For the first time in more than a year and a half I ventured into a NA meeting last night. What a strong impression that circle of chairs still leaves on me. I get filled with a nervous energy, tense with the question of whether or not I'll speak. "Hi, I'm an addict named..." I looked around at the faces and wondered who had used that day, even right before they came in to the meeting. Who had fallen off the wagon. It's a welcoming group if you ever attend the meeting. People who the outside world wrongly consider to be the scum of the earth tend to be very welcoming to others, especially those who have also been ostracized.
I've never been quite comfortable there myself though. Funny how in a place like that I could still feel out of place, but I do. The people there are in a life and death struggle for their lives with their addictions. I am not. I struggle with the disorders that in turn cause the addictions, but drugs themselves would never be my end. I tried for a long time to lie myself into believing I was an addict; that's what I was supposed to do. If I said I wasn't, well obviously I was just in denial...but no, that's just not how it was. It's not how it is, and I can never feel part of a group with which I share so little in common. I don't need their twelves steps, not to get by each day.
It was an interesting experience after going so long without a meeting. It definitely threw me for a bit of a loop in my mind, but I'm pulling it together now. If nothing else, I learned that I don't need that kind of thing in my life.
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