April 10th, 2024

The weight of wanting sobriety for a friend is heavy. I guess that’s why you’re not meant to pick it up to begin with. Having a great day but you can’t help but feel a little guilty. Trying to enjoy it but in your mind you know that they are hurting.  Guilt you do not deserve to feel. Guilt you shouldn’t feel because you are sober today. You struggle knowing you must put your sobriety first. You can’t help but to keep looking behind you. Because you remember the days early in sobriety when their hand was the one that reached out to you. You remember seeing the light inside them.  The happiness and wisdom in their voice because they’ve been at this for a few months now. They were your inspiration that you could live a life, a good life in sobriety. They slip up and start to stumble. Watching them give in and give up. Pick back up. Waiting patiently for them to walk back into the rooms. The same rooms you now walk into without them. You ask and almost plead with them. Because it was their words that got you to your first AA meeting. It was them who introduce you to people who would go on to change your life. 

Friendship has a different meaning in sobriety. The friends you meet understand you on a level no one else is able to comprehend. Because they’ve been there. They’ve gone through the struggles time and time again. How could you not want to keep a friend sober? Feeling like you failed as a friend because you weren’t there when they needed just one friend. You saw the signs but trusted the words they spoke. You believed the lies they spilled even when something seemed incredibly off. You were blinded by the past imagine of them in sobriety. Wanting to see the light in them that brought you into sobriety. They made it look attractive and powerful. Wanting to just be there for them as they were there for you. All the while you tell yourself you can’t want someone to want this with you. You can’t watch another friend die. You should’ve saw the signs. Your past history has shown them to you before. Miscues and missteps maybe you could’ve just done something, anything before they picked up and stepped out. You know your heart is the right place. But you carry an enormous weight. A weight that is not your place to carry. Your mind is clear and has to remain strong. So you’re there for them when that phone call comes. 

Feelings that now you must remain sober for the both of you. So when they are ready it’s your hand that’s there to guide them back. You’ve got 8 months of sobriety. Hardly have you even gotten your feet wet. But you’re living with this thought that if you could just shake them some hope and light might still be left inside. You can’t control people like puppets. Make them say and do what you feel is right. People are their own people. You can’t make someone stay sober. Just like they can’t make me want sobriety. The guilt of not doing enough to save them from themselves. If maybe I would’ve picked up the phone more. Check in and said hello when the messages were being left on read. You’re torn in half because you don’t want to watch another friend die. You fear the black as you attend another funeral for friend taken from you far to soon. How can you be there for a friend even when what they’re doing is slowly killing them? 

As time goes by you must put your sobriety first. Enjoy the life you live. Pray for them. Pray hard. Every day. Maybe twice a day. Because you remember the days when you had no hope. You had no faith. No guidance. Inside you just felt alone and dark. You remember thinking everything in your life was alright. You were getting by managing everything just fine. Than you remember that night and the days that followed when dying seemed like good option. It was them who went to bat for you. Step up when no one else had a single clue. Wanting to give back a gift that was so freely given to you. Hoping for a chance to give back the same gift that they had given to you.

It was you that first helped me get sober. It’s me that continues to stay sober.

My friend. Thank you.