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Self-Sabotage in Recovery

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 One of the biggest dangers in both active addiction and recovery is self-sabotage. A lot of us think relapse happens only when life gets bad. But the truth is, for many addicts, relapse can also happen when life starts getting good. Why? Because our brains became conditioned to chaos, pain, destruction, and survival mode. In active addiction, we trained ourselves—over and over again—to live in dysfunction. We got used to crisis. We got used to shame. We got used to tearing things down before life could tear them down for us. That is why self-sabotage is so common in recovery. When things finally begin to improve—when relationships heal, when peace shows up, when hope returns, when bills are getting paid, when we begin feeling proud of ourselves—that unfamiliar peace can actually feel threatening. To a brain that spent years wired for destruction, stability can feel uncomfortable. Safety can feel suspicious. Joy can feel foreign. That old addict...
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Self Care is Recovery

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 Damn… I forgot to check in with myself today. I’ve been sleeping for what feels like the last 24 hours, and honestly, that says a lot. I’ve got a bad habit sometimes of letting life pile up on me without stopping to take care of me. Yesterday, I drove over 160 miles round trip when I was already exhausted to begin with. I pushed through it, came home, crashed hard, and woke up feeling physically sick — nauseous, drained, and completely run down. And the truth is… none of that happened by accident. It happened because I didn’t make time for self-care. That’s something I need to be real about, not just for myself, but for all of us in recovery. Self-care is not optional in recovery — it is essential. It is integral. It is foundational. Without it, we set ourselves up to break down mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and physically. And when we’re broken down, that’s when our disease starts whispering lies to us. Recovery is about working on self. It’s ...
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Pardon My French Today

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 I apologize in advance for the cussing in this message, but sometimes in recovery, there’s just no better way to say it than this: the fuck-its are real. In early recovery — and especially in rehab — I dealt with that a lot. Truth is, for most of my life, I lived by “fuck it.” I didn’t care much about what I said, what I did, who I hurt, or what I was throwing away. That same mindset is exactly why I left so many rehabs. I’d get a little uncomfortable, a little challenged, a little too honest with myself… and then I’d say fuck it and walk out. And I know I’m not the only one. Matter of fact, I’d bet just about every one of us reading this has had a case of the fuck-its at some point. That voice that says, “This is too hard.” “I’m tired.” “What’s the point?” “One time won’t matter.” That voice has taken a lot of us out before. Now yes, it can absolutely be a character defect that needs work. But I also believe something else: what used to be a...
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Your Scars Can Be Someone Else's Survival Guide

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 Relapse is probably one of the scariest things that still bothers me daily in recovery. It’s not that I’m constantly thinking about using — it’s the fear of going back to that life of active addiction. I fear it enough that I don’t make bold promises about never using again, because for me, that almost feels like tempting fate. Historically, relapse has been part of my recovery story. I have relapsed ten times in the thirteen years I was seeking recovery, and every one of them ended in rehab or some kind of treatment center. That means I got very experienced at lying to myself. And trust me when I say this — I can lie to myself so well that I can justify destroying everything, even going back to prison, just to get what I need to get high. That’s why I believe it’s actually healthy to be weary of relapse. Not to live in fear, but to stay grounded. To respect relapse enough to remain humble. Addiction is patient, cunning, and ruthless. The moment we s...
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Never Make Promises You Know You're Going to Break

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 Sometimes I like to share parts of my story. I do it sparingly because I never want this platform to become all about me. But I do believe that sharing our experience, strength, and hope can help someone else who may still be struggling. I spent a long time incarcerated. My longest stretch was from 1999 until 2012. When I first got locked up in 1999, my girlfriend at the time was pregnant. By the time my daughter was born, I was already in prison. I had no contact with her and knew very little about her. The only way I got to “watch” her grow up was from a distance, mostly through social media. I kept my distance out of respect for her mother. When my daughter was around 21 years old, I met her for the first time. The problem was… I was still in active addiction. I made all kinds of promises. I told her I would be there for her. I told her I wouldn’t go back to prison. I told her I would finally be the father she never had. And within a month of maki...
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Using Dreams and What They Really Mean

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 Had another one last night. Yep… a using dream. I hate those things. Especially when everything seems to be going well in recovery. It can leave me feeling like I just got done using. Sometimes it feels so real I can almost feel it, taste it, and carry that heaviness with me after I wake up. If we’re being honest, it can be scary because it feels so suggestive that it could push us toward relapse if we let it mess with our heads. But here’s what I’ve learned. Using dreams are actually very common in recovery. Research has shown that drinking and drug-use dreams happen often, especially in early recovery, and they usually decrease over time as the brain and body continue adjusting to abstinence. One national study found they’re a known part of recovery and tend to fade as time goes on. Dr. Nicole Labor—an addiction medicine physician who is also in long-term recovery herself—teaches that addiction is deeply rooted in brain chemistry and the brain has ...
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Surrender is About Strength, not Defeat

Brothers and Sisters in Recovery 🙏 Good morning, family. It took me a long time to truly understand what it means to surrender. For a long time, I thought surrender meant weakness. I thought it meant I was giving up, waving the white flag, or tossing in the towel. But recovery has taught me that surrender is something completely different. Surrender is not quitting. Surrender is not defeat. Surrender is not giving up on yourself. Surrender is the moment we stop fighting the truth. It’s when we stop trying to control the uncontrollable. It’s when we stop denying what addiction has done to our lives. It’s when we stop telling ourselves we can handle it alone, fix it alone, or somehow outthink it. The more I fought my addiction, the worse it got. The more I denied it, the stronger it became. Addiction feeds on pride. It feeds on denial. It feeds on isolation. It feeds on the lie that we don’t need help. But surrender is where freedom begins. Surrender means I finally accept the truth: I ...
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