. We make fun of the warriors who choose to live instead of to die in battle. We pity the boxer who stays down on one knee so he can go home to his family, instead of defiantly getting back up for another brain pounding punch. Then we come into a meeting and are told how important it is to admit we are defeated, that we are powerless against our addict. What a shock that we resist so much of the Steps! And we do that even in the face of knowing that hundreds of thousands of people, perhaps millions, profess that these tried-and-true methods have saved their lives.
Parts of my program seem silly — elements I don't like, steps I don't understand. But after more than two years attending meetings, and more than a year of working my own program, there are far fewer holes in my understandings than there were before.
I still hate surrender. I hate my addict even more.
–JR
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